The Development of Sports Medicine.

The development of sports medicine can be understood in terms of a conjuncture involving processes of medicalization and the increasing competitiveness of modern sport. It is also suggested that the growing involvement of sports physicians in the search for championship winning performances has led them not only to develop improved mechanical and psychological techniques, hut also to play an active part in the development of performance enhancing drugs and techniques. The argument is developed via three case studies. The relationship between sports medicine and drug use in some of the former communist countries of Eastern Europe, the early development of anabolic steroids in the United States, and the development of "blood doping". One important implication of this analysis is that, if we wish to understand the processes involved in what is almost certainly an increase in recent years in the illicit use by athletes of performance enhancing drugs, then we need to shift our focus away from what has hitherto been an almost exclusive concentration on the athletes, and examine more closely the networks of relationships in which athletes are involved.