The EU’s Engagement with FIFA and UEFA: Principals, Agents, and Supervisors

Abstract

This chapter introduces the PA model, deconstructing the core elements of the model and identifying key actors. Control is exercised in a dyadic setting between two EU actors (the Commission and the CJEU) and two sport actors (FIFA and UEFA). However, in order to fully comprehend the EU’s role, account must be taken of the actors that delegate authority to the supranational EU institutions. This chapter therefore presents a triangular (principal-supervisor-agent) model. This necessitates two analytical steps. First, a classic dyadic model is employed to analyse control between football principals (clubs, players, national federations, and players’ agents) and political principals (public authorities) and the agents, FIFA and UEFA. Second, this model is extended by adding a third actor, ‘supervisors’ (in this case the Commission and the CJEU), which accommodates the actors who serve as both principal (for FIFA and UEFA) and as agent (for the EU member states, the European Parliament, and football principals).