Electronic sports, more commonly known as "esports", has seens increasing popularity and media coverage since the early 2010s. The interest of the generalist and specialized media for this phenomenon goes hand in hand with the recent recognition of esports by the French public authorities. Indeed, since April 2016, the association France Esports, an entity resulting from the "Digital Republic" bill, is officially supported by the Ministry of Economy and Finance. The association has set itself the task of structuring and promoting esports at the national level by drawing up technical regulations relating to the practice, establishing a membership policy, setting up rules for the organization of championships or the protection of minors. However, since the late 1990s, esports French development is independent of any public authority. How has esports been structured in France over time? What are the supervisory bodies involved in the organization of the French esports area? Thus, this contribution aims to report on the structuring of esports in France and its institutionalization.
First, it is important to note that there is little research on the esports’ institutionalization
(Thiborg, 2009; Salice, 2010), particularly that relating to the French case
2.1
From institutional theory to neo-institutional theory
According to Suchman (1995), institutions can be defined as the rules of the game that shape
and normalize behavior and distinguish what is legitimate from what is illegitimate. The
literature seems to suggest that institutional theory is proving to be a theoretical framework for
understanding the development, protection and resilience of social structures and institutions
(Humphrey, 2010). More specifically, it examines the organizational environment and helps to
understand how individual actors, firms and markets achieve or maintain a certain level of
legitimacy
The major evolution of neo-institutional theory lies in explaining institutional change through the recognition of actors, entrepreneurs and consumers, the ability to change institutions and, subsequently, to initiate a new cycle of stability and continuity (Zietsma & Lawrence, 2010). Thus, the neo-institutionalist grid would put the dialogue and tensions between the agency and the structure into perspective.
2.2 Favor the concept of institutional work over that of institutional
entrepreneurship
Beyond the notion of legitimacy, institutional theory highlights two other concepts. The first
refers to the institutional logic
Nevertheless, recent research
Lawrence, Suddaby and Leca (2011) suggest focusing on the concept of institutional work rather than institutional entrepreneurship. In their work, they define institutional work as a physical or mental effort to affect an institution or set of institutions. In addition to defining the concept of institutional work, Lawrence, Suddaby and Leca (2011) also suggest that it could help solve long-standing problems in institutional research.
The concept of institutional work would make it possible to highlight and analyze the complex relationship between individuals and institutions, in other words, to analyze the relationship between agency and structure. Second, the concept of institutional work emphasizes the need to take into account the recursive and permanent dialectical interaction between the organization and the institution. Third, the concept of institutional work is based on the analysis of actors’ contextual and reflective practices about the institutions around them, and then give more intent to the actors. Thus, it suggests neither determinism nor heroism and remains potentially sensitive, on the one hand, to the oppression of cultural, social and material structures, and, on the other hand, to the potential for the emancipation of the actors of some of these structures.
To conclude, it would appear that the institutional work concept is intended to encourage researchers to take a different view of their research topic and to divert their attention from the ‘organizational field’. This would then make it possible to foster the relationship between the institutions and the actors that populate it by promoting an approach based on an understanding of practice and procedures rather than on results. Implementing institutional work would relocate the agency by diverting attention from the heroic entrepreneur’s dramatic actions to the small worlds of institutional resistance and maintenance, in which institutionalization and institutional changes are promulgated in the daily evolution of individuals and groups. The neo-institutionalist grid and the concept of institutional work seem to favor an understanding of the mechanisms underlying the institutionalization of esports in France. This is why, through two field surveys on the respective scenes of Mortal Kombat X and Hearthstone, we tried to apprehend the institutional crumbling and the dichotomy of the French esports scene to the prism of neo-institutional theory.
Our pluridisciplinarity leads us to describe our method as 'mosaic' (Clark, 2005). Indeed, the
use of different field methods allows us to focus on the commitment of esports actors. Thus,
we propose three methods to approach the esports’ institutionalization, namely (Table 1):
- The ethnography of 33 offline videogames tournaments;
- 10 interviews with French actors with different functions within the French
esports ecosystem;
- A corpus composed of legal and parliamentary documents and press articles on
esports.
First of all, the ethnographic approach consists of immersing oneself in the esports scene
through practice and to understand as well as possible what ‘doing esports' means. This
immersion in two esports scenes (Mortal Kombat X and Herathstone) allowed, on the one hand,
to highlight the tensions and the stakes of the definition of esports for the actors of this
ecosystem. On the other hand, tournaments and teams’ ethnography show the structure at 'two
speeds' of esports in France
This institutional fragmentation seems to have resulted in the impressive rise in number of competitions, tournaments and championships – professionals and amateurs. However, this multiplication seems to obstruct the understanding of competition circuits and their rules, for the media, the authorities, the public and sometimes even for competitors. Then the interviews relate the testimonies of the actors involved in the creation of the association France Esports and the reasons behind the initiative of the Ministry of Finance – which aim is to build a legal framework. Finally, the corpus analysis was divided into two parts. These two parts deal respectively with what was voted by the government in 2016 and how the esports is treated in the newspaper Le Monde. The analysis of the press articles highlights three distinct periods during which the media discourse evolves and testifies to the appeal of the development of video game competitions as a market.
From these three methods, we analyze the results of prisms from our three scientific perspectives – sports science, sociology and marketing. We develop an interdisciplinary vision of issues related to the esports' institutionalization in France, with a view to objectifying the ongoing institutionalization process. Therefore, we believe that this attempt at cross-analysis between methodologies from the sports, marketing and sociological spheres puts into perspective a multidimensional interpretation of the esports’ acknowledgement. Our objective is to analyze the recognition of esports by the French government and to understand the mobilization of stakeholders by developing a 'competitive gaming industry' (France 24, 2017).
In France, the esports’ institutionalization raises a lot of questions as to the nature of this
practice, but also questions relating to its governance. Indeed, the boundaries between
‘traditional sport’ and ‘electronic sports’ are not clearly delimited
Decree n°2017-871 of 9 May 2017 on the organization of video game competitions, supervised by the Ministry of the Interior; Decree n°2017-872 of 9 May 2017 on the status of salaried professional players of competitive video games, supervised by the Labour Ministry.
The latter aims respectively to set financial equilibrium thresholds and ratios that a video game competition must comply with, the procedures for reporting video game competitions to the central races and games department and the conditions for participation by minors in video game competitions. They also define the conditions for obtaining the required accreditation for the employment of professional video game players, the conditions under which a contract may be concluded during the season, and establish detailed rules for determining the start and end dates of video game competition seasons. The legislator then provides a new legal framework which aims, on the one hand, to encourage the organizers of competitions which were previously prohibited by ARJEL, and, on the other hand, to provide a status adapted to the esports’ specificities. Associative teams
Weak
Amateur
Competitions Local, regional or national
Tournaments Kayane session
(Kayane) Born 2 Fight (YUZU Clan) Mad Cup (Mad
Corps) Wanna War (Wannawar)
Stunfest (3 Hit Combo) Armor Break (GameLine) INSALAN (Insa)
GA (Futurolan)
Professional teams
High Professional & Invitational
Competitions International
Tournaments
Private Companies
Game Publishers EVO (Shoryuken) Fatal 8 Exhibition MKX Pro League (Warner)
(ESL) MK Cup (Warner)
ArmaCup (ArmaTeam) GOCS (Gamers
Origin)
Hearthstone
World Championship (Blizzard) Hearthstone Global Games (Blizzard) Media Coverage
Participate at
Type of event
Examples for MKX
Examples for Hearthstone Who organized competitions?
Communities
Associations However, as we see in Table 2, there are two facets of esports practice: (i) associative practice and (ii) professional practice. Two distinct models seem to coexist, whether for organizing events or managing teams. On the one hand, we observe an associative model, where the practice of amateurs is dominant, supported by many communities, associations of local and national players specialized in online esports events. On the other hand, there is an entrepreneurial model, mainly international, much more spectacular and widespread than the first practice model, and which favors the elite of professional players.
From now on, the French government and private actors (two large associations and eight professional founders of France Esports) have set up a normative and legal framework which has imposed a normative way of practicing esports, thus contributing to its institutionalization. The creation of the France Esports association brought together fragments of the French esports scene, while its affiliation with the Ministry of Economy seems to mark a break with the two pre-existing sports models. This collaboration transforms esports by imposing its institutionalization on the political agenda. In one year of existence, the "groupement d’intérêt économique" (i.e economic interest group) has become an "association", open to all esports enthusiasts in France and promotes dialogue between the esports’ actors and the French authorities.
Despite this democratic act of the founding members, questions arise as to the divergent interests between the political sphere, non-profit organizations and professional actors. The public recognition of esports in France can then be seen as the desire to consider esports more as an industry rather than a sport. An interest that converges with that of industrialists outside the esports sphere (Red Bull, McDonald’s, Coca Cola…) or that of the "traditional media" (such as television channels): since it is indeed a young practice of "young man users and spectators are easy to target for who wants to get involved in esports" – said a man representing a banking group at the Esports Summit 2017 in Paris. If the traditional sports model can be adapted to esports practice, the logic of the French actors seems to favor the development of an industry. As a result, certain players and associative actors seem to have been disavowed by the Ministry of Sports, even if today three ministries (economy and finance; internal affairs; and labour) supervise the esports’ institutionalization.
The esports’ institutionalization in France raised a lot of political (organizational model), economic (industry growth) and social (educational and professional training, monitoring of players) issues. This is why the government wishes to establish a legal framework for the players, whereas the actors of the sports scene and its industry rather wish economic support of their activity and their development. For companies outside the sphere of esports, the objective is clearly to (re)conquer young consumers, whereas for esportives, the main challenge is to legitimize a way of living and practicing a common passion in everyday life - a task in which they do not seem to be invested.
While France participates in a worldwide movement of recognition of esports by the public
authorities and thus of "sportivisation"
As we underline in this presentation, the esports’ recognition by the public authorities, wanted by the prime actors of France Esports in 2015 tends to mark the establishment of a market and an industry. The French example of the esports’ recognition does not allow action and consultation on other works than the construction of its market. This overlooks then what concerns the body and health of the players, the learning of the esports profession, or the integration of esports in school and university training. This is what the recognition of esports as a sport allows; for example, in Geneva, at the end of a school day, children will be able to try their hand at esports from September 2018 through extracurricular activities.