Using data on wrestlers and tournaments since the early 1970s, we study promotion practices in Sumo, a Japanese traditional sport. We show that, especially since 2010, foreign-born wrestlers trying to attain the second highest rank in Sumo were treated less favorably than Japanese born wrestlers. Similar practices, however, do not apply to foreign-born wrestlers competing for the top rank, probably because of the much higher public scrutiny attracted by promotions to this rank. Together with the 2010 Reform that effectively restricted access to foreign-born wrestlers, existing promotion practices may favor the return of Japanese born players to the top rank of the game.
We use cookies to provide you with an optimal website experience. This includes cookies that are necessary for the operation of the site as well as cookies that are only used for anonymous statistical purposes, for comfort settings or to display personalized content. You can decide for yourself which categories you want to allow. Please note that based on your settings, you may not be able to use all of the site's functions.
Cookie settings
These necessary cookies are required to activate the core functionality of the website. An opt-out from these technologies is not available.
In order to further improve our offer and our website, we collect anonymous data for statistics and analyses. With the help of these cookies we can, for example, determine the number of visitors and the effect of certain pages on our website and optimize our content.