Golf: a beautiful or dangerous game?

Golf is an ancient game, with the modern rules of golf being developed in Scotland in the seventeenth century. Today, the Royal and Ancient (R&A) at St Andrews, Scotland,\ud together with the United States Golf Association (USGA), ‘writes, interprets and maintains the Rules of Golf to guard the traditions and integrity of the game.’ The\ud USGA has jurisdiction for the Rules in the US and Mexico, while the R&A has jurisdiction for the rest of the world.1 It should also be noted that many golf clubs produce their own rules that essentially supplement, or modify, these international rules of golf. Most of these rules are very much procedural, but a number of have also been the subject of litigation after players have been injured on a golf course. This is because the rules of a particular sport are one of the things that needs to examined by a court to establish whether a competitor who has a duty of care to another has been in breach of that duty, and therefore potentially liable in a negligence claim. This paper will therefore examine a number of cases involving litigation that arose because of an injury sustained on a golf course in the common law jurisdictions of Australia,\ud Canada and England. It will involve looking at what the law has determined in relation to situations involving players and spectators, between players in different\ud groups, and players within the same playing group