W hen the International Rugby Board (now World Rugby) voted on the idea of the World Cup in 1985, the result was 10–6 in favour, 16 votes shared equally between the eight nations who alone constituted the body governing the sport around the world. It is not as if rugby was played exclusively in those countries – when that first World Cup was held, nine other nations were invited (to make up 16, with South Africa in isolation) – but they were, literally and metaphorically, the only ones who counted, a setup consistent with that tension between exclusivity and democratisation that has fuelled and distorted rugby throughout.

The IRB began life, inevitably, because of an argument. And, inevitably, it was an argument about the labyrinthine laws. The 1884 Calcutta Cup match on a freezing day in Blackheath had been won by an England goal, but the preceding try was bitterly contested. One of the Scotland players passionately owned up to having knocked the ball backwards with his hands in the buildup. In those days, the Scottish were adamant that knock-ons of any kind were illegal, whether forward or backward, and much of the argument centred on the fact the English were not so sure about the backward bit, a typical point of ambiguity from which, one senses, the simpler code of football did not suffer. There was no advantage in those days, so by the letter of the law play should have stopped, but the English argued that to have done so would mean Scotland benefiting from their own infringement.

The argument raged – on the pitch for nearly half an hour (play eventually resuming with no decision reached, although the kick at goal was allowed to proceed) and then in letters and correspondence to newspapers for more than a year. The Irish referee is said to have left it until that evening to decide one way or the other. In the end, he sided with the English interpretation.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest A simple change of name for the RFU, based at Twickenham, could make a huge difference to its image. Photograph: Steve Bardens/The RFU Collection via Getty Images

Scotland were having none of it. They refused to play the following year’s fixture and in 1886 effectively buddied up with their fellow Celts, who sympathised with any attempt to defy the English overlords (even if, on this occasion, the English surely had a point), to form the International Rugby Football Board. Scotland, Ireland and Wales appointed themselves the guardians of the laws of the game and invited – practically defied – the English to join. Needless to say, they refused. No one played England for a couple of years.

It all feels rather familiar. Even the IRB, though, knew that a championship without England, who had more than three times as many clubs as the others combined, lacked a certain credibility. In 1890, an independent arbitrator decreed that the English should join the IRB and abide by its laws – but with the fairly significant proviso that their numerical superiority be recognised by the incorporation of six English members and two from each of the other three unions.

And so was born an institution, led as it was by the RFU, as brutal and chauvinistic as any in rugby’s brutal, chauvinistic history. The IRB predated its football equivalent, Fifa, by 14 years and, attitudinally, by about 1,400. The French, naturally, wanted to join in the early 20th century but were not allowed because it occurred to the IRB when the matter was raised that only English-speaking nations were. New Zealand, Australia and South Africa wanted to join, but they couldn’t because, well, they were mere colonials and needed to know their place, particularly as they did not seem to know it on the pitch. At one point, British Columbia applied to join, but it didn’t stand a chance because it wasn’t even a country. It was not until 1948 that the three from the south were admitted to the IRB and not until, incredibly, 1978 that the French were. Meanwhile, Fifa (Fédération Internationale de Football Association), whose very name is French, counted among its multilingual membership nearly 150 nations. By 1978, it was already on its 11th World Cup.

At least by the time the French had brought the IRB’s membership up to eight, a more equitable distribution of power had been instituted, so that those 16 votes were shared equally, but rugby remained a sport, even in 1995, administered by a small clique who knew what was in their interests and, just as importantly, what was not. It is a moot point whether they wanted their sport to expand.

The question is, how much has changed? When a status quo has been allowed to develop that institutes the interests of a minority so deeply into a system of governance, expansion beyond that minority – genuine, transformative expansion – faces so many obstacles as to become inherently compromised, even preventively so. The constitution of World Rugby has evolved since then, but gradually, and never once in such a way as to threaten the mandate of what rugby has unashamedly come to refer to as the tier-one nations.

No other sport – and surely not many institutions – has considered it normal, healthy or even anything other than offensive to its membership to formalise any stratification in such terms. There are now 10 tier-one nations, which is progress of sorts from the original eight, Italy and Argentina having joined rugby’s two major annual international tournaments (the Six Nations and the Rugby Championship) in the 21st century.

So was born an institution, led by the RFU, as brutal and chauvinistic as any in rugby’s brutal, chauvinistic history

But if you are of a World Cup standard and not in that club you are in tier two, should there be any doubt about your right to self-respect. There then follows the swathe of tier-three nations, analogous to cricket’s non-Test nations, who are, in rugby terms, works in progress.

It is a profoundly discouraging arrangement, which does nothing to dispel the impression that rugby’s administration remains as much of a clique as it has always been. Likewise, one might add, the name of the governing body that oversees rugby in the country with the biggest image problem of all, England. Everyone understands and (to a greater or lesser extent) respects the fact that the English were the first to play the game and establish a union, but to continue to go by the title of the Rugby Football Union lays the game’s most powerful organisation open to all the accusations of arrogance it spends so much of its time elsewhere trying to undo.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Smaller, less established countries such as Spain and Germany are considered to be outside the elite club. Photograph: Friedemann Vogel/EPA

As a microcosm of rugby’s wider struggle in the 21st century, it is apt. Admirable intentions abound, as do policies, but the old instincts remain deep-rooted and give themselves away time and again, sometimes with details like nomenclature, sometimes with insidious attitudes that belong indeed in another century. With a title like that, the RFU might as well rebrand itself as THE Rugby Football Union, but how easy it would be to change instead to the English Rugby Union. The message that would send out is generous and egalitarian. The same might be said of the Football Association.

The Breakdown: sign up and get our weekly rugby union email.

Football, though, has democratised far more effectively, so that the balance of power is spread more or less evenly across the globe – at international level, anyway – and any airs and graces of an individual member obliviously swept away. The constitution of Fifa is simple: 211 members; 211 votes. This setup undoubtedly has its drawbacks – if airs and graces can be easily missed in so unwieldy an organisation, so too, it seems, can corruption – but the speed with which football has developed in Africa, Asia and North America cannot be wholly put down to the simplicity of the sport itself. World Rugby’s constitution is just not set up for such growth.

Extracted from Unholy Union: When Rugby Collided with the Modern World by Michael Aylwin with Mark Evans, out now, published by Constable