Before the establishment of WCBS in 1992, there was no one organization in charge of all cue sports as demanded by the (IOC). Moreover, cue sports did not comply with the definition of at that time. These two reasons are the main obstacles for the approval of including cue sports into the Olympic Games by IOC,[ despite many attempts that have been made in order for billiards to possibly achieve the Olympic recognition since 1950s.
In 1985, from became the new president of the UMB, the world governing body for carom billiards. In order to achieve Olympic recognition, he contacted the WPBSA, the governing body of professional snooker, to discuss the possibility of forming a governing body for all cue sports (there was no world governing body for pool at that time). Nonetheless his first attempt failed as he could not impress the WPBSA why it would be so important for them to achieve the IOC recognition, and what a possible cooperation with the UMB could do in order to further their goals.
Following the founding of the WPA as the international governing body for pool and their successful organization of the first ever in , Gagnaux again decided to contact the WPBSA. This time he was more successful. In order to fulfill the conditions set by the IOC, the representatives of the governing body of the three main cue sports, namely carom billiards, pool and snooker, convened on August 30, 1990, at a historic meeting in , with the WPBSA as the host. It is the first time representatives of the three divisions gathered around one table. As a result it was decided to form the World Confederation of Billiard Sports (WCBS), an umbrella organization encompassing all billiards sports, and a three-man committee consisting of Mr. Gagnaux for Carom, for Pool and for Snooker was appointed in order to work out the first , to serve as a guideline for this new body. The following 18 months were spent on this work, which was somewhat complicated since the idea was to enable the various disciplines to work closely together, while maintaining their independence. The inaugural General Assembly of the WCBS was held in on January 25, 1992. A board consisting of 9 delegates was elected with three representatives from each founding member: the UMB, the WPA and the new (WSF), formed as a cooperation between the WPBSA and the IBSF. The office of President is passed around on a rotating order, so that all three divisions will take their turn at heading the organisation.
The year 2003 was a stormy one following a domestic dispute within the WCBS. In September 2002 the WPBSA advertised to the IBSF that it was no longer interested in a cooperation with the latter, and WPBSA also automatically withdrew from the WCBS. For whatever reason, the IBSF failed to share this information with the WCBS board, and it was only due to rumors that the WCBS finally got wind of the situation.
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