Federal Government Involvement in Australian Disability Sport, 1981–2015

Abstract

Few historical accounts of Australian sport policy have explicitly profiled the federal government’s involvement in disability sport. In this paper, we draw on the concept of ableism as a lens to address this lacuna. In doing so, we profile the history of the Commonwealth government involvement in disability sport and explore how the policy of ‘mainstreaming’ has emerged through partnerships led by the Australian Paralympic Committee with National Sporting Originations (NSOs) and government. We highlight that whilst these changes have arguably made mainstream NSOs more aware of their legal obligations and have led to positive changes in the provision of opportunities for people with a disability through the development of ‘Paralympic pathways’, there is some evidence of potential caveats of ‘mainstreaming’. Specifically, we point to an emerging body of evidence which suggests that despite these policy measures, people with disabilities still report being marginalized and excluded from ‘mainstream’ sporting programmes. Therefore, we question if less governmental leadership is the right path given the limitations of the present policy framework. Additionally, we highlight how performance-based funding mechanisms such as ‘Winning Edge’ are narrowing who is eligible for funding and thus curtailing finite resources for only the most ‘abled’ of the disabled.     

School-based sports development and the role of NSOs as ‘boundary spanners’: benefits,disbenefits and unintended consequences of the Sporting Schools policy initiative

The focus of this paper is on Sporting Schools, a $100 million policy initiative intended to increase children’s sport participation in Australia. Our account seeks to proffer a critical analysis of this federal policy, and the way it functions as part of the new heterarchical or networked form of sports governance in Australia. Using a network ethnography methodology, we analyse Sporting Schools from the perspective of National Sporting Organisations (NSOs), who have the key responsibility for enacting this policy. Using their perceptions, we reflect on their role as policy ‘boundary spanners’ and outline the complexities they face in creating ‘win-win’ scenarios so that schools, students, government and NSOs themselves all benefit from the Sporting Schools initiative. We argue that NSOs have to balance benefits and disbenefits and face tension between their desire for tight quality control of their school-based sports programmes and the need to have a cost-effective funding model for maximum exposure to schools and students. In conclusion, we reflect on the unintended consequences of enacting the policy in its current form, including issues of teaching and coaching expertise, the potential displacement of the educative value of PE in favour of school sport, and the opening of this public policy space to commercial providers on a for-profit basis.     

The chaos of inclusion? Examining anti-homophobia policy development in New Zealand sport

Sport is inherently homophobic and sport managers have been able to do little to address this. The purpose of this research was to examine the work of the ‘Sport for All’ Steering Group in New Zealand. This group was made up of six National Sport Organisations. Three research questions were addressed: Why were the organisations involved; what were their priorities and how can they be examined conceptually; and what (if any) strategies could help to develop the goals of the group? A conceptual framework was developed in which a combination of social identity theory, critical theory, and post-structuralism were utilised to examine the complexities of the steering group’s work. Six semi-structured interviews were conducted by phone. The following themes were examined: the organisations’ initial responses to the creation of the steering group; the complexities of the work; and the potential to develop inclusion through community. It was found that the organisational respondents used multiple conceptual approaches to inform and justify their work. Suggestions for inclusion development using the organisations’ ideas and enthusiasm alongside the funding framework of Sport New Zealand are offered.     

群众体育政策基层执行的调查与分析

采用文献资料法、问卷调查法、实地调研法,依据史密斯的政策执行过程模型,以江苏省为个案,对群众体育政策本身、政策执行机构、政策目标群体以及政策执行环境等进行分析。归纳群众体育政策基层执行存在的主要问题。提出:改革地方政府绩效评价机制,扩大群众体育政策执行的财政来源;建立激励机制,优化政策执行方式;确立目标群体的利益表达机制,提高其健身意识与组织化程度等。     

Organisational readiness and capacity building strategies of sporting organisations to promote health

This paper explored the readiness of Victorian State Sporting Organisations (SSOs) in Australia to implement health promotion (HP) programs and sought to understand how they implemented capacity building strategies to promote health. Ten SSOs that received funding to develop and implement HP were recruited for the study. Interviews were conducted with key staff from SSOs and focus groups were undertaken with their Boards of Management. Factors analysed were SSO organisational readiness and capacity building strategies to implement change in organisational processes, organisation and resources, and systems and controls. SSOs made a concerted effort to create and support sport and recreation contexts that promote healthy behaviours. A number of SSOs achieved changes in their culture and systems by implementing formalised and systematic programs such as the club development program. The club development program supported the implementation and sustainability of HP throughout the organisational system of the SSO. These changes, however, were dependent upon organisational readiness; particularly climate and capacity, whereby financially “well off” SSOs had the capacity to engage in HP in a significant way. This paper highlights opportunities and challenges for policy makers to fund HP within sporting organisations; especially when the delivery of sport is a more immediate responsibility than HP.     

Managing a confederation of rivals

This case highlights sport development issues within a free market environment where natural rivals compete for scarce resources (i.e., athletes). Set in a fictional environment of sport clubs grappling with the development of a network of clubs and coaches to support the growth of youth sport in the area, the case explores the challenges of two independent levels of policy-making – national and grassroots levels – for increased participation and elite development. At the national level, policy strategies and participation proliferation are best served when organizations work together; however, this becomes a challenge when organizations that implement these policies at the grassroots level compete for scarce resources. The resulting natural rivalries must be properly managed to meet larger objectives for growth. The case encourages students to consider the theoretical and practical issues for sport development at the grassroots and national level.     

The Role of Gukgung in the Success of South Korean Archery

Abstract

South Korean archery has a remarkable history performed on a global stage, with the Olympic women’s archery team having won seven times consecutively. The Korea National Archery Association joined the Fédération Internationale de Tir à l’Arc (FITA) as a result of a national government policy but there are several factors that have made Korean archery successful, including active investments from Korean conglomerates, national sports promotion policy, field-oriented training and a scientific player management system, amongst other influences. Among the valuable factors, the most significant is that traditional Korean archery Gukgung instructors taught several archers in the early stages of their success. There are many similar shooting techniques in archery adopted from traditional techniques, including levelling one’s arms, releasing the string, taking one’s arm back to the rear and aiming according to the wind direction. This approach eventually became a foundation for the success of Korean archery. The Korea National Archery Association is the home of Gukgung, which advances traditional Korean archery. In this context, the Korea National Archery Association – the Mecca of traditional archery – has contributed much to the success of Korean archery.     

Emergent models of sport development and delivery: The case of triathlon in Australia and the US

Sport development is a core concern for all nations as they seek to enhance elite performance and cultivate opportunities for mass participation. In the sport of triathlon, new models for sport development have been shown to exist where third party organisations have a critical role in the delivery of it. Using institutional theory as a framework, the purpose of this study was to explore the emerging models of sport development in triathlon. A case study of triathlon in Australia and in the United States was used. The results illustrated emerging models of sport development in both the US and Australia. Third party organisations as well as local councils have become increasingly involved in the creation and implementation of programmes and activities that would normally be the responsibility of a governing body. As such, the organisational fields and institutional logics in triathlon are rendering governing bodies irrelevant. Governing bodies are grappling with finding relevance and legitimacy in triathlon. Implications for sport management research, practice, and education are discussed.     

Affective response to gambling promotions during televised sport: A qualitative analysis

Gambling promotions extensively punctuate contemporary televised sport broadcasts and concerns have been raised about their potential impacts on vulnerable groups. Research suggests advertising can shape individuals’ emotions, or affect, towards a product/brand and can subsequently influence purchasing decisions. Consequently, understanding how promotion of gambling influences sport viewers is an important although sparsely addressed area of research. This paper presents exploratory research on affective responses towards gambling promotions displayed during televised sport. Eight online focus groups were conducted with a sample of regular sports viewers in Queensland, Australia. Participants were exposed to a variety of gambling promotions used in National Rugby League match telecasts. Utilising adaptive theory, themes reflecting affective responses to each promotional technique were identified. A range of positive and negative affective responses were identified including arousal, joy, anger and worry. A conceptual model representing emergent affective response categories, message delivery techniques and moderating variables is proposed to inform a broader future research agenda examining how gambling promotions during televised sport influence affective response and concomitant gambling intention.     

Getting to the heart of the matter: A diary study of swimmers’ appraisals of organisational stressors

Abstract

We explored sport performers’ cognitive appraisals of organisational stressors. The relevant demands and transactional alternatives that athletes experience in relation to the situational properties were identified. Thirteen national standard swimmers completed semi-structured, interval-contingent daily diaries for a 28-day period. A combination of inductive and deductive content analysis was used to organise and analyse the diary entries with a focus on the following areas: organisational stressors, their underlying situational properties, and the swimmers’ transactional alternatives. One hundred and thirty-one of the organisational stressors were appraised as threat, 41 as challenge, and 83 as harm/loss. Support was found for the majority of Lazarus and Folkman's (1984) situational properties with the only exception being temporal uncertainty. Imminence was associated with the greatest number of threat appraisals (47), novelty was associated with the greatest number of challenge appraisals (17), and duration was associated with the greatest number of harm/loss appraisals (22). It is concluded that appraisal plays a pivotal role in sport performers’ experiences of their organisational environment. Swimmers’ transactional alternatives are influenced by the situational properties of the stressors encountered.     

From Budding to Developing: The History of China’s Sport Industry Policy

Abstract

The sport industry is an emerging industry in China. The aims of this paper are to explore the history of China’s sport industry policies and to reveal existing problems and their causes in these policies. In this qualitative research, documentary analysis and in-depth interviews of 15 interviewees were conducted. It is concluded that the history of sport industry polices in China has undergone roughly four stages: budding (1978–1992), exploration (1992–1998), integration (1998–2008), and developing (2008 onwards). The Chinese sport industry policies have experienced numerous problems. First, the policy goals are hollow, unspecific, and undefined. Second, the policies lack pertinence. Third, their value standard deviates from the constraint condition. Fourth, they lack continuity and stability. The complicated reasons for these problems include factors related to the sport management system, the policy value orientation of government, and the interest game between stakeholders throughout the policy process. This paper, therefore, presents suggestions for China’s sport industry policies. First, the sports market should be opened gradually. Second, the government should increase policy support. Third, the government should support and regulate the development of professional sports. Fourth, the government should promote the construction of a national and local sport industry base.     

Education in the Chinese national sport system: experiences of professional wushu athletes

Abstract

Within the Chinese national sport system, the government provides resources and funding to train athletes from a young age to become high-performance competitors. Though athletes are well supported to excel in their sport, during their years of intense physical training, athletes generally receive little to no formal education to prepare them for life outside of sport. The sacrifice of forgoing formal education to compete in elite level sport is not uncommon for athletes within centralized sporting systems and has been widely documented; however, there is little research that focuses on the impact of the team’s educational systems from the perspective of the athletes. To add to the growing body of research in this area, the authors utilized in-depth interviews to examine professional wushu athletes’ education experiences whilst training on their team. Thematic analysis of the findings revealed that athletes who committed themselves to sport training in the Chinese national system had to negotiate a number of factors related to time, motivation, social influences, and resources when it came to education and academia. Findings highlight the ways in which these athletes experience and come to terms with limited academic opportunities, preparation and support from their team and the training environment.     

A post-social conceptual framework for exploring object narratives in sport organisations

In this article we propose a theoretical framework for narrative analysis that gives voice to objects in sport organisations. Despite considerable interest in the symbolic and mnemonic potency of some sporting objects – most notably memorabilia – many organisational objects go unnoticed, whilst little attention has been paid to methods for gathering stories from inanimate objects. We suggest that material objects in sport organisations participate in narrative production and therefore constitute a rich investigative site. We adopt a post-social approach to narrative methodology where objects are recognised as non-human actors in organisational sense-making, not as narrative repositories that ‘contain’ stories and memories. A three-domain research framework is developed recommending an approach to eliciting an object narrative within a sport organisation. First, object materiality exposes the significant networks of forces, materials and people – and therefore episodes and actors – that engage with and through objects. Second, since people and objects are enmeshed in sequenced, workplace activities, object practice allows organisational agents to define what stories objects can tell whilst objects reciprocally bound the scope of human performance. Third, object biography provides a strategy to map the connections and transitions that occur over the lifecourse of an object, which reveals a changing web of organisational relations.     

Ganma theory and third-sector sport-development programmes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander youth: Implications for sports management

Sport-development programmes provide opportunities for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander youth to excel and overcome social inequities. In Australia, all levels of government have identified sport-development programmes in their policy responses as a method to redress inequity amongst this population. Yet, a recent report has shown that national sport organisations have been more reactive in establishing anti-discrimination policy and less proactive in cultivating culturally inclusive programmes and meaningful sporting experiences (Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, 2007). At the same time, neo-liberal approaches to policy in Australia have seen the emphasis on grassroots community sport-development shift to third-sector organisations. However, little research has examined how the third-sector organisations operate with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities and how culturally inclusive the programmes they deliver are for the communities in which they operate. Three case studies with the objectives of analysing organisational approaches to: structure and governance; sport-development philosophies; and cultural inclusiveness of the programmes, are presented here. The case studies were informed by the cultural lens of Ganma, a theory belonging to the Yolngu community of Yirrkala (Marika, Ngurruwutthun, & White, 1992). The case study method included in-depth interviews with programme leaders, reviews of management information systems and programme observation. The findings provided evidence of the importance of culturally inclusive programmes through governance and an informal lived approach to philosophy and culture. The implications for sports management are discussed, including: the benefits of involving Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people at the board level; the need for collaboration between local communities and partners; the explicit need to empower local communities to develop the skills to sustain programmes and outcomes; and the maintenance of mutually beneficial interactions.     

Exploring sport brand development strategies to strengthen consumer involvement with the product – The case of the Australian A-League

The branding of sport leagues represents an emergent area of scholarship. The current research capitalised on an opportunity to explore the strategies sport leagues can implement to develop their brand and consequently better satisfy their consumers. The Psychological Continuum Model (PCM) was used to guide the examination of sport brand development strategies recommended by consumers of a sport league. Mixed method data were collected from football consumers in Australia (N = 230). Seven themes were uncovered through qualitative content analysis representing three brand development strategies – market penetration, market development and product development. The study contributes to sport management literature by (1) identifying strategies that can be used to position sport brands; (2) indicating how these strategies may be used to influence consumers’ brand associations; (3) demonstrating the close brand relationship between leagues and their clubs and (4) enhancing market research sampling knowledge. The study also provides sport managers with strategic brand management directions.     

Canada Hosts the World: An Examination of the First Federal Sport Hosting Policy (1967)

The Canadian federal government has a history of financing the hosting of large-scale international sport events, beginning with the 1930 Hamilton British Empire Games. Since the 1961 Fitness and Amateur Sport Act, the number, cost and impact of hosting these events has grown exponentially in an era of increasing efforts to showcase the nation on an international stage. Hosting events routinely results in a large infusion of government funding: the upshot is intensive bid competitions. Immediately following the act, the federal government furtively worked towards a hosting policy to guide its efforts in that regard. This paper tracks events and government processes influencing the development of a rational and planned approach for selecting those events (and cities) that benefited amateur sport and met other federal goals. A relatively obscure but key sport policy is uncovered and examined: the 1967 federal sport hosting policy.     

Reflections on tie Philosophy of Sport In Australia

With recent controversies surrounding the eligibility of athletes with disorders of sex development (DSD) and hyperandrogenism, as well as continued discussion of the conditions transgender athletes must meet to compete in high-performance sport, a wide array of scholars representing a diverse range of disciplines have weighed in on both the appropriateness of classifying athletes into the female and male categories and the best practices of doing so. In response to cases of high-profile athletes’ sex (and gender) being called into question, the International Olympic Committee, the International Association of Athletics Federations, and the National Collegiate Athletics Association, among others, published or updated policies addressing who is eligible to compete in the women’s sport category and under what conditions. This paper addresses the areas in which philosophical reasoning and ethical analysis can contribute to reopened debates about the surveillance of the women’s category in sport. Emphasis is placed on determining where the onus of responsibility should fall for ensuring the new policies are followed.     

Recruiting and retaining girls in table tennis: Participant and club perspectives

Government and sport stakeholders, in the Australian context, are focused on increasing girls’ participation in sport. Sport organisations, particularly those who receive limited government funding and commercial revenue, experience challenges in recruiting and retaining adolescent girls. In this paper, a case study of table tennis delivery in one Australian state, is presented, with a focus on the issue of girls’ participation. Framed using Green’s (2005) normative theory of sport development, and drawing on physical activity participation literature, micro- and meso-level factors are examined. The focus is placed on girls’ experiences participating in the sport of table tennis and how delivery stakeholders find the process of recruiting and retaining girls in the sport. Interviews and focus groups reveal that a male-dominated culture, resource constraints, and a host of social influences, including peer and parental influences, and the absence of a social norm around girls’ participation, are hampering this sport’s capacity to recruit and retain adolescent females. Organisational commitment at state and national levels are necessary if table tennis is to target the issue of gender balance within its junior participation market.     

Interrogating the Key Policy Factors Behind South Korea’s Archery Success

Abstract

This paper aims to interrogate the key policy factors behind South Korea’s archery success. Based on our review on the history of Korean archery, two additional key elements in terms of organization and administration were also included to form the analytical framework of this research, aside from Green and Houlihan’s four key policy elements. Our analytical framework is thus comprised of two background elements for elite sport development – the organizational structure and administration, and four areas of elite sport policy. According to our analytical framework, this paper highlights four key policy dimensions that have influenced South Korea’s archery success, as follows: (i) establishment of the Korean Archery Association (KAA) and the involvement of business elites; (ii) emergence of potential full-time archers by the identification of, and the support for, young talented athletes; (iii) developments in sport science, coaching, and facilities/equipment; and (iv) the provision of more systematic competition opportunities for elite-level archers. In summary, the success of Korean archers might be closely linked to the result of the KAA’s staunch strategy and policy initiatives encouraged by the government for international sporting success and the way in which the organization has paid more salient attention to the policy commitments as noted above.