‘Community Engagement and Scottish Football’ - Can community owned Scottish professional football clubs deliver outcomes for Community Planning Partnerships? (original) (raw)
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A CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF GOVERNANCE STRUCTURES WITHIN SUPPORTER OWNED FOOTBALL CLUBS
The aim of this study was to critically analyse governance structures within supporter owned football clubs. Mutuality is a longstanding successful model of ownership within European professional football. There was little understanding of mutuality as a form of ownership in British football until it emerged during the past decade, albeit confined to lower leagues. This research utilised a multiple case study methodology to critically analyse the key issues relating to governance structures within supporter owned football clubs. Due to financial mismanagement under private ownership, there has been a recent rise of Supporters’ Trusts taking ownership of their football clubs in the U.K. The key objectives of this research were to identify what mutual business models exist in the organisation of football and examine which governance structures are the most appropriate for mutual football clubs to operate effectively. The study focused on five football clubs adopting varying mutual business models with differing fortunes. The sample encompassed clubs who had matured with the model, clubs who had adopted it out of financial necessity and newly formed clubs which had evolved using the mutual model. This research represented what Weber referred to as ‘ideal types’ by purposively selecting case studies by type, which brought to the surface issues and tensions that improved our understanding of mutual organisations in a specific temporal context (Weber, 1949). The main findings reveal that supporter ownership allowed a greater sense of ‘buy in’ and inclusion of a wider cross-section of stakeholders. However, evidence shows limitations to mutuality in identifying alternative revenue streams, overly bureaucratic decision-making, and ability to developing capabilities to compete. It is the first major study to identify detailed governance processes of supporter owned football clubs and more significantly, has provided an original qualitative critique in the academic field. This thesis makes a number of significant contributions to knowledge. The research has been conducted in a way that allowed an emergent approach to epistemology. It has afforded the researcher the opportunity to produce knowledge that is both practically useful and academically rigorous, and it represents an important contribution to the nonprofit governance literature as well as providing a deeper understanding of sports governance themes in a football context.
2012
The purpose of this study was to outline the need for football community trusts (FCTs) to reduce their reliance on grant funding and to explore opportunities for partnerships with commercial organisations, in particular through sponsorship arrangements, as an appropriate mechanism to do so. The first stage of research involved the quantitative analysis of 76 FCT financial statements to explore revenue sources and mix at FCTs. The second stage involved case study analysis of four FCTs using semi-structured interviews with senior staff and supporting secondary data to explore opportunities for increasing income through sponsorship arrangements. The research found that FCTs are overly reliant on grant funding and that opportunities exist for FCTs to target sponsorship as an area of revenue growth. This paper demonstrates the opportunity for FCTs to generate sponsorship income to diversify revenue streams and ensure their financial sustainability in a competitive operating landscape. Th...
The regulations of football, football clubs and competitions were established in England during the nineteenth century allowing the growth of domestic football in Great Britain. Due to later developments in international tournaments, similar models of governing football spread throughout the world. The historical pedigree and current significance of English teams has stimulated a growing international interest in English football’s most prestigious tournament, the Premier League, largely through mass-media coverage. The global appeal and exposure of elite-level clubs in the UK has resulted in many of these clubs becoming increasingly dependent upon international markets for players, personnel and income through sponsorship and television coverage rights. However, some clubs have resisted these globalising tendencies, focusing instead on community development. In collaboration with a number of sporting bodies, Everton Football Club (F.C.) have sought to remain true to the essence of their identity as a “people’s club”, by devising a number of community-based initiatives. This article examines the partnerships which the club’s community department has devised; principally for the provision of football opportunities for young people in the community. Interviews were conducted with key personnel from Everton’s community coaching staff and the Liverpool Schools Sports Partnership, as well as with young participants working within the initiative. The sport programmes implemented were considered to have helped improve the sports skills of some young people as well as direct the future career paths of some participants, by informing their decisions regarding applications for school, college and university courses. The partnerships developed were also perceived to have supported Everton F.C. in tackling key challenges and negative stereotyping directed towards the club and the surrounding communities. In conclusion, further research is necessary in order to ascertain the long-term impact of the programmes implemented by Everton F.C. and the extent to which these have supported the club’s claims and aims to reflect and represent the whole community of Everton through such provision.
European Sport Management Quarterly, 2018
Research question: Within sport management, there is a lack of empirical research on the reasons why stakeholders mobilise. This article identifies four antecedent factors underpinning the formation of the Our Tottenham community network: a network formed by community groups in Tottenham to challenge, inter-alia, the stadium-led regeneration scheme. Research methods: The research draws on a longitudinal, qualitative case study, involving interviews, participant observation of community meetings, and analysis of documents. Results and Findings: Four factors underpinned the development of the Our Tottenham community network. The erosion of local democracy and the violation of reciprocity are categorised as reactive forces, in which mobilisation occurred as a response to the behaviour of the Council and the football club. Protecting community interests and increasing salience were driven more by the needs of the community and are categorised as proactive forces underpinning mobilisation. Implications: In the context of this case study, we argue that mobilising efforts occurred due to the presence of both reactive and proactive forces. This helped the Our Tottenham network to build a salient stakeholder coalition. The findings also suggest that focal organisations need to recognise how their behaviour can create the antecedent conditions for stakeholder mobilisation and put in place structures that enable community stakeholders to have a voice during stadium-led regeneration.
Background Although the assumption is often made that professional sports clubs bring a raft of material and other benefits to the towns and cities in which they are based, any such benefits are invariably bought at the expense of those communities living closest to stadia. The relationship between these communities and clubs is generally poor. Years of wrangling over planning applications and redevelopment proposals, a lack of consultation, myriad match day problems, racism (institutional and by supporters) and the clubs' commercial activities, have created mistrust and terse relationships. Since the publication of the Taylor Report, football clubs, particularly larger ones, have become even more detached from their local community, with the neighbourhood around the ground now regarded by clubs, in the main, as nothing more than a constraint to development, with neighbours who oppose their plans viewed as a downright nuisance.
The Supporter Ownership Governance Model: Empirical Insights from English Football
British professional football clubs mostly began as mutual, membership clubs, then converted to limited companies, with shares to buy and sell, in the late 20th century. Supporters' trusts, some of them newly formed, became the saviours of last resort for several stricken clubs following the 2002 collapse of ITV Digital. However, the battle to compete financially, against clubs subsidised by wealthy backers, has seen several cede ownership back to private investors. Focusing on Brentford FC who adopted a 'supporter owned' governance model in 2006, this case study provides a thorough insight of the governance issues faced by a supporter owned football club. The main findings revealed that Brentford FC struggled to reduce the club's debt, increase alternative revenue streams and instil democratic decision making in the boardroom. The chapter concludes by evaluating whether supporter ownership could effectively operate within the current governance structure of English football.
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The commercial and political development of association football (soccer) in Europe has transformed the relationship between the sport and its fans. A growing political discourse has argued that football has lost the connection with its (core and traditional) supporters; a connection that should be regained by allowing them a greater say in the governance of the game as legitimate stakeholders. This article reviews the emerging academic literature on the role of supporters. It suggests that the evidence to support a case in favour of increased supporter involvement in football governance is limited. This group of literature is theoretically and conceptually incongruent and fraught with contradictions. Academic attention thus far is broadly divided into two areas with little overlap between the two: analysis of supporter engagement at the macro (government/policy) level with a top-down focus, and sociological 'bottom-up' case studies of supporter engagement and activism at the micro level (individual clubs/supporter groups). The study of supporters has predominantly focused on them as customers/fans and it needs to articulate a new narrative around this 'governance turn' to consider supporters as stakeholders, hence responding to on going policy developments. By doing so, it will be possible to reconcile the existing disparate bodies of work to gain a greater understanding of the new demands from the supporters and, moreover, the literature will be better placed to have an impact and to contribute to better informed policy-making if public authorities decide to continue their existing political agenda in favour of greater supporter involvement in football governance.
Sports equity strategies and local football in England
2009
This study traces the implementation of The English Football Association's Ethics and Sports Equity Strategy (E&SES), which aims to tackle inequalities -including racismin English football, but particularly in the often overlooked local, grass-roots form of the game. Case studies of five County Football Associations were undertaken to assess the implementation of the E&SES, involving 57 semi-structured interviews with local football stakeholders and participant observation at County FA and National FA offices. Following critical realist principles, the structural conditions of local football were outlined using historical documentary evidence, tracing the legacy of amateurist ideas of fairness and apoliticism, and identifying the exclusivity of 'club cultures' at County FAs. The influence of more recent policy developments that have politicised and professionalised the local game were then assessed.
The Social Responsibility of Football Clubs: The 'Shared Value' as a Process of Value Creation?
SSRN Electronic Journal, 2015
In the literature, CSR has been studied as a mean to reconnect sport organizations and society. Nevertheless, little attention has been paid to Porter and Kramer's « shared value ». Therefore, after presenting the management of sport organisations as well as CSR, this article will be drawn on Crane et al.'s six characteristics of CSR and on Porter and Kramer's concept to assess whether professional football clubs in Belgium are developing CSR or not. Then, we will assess, in this qualitative and exploratory research, if the most developed ones regarding CSR are also the most involved in the shared value process. In addition, value creation will be examined regarding supporters. This study, realized in 2012, allows discovering that if CSR is well developed in the observed football clubs, differences exist between them and opportunities to create shared value can still be taken. We will show that the success of one club doesn't depend only of the financial and human resources. A successful RSE process has an impact on the representation that the stakeholders have about the club and on the engagement for the club. Keywords Social responsibilitystakeholders-management sport organizationcommunication-ethics Sport has an important place in our current society, for instance in the European societies. According to the Eurobarometer published by the European Union, 40 % of EU citizens practice sports at least once a week (European Commission, 2010, p. 8). However, sport raised important issues nowadays. The image of sport is tarnished by large misuses; corruption, falsification or political hijacks (Andreff, 2007; Chantelat, 2001; Katz-Bénichou, 2004). The public opinion demands more transparency and the audience threatens not to follow the major sports events anymore (Chantelat, 2001). Sponsors may withdraw themselves as Radobank did following the doping scandal of its cycling team. Therefore, Sports organisations may lose important financial resources. This contributes to jeopardize sport and its institutions (Chantelat, 2001). This is why the implication of sports clubs for CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) is important to keep in my mind.