Abstract
The use of sport in international development work has seen a very marked increase over the first decade of the 21st century. In 2001 the UN established their Office on Sport for Development and Peace and in August of 2013 they proclaimed the 6th April as the International Day of Sport for Development and Peace. The wide swath of this movement, ranging from transnational donor funded programmes to informal small-scale grassroots activity, presents a considerable challenge to coherent and expansive research in the field. Furthermore, the organic emergence of this field has resulted in considerable variation in language, with different authors adopting different terminology and acronyms with reference to sport for development literature. This review considers two leading voices and texts that sit amid the edited collections dedicated to the evaluation and study of sport for development/sport in development/development through sport/sport for development and peace initiatives - Darnell’s Sport for Development and Peace: A Critical Sociology and Coalter’s Sport for Development: What Game Are We Playing?
Darnell’s foundational text comprises seven chapters, each devoted to exploring and raising critical questions about the political and social impact and reach of Sport for Development and Peace (SDP). Taken in its entirety, his text demonstrates the need and ability of social theories to offer new understandings and insights into the SDP sector. The book includes chapters that introduce and apply various social theories to the study of SDP (Chapter 1), situate SDP in the larger international development industry (Chapter 2), and offer up empirical evidence regarding the experiences of SDP interns/volunteers and stakeholders (Chapters 3 and 4). In his early chapters, Darnell’s findings are fairly straightforward: SDP research would benefit from more reflection on the opportunities and limitations provided by existing theoretical approaches. Furthermore, the need to contextualise SDP within the larger international development sector is emphasized in Chapter 2 and its important historical summary.
With the inclusion of empirical evidence (in Chapters 3 and 4) in a consolidated text on SDP, Darnell makes clear his claim that there is room, and a need, for more theoretically informed analyses and consideration of the realm of SDP. That is to say, he suggests that programme evaluations only scratch the surface when it comes to really understanding the realm of SDP. Darnell supports this assertion by including chapters on the experiences of SDP interns/volunteers, by exploring the political orientations of SDP programming by means of interviews with key stakeholders, through careful consideration of sporting celebrity in the SDP movement and by reflection on SDP and mega-events. These chapters necessarily extend analyses of SDP beyond the intended/target beneficiaries of such programming and provide a more expansive understanding of the people, layers and levels involved in SDP. His text effectively manages to do crucial groundwork and also present an inspired, forward-thinking research agenda. This difficult task is skilfully managed in this book.
For example, Darnell’s chapter on international development and sporting celebrity brings insights from sociological writings on celebrity, philanthropy and social change to bear on a common practice within SDP organisations: using celebrities to help fundraise or to gain (media) attention for their projects. The majority of this chapter deals with an analysis of interviews carried out with SDP fieldworkers on the use of celebrity sportspeople in their projects. However, the other component of this chapter involves an exploration of the work done by a celebrity sportsman, Steve Nash, an NBA player involved in work of this genre through his own organisation, The Steve Nash Foundation, which seeks to help underserved children around the world. While not the exclusive focus on this chapter, Darnell’s analysis of Nash’s philanthropic efforts proves important in so far as it links SDP research with current research themes within sport sociology (for example, media and celebrity) and extends the possibilities of SDP research currently being done by modelling new approaches, topics and theoretical lenses that might be used for the next phase of SDP research.
By way of conclusion, we offer suggestions for addendums to Darnell’s important first efforts to push the boundaries of SDP research. As researchers who have experience of working with girl-centred programming, we have an interest in ensuring that discussions of gender are always included in any account of the SDP field. To that end, an acknowledgment of feminist perspectives on development such as WID (Women in Development) and GAD (Gender and Development) would offer a more complete picture of development history and offer researchers a larger contextual frame from which to assess current SDP interventions enacted in the name of empowerment of girls and women. Equally, and in the same vein, while much effort is devoted to identifying and establishing neoliberal development policy and practices, future studies would benefit from an articulation of how neoliberal policies affect different sub-groups of a society (for example, girls or women) and, in particular, those involved as ‘direct beneficiaries’ of SDP programmes. In other words, how do neoliberal development policies shape the material and imagined realities of SDP beneficiaries? To engage and attempt to answer this type of question requires blending important sociological theories and empirical evidence with programmes in the field. Darnell’s text has shown us this can be done: this, we feel, is Darnell’s most important contribution. By stepping outside the traditional foci of SDP research he inspires others to explore new questions and bring new perspectives to a body of research that largely focuses on questions of monitoring and evaluation and single-issue agendas.
Coalter, in his latest contribution to the sports policy field, presents a strong critique of theory, policy, and practice in international Sport for Development (SfD). His opening chapter (p. 9) outlines his critical reflections on the epidemic of ‘well-meaning ambition’ of academics, researchers and practitioners throughout SfD discourse. He helpfully moves on to substantiate his scepticism through exploring issues related to a core rationale for SfD programmes, including their contribution to personal development (perceived self-efficacy and self-esteem), reduction in the incidence of HIV/AIDS, and means to social capital and social integration. Balancing an extensive use of empirical data from the most researched SfD programmes to-date with a fully integrated assessment of theory, Coalter provides extensive insight into the complexity of SfD both as a theory and as a movement battling to become a stronger political and programmatic player in the global development game. His sober scepticism of SfD programming and intellectual attack on SfD academics whispers a refreshing critique into the dominantly positivist field of sports policy and practice – albeit, perhaps, a hefty pill to swallow for many readers.
Coalter’s third chapter, on ‘Conceptual entrepreneurs, liberation methodologists and research as a dirty word’, brings (p. 38) a weighty critique of the assumptions upon which SfD programming is designed and SfD research is conducted. Commenting upon the current research discourse within SfD, he asserts his frustration about sports evangelists who view research as having a function to affirm belief in the power of SfD and consequently lacking in scientific endeavour and rigor. This is further developed into Coalter’s austere critique of academics in the field that he refers to as ‘liberation methodologists’. His discontent with the approach of ‘decolonising, feminist-orientated, participatory action research’ scholars (Darnell and Hayhurst, 2012: 120) is that their overriding fear of neo-colonialist hegemonic repression makes others attempts to measure and quantify impacts and outcomes illegitimate. He argues that alleged claims to address structural poverty and global power relations through the latest wave of participatory research within SfD are another example of methodological and ideological over-reach on the part of those who share sports evangelists’ grand designs for the potential of SfD.
Coalter’s analysis of SfD research ideology has the potential to become an important catalyst for collaboration between academics and practitioners from outside the realms of sports policy. Similar debates concerning neo-colonialist discourse have been echoed within development studies – for example, by Sumner (2006) – with participatory research methodologies long criticised for their undertones of moralism (Pain, 2004). Coalter’s plea (p. 56) to ‘de-reify’ ‘sport’ and shift attention away from ‘families of programmes to families of mechanisms’ opens the way for SfD theory, policy and practice to be better informed by such research and debates within other development disciplines. Provided Coalter’s dissenting voice within SfD acts as a trigger to provoke further discussion and move beyond debate to programme improvement, this book can but offer a helpful reminder to SfD researchers and practioners alike to take a slice of humble pie and be honestly realistic about the complex causality of programme impact.
Coalter’s central chapter, offering evidence to support his claim that there is no simple and predictable SfD effect, encourages readers to question the centrality of sport in SfD programmes and the status of self-efficacy and self-esteem as social vaccines for development progress. Disappointingly, however, this book notably lacks attention to the issue of gender, particularly with regard to the subject of empowerment of girls and women, and gives little support to local voices in research findings. In a critique of SfD’s inclination to disregard the complex system of social relationships within which any changes in behaviour or social conditions take place, one might expect the issue of gender relations to have received much greater attention in Coalter’s research findings. Nevertheless, the informed scepticism of his book makes an invaluable contribution to the intellectual and practical development of SfD as a movement. Through theorising the limitations of SfD and inviting collaboration with a wider world of development knowledge and research, Coalter offers permission to do so in the politically dominated context of SfD research and evaluation. If you can push through the despondency, this book encourages those engaged in SfD to resist the neoliberal results agenda – which simply conceals unanswered questions – and inspires the pursuit of genuine understanding concerning the complexity and depth of social, economic and cultural problems in our world’s most disadvantaged communities.
These recent works of Darnell and Coalter are invaluable contributions to the rapidly growing interest in sport for development. Both authors make the case for more theoretically informed analyses of programmes, albeit in different ways, and these texts will help to shape future collective – and individual – research agendas. These texts speak to academics and practitioners alike involved in SfD and sports policy. The increasing numbers of keen young students volunteering to work overseas with SfD programmes may also find challenges from these authors, encouraging these students to question underlying assumptions and personal ideologies concerning the power of sport. Coalter’s book is perhaps most relevant to broader debates on international development; however, it is unfortunate that neither text engages with recent discussions about gender empowerment, coverage of which we would like to see expanded.