Speakers
Description
Objectives: Throughout the past decades, various studies have empirically focused on social stratification patterns among volunteers in sport clubs. The social composition of boards in sport federations has received less, yet at least some attention. With reference to this state of research, our study (a) empirically analyses board diversity within the German Football Federation by (b) theoretically drawing on the concept of Belonging (Yuval-Davis, 2011).
Methods: Our data set includes information about approximately 400 individuals that were members of the board and the committees defined in the statutes of the German Football Federation in the past two legislative periods.
Findings: Our analysis inter alia shows a misrepresentation of women and immigrants among the board- and committee members, which holds especially true for very representative positions (e.g., for the chairs of the respective committees). This pattern has remained rather stable throughout the two legislation periods.
Discussion: The results will be compared to prior empirical findings. Furthermore, the discussion concentrates on the claim that the composition of boards and committees can be seen as a form of boundary-drawing which is, in turn, closely linked to the ‘politics of Belonging’ as described by Nira Yuval-Davis (and others).
Conclusion: The study leads us to conclude that alternative theoretical approaches can help to add a layer of understanding to the phenomenon of representation in sport organizations, and that the concept of Belonging is particularly suited for multiple analyses within the field of sport sociology.
