Speakers
Description
Over the past half-century, critical sport sociologists have demanded better of existing sport governing bodies, yet by and large, these demands have resulted in reforms within the existing structures rather than significant organizational or policy-based change. At NASSS Montreal in 2022, we introduced the possibility of a new supranational organization committed to anti-corruption, athlete and social justice and an emphasis on diversity, equity, and inclusivity in sport – targets that we argue have been missed by many sport governing bodies and federations.
The first phase of our research was designed primarily as a thought experiment with the “if we build it, will they come?” approach at the centre of our inquiry. Our next phase, which will be the basis of this presentation, will explore the first steps of something more tangible. We will begin with historical precedents for building new sport organizations, exploring how the CAS and WADA were developed from within existing global sport governing bodies. We will then show our preliminary results from a survey of a diverse pool of sport governance experts and scholars. We seek to gauge the interest of the broader sport sociology community for, amongst other things, whether or not this new organization should be built; what issues the community sees within existing sport governance; and the possibility of forming working groups to help develop the organization.
As we have stated from the start, we know that if we build it, they might not come, but it is certainly better to try.
