Professional Processes
A Mile Wide but an Inch Deep: Pervasive Racism in International Football, Symbolic Compliance, and a Substantive Path Forward View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Shauhin Talesh
Despite football (also known as “soccer”) being the most popular and diverse game in the world, racism and discrimination pervade the sport. Racism and discrimination continue notwithstanding widespread recognition of the problem and continuous reforms and regulations implemented by international and regional bodies. To our understanding, this is the first study to systematically analyze the regulatory failures surrounding racism in football and explain why organizational efforts to respond have failed. While other studies have examined the long history of racism in football, documented how actors have diffused responsibility, and categorized anti-discrimination efforts into reactive and proactive categories, this research draws upon new institutional organizational theory to understand how, but also why, football organizations—at the international, regional, and club levels—have been ineffective at curbing racism. This paper explains why racism has persisted in football, why previous anti-discrimination efforts by European football governing organizations at every level have fallen short, and what can be done to curb this problem in the future. We offer a series of interconnected proposals that will likely move the sport closer to substantive compliance and transform anti-racism efforts from futile gestures to impactful initiatives. By identifying the organizational predicates that have allowed racism to reproduce in football, this study is critical for understanding the larger question of why so many industries—healthcare, education, banking, government, and financial institutions—fail to sufficiently address racism in the workplace. This paper, therefore, has implications for those interested in employment law, regulation, organizations, sports, and compliance.
The Impact of Sporting Culture and Identity throughout Art History View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Ella Moroney, Jae Won Kang, Kristen Beck
Sporting culture and identity has influenced the creation of art throughout history, carving out a unique aesthetic that combines the brutality of athletic competition with the marvel of human achievement. The representation of sporting culture through artwork provides deep sociological meaning and context to its respective time period and serves as a physical reminder of the integral role that sport has played in the shaping of society. An exposition of sport focused artworks ranging from prehistoric cave paintings to modern videography reveals connections between sporting culture and community identity and illuminates the undeniable vitality of sport as an art form.
“Ambient Christianity”: The Continuity of Religious Presence in a Vancouver-based Evangelical Christian Soccer Team View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Nicholas William Howe Bukowski
The paper addresses the following question: what is the religious nature of a Christian-founded yet now-secularised soccer team in Vancouver, Canada? The paper looks to understand the continuity of religious presence for a team founded as a Christian team that has become secularised to understand the remaining presence of the initial motivations of the team’s foundation. This is based on research from my dissertation fieldwork in Vancouver working with Christian soccer teams including Regent College FC. The team was founded by members of the theological college, Regent, as a self-described Christian team and desired to play with a Christian ethic. Over 20 years the team has lost most ties to Regent except the coach, Ben, who teaches part-time at the college. Ben still yearned for a Christian atmosphere, described by him as “ambient Christianity”, to pervade the team to continue the religious motivations of the team and motivate his coaching style. The paper looks to address whether the Christian foundation remains an animating presence for the collective team. Additionally, Regent College FC mirrors the early history of English soccer where many early teams (Aston Villa, Tottenham etc) were founded by churches and then secularised. Through Regent College FC we can understand the presence of a religious trace and history tied to a broader trend in global soccer. Resulting in the question: does Regent College FC retain a religious trace that mirrors a trace that can be found in other, now secularised and professionalised, clubs such as Aston Villa and Tottenham?
Featured Olympic Legacy from Cancelled Olympic Bids and a Non-Host City: Indigenous Inclusion Through Sport Events View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Dilara Valiyeva
Olympic legacy research has traditionally emphasized the outcomes of hosted events, often neglecting the broader and more nuanced impacts of cancelled or unsuccessful bids. Inclusion—particularly of Indigenous Peoples—remains underexplored in the planning of sport mega events, despite its growing prominence in sustainable development and sport governance discourse. This study addresses this gap by examining the intersection of three largely disconnected research streams: Olympic cancelled bids, legacy, and social innovation. Focusing on the cancelled bids for the 2014 and 2018 Winter Olympic Games in Tromsø, Norway, this research explores how legacy ideas of social inclusion of Indigenous Sámi population were conceived, perceived, and (re)interpreted and thereby highlights how unmaterialized social legacies can be translated into long-term value. We explore how inclusion-related ideas —particularly those related to Indigenous inclusion—evolve within bid committees and the planning of Olympic legacies and certain concepts shift between active and dormant states within organizational contexts. Findings indicate that several legacy ideas involving Sámi inclusion were developed during the bid process, including cultural representation, co-governance mechanisms, and institutional visibility. While some of these ideas entered a dormant state after the bid was cancelled, they continue to hold potential for reactivation. Sámi stakeholders perceive certain legacies as valuable but unfulfilled and highlight both political will and institutional commitment as necessary conditions for realizing these latent innovations. A focused examination of the role of Indigenous Peoples is a necessary contribution to the sport management field which integrates critical social perspectives into a domain often dominated by economic and promotional narratives.
