Prof. Ankan Banerjee
Member of Faculty, Academic Coordinator
Naval Tata Centre of Excellence in Sports Management
Indian Institute of Social Welfare and Business Management (IISWBM)
The objective of this article is to explore the role of State in developing sports in a country. State has an important role in building sports infrastructure, designing athletic development programmes, regulating the administration of sports etc. By expanding the reach of sports and by enhancing the participation opportunities, State also plays an instrumental role in producing elite athletes. The Public Sector of sports helps the other two sectors, namely non-profit and private sectors of sports, to grow by providing financial and institutional support. Thus, it is necessary to discuss the role of State in developing the sports ecosystem of a country.
State, in brief, can be defined as the structure that governs the society. In Ancient Greece, various sporting festivals, which were known as the Panhellenic Games, were organized by the State in order to unite the ‘City States’ or ‘Polis’. Thus, the state tries to achieve various objectives through the promotion of sports. The Public sector of sports that includes National, State and local governments and governmental organizations, has various responsibilities, including and not limiting to the making of sports policies, providing financial and institutional support to other sectors of sports, building infrastructure, supporting athlete development programme etc.
Now, there may be a question that is it really required for the state to promote sports. What are the benefits that may be derived from sports, both at grassroots and at the elite level? The state always intervenes into the activities of the society in order to increase social welfare which provides a direction to the nation’s economic development. For example, by building railway and road infrastructures, the state can improve the system of transportation which accelerates the growth of industries. By setting up schools and colleges, the state can improve the system of education which can make the residents of the society employable and productive. The establishment of hospitals can enhance life expectancy of the people. Therefore, the role of state in improving the well-being of the society is crucial. Sport is not an exception. State intervenes in sports primarily to fulfil the following objectives:
i.
To develop a healthy and fit nation through the
provision of sporting opportunities.
ii.
To produce elite athletes for gaining national
pride and prestige at the international level.
At the
elite level, social benefits can be derived in the form of social cohesion,
national pride and prestige, international recognition, economic development,
sports tourism etc. If all these benefits are added, the social benefits
derived from sports are quite extensive and thus it justifies the role of State in improving the social well-being through sports.
Finally, it
can also be argued that the state should extend its support to sports on equity
ground. For example, it may be argued that the entire community is benefitted
by participating in sports and therefore, no one can be excluded due to lack of
availability of facilities or low income. In these cases, benefits can only be
provided to the entire community if every individual has the access to
appropriate sports and recreational activities which can help them in improving
their health and fitness. In order to ensure equity in sports, the state should
set up low-cost and easily accessible sports facilities, subsidize existing
sports services and design specialized programmes for the disadvantaged groups.
It is equally important to note that the degree of State intervention may differ as per the ideologies that govern the society. For example, the ‘Reformists’ directly intervenes in sports for the benefits of the people of the society, their focus on the elite sports is relatively less. The ‘Socialists’ focuses both on the community and elite sports, but their sports ecosystem is centrally regulated. A State, at the same time, may combine the features of a number of ideologies to come up with a new approach.
Over the
last two decades, the world has changed significantly due to globalization.
Revolution in telecommunication industry, accompanied by the gradual
integration of economies across the world, has made a radical change in the
pattern of production and consumption in all industries, ranging from oil,
coal, motor vehicles, electronics to tourism, arts and sports. In fact, sport is one sector which is
impacted immensely due to globalization. As a result, the mega sports events,
like the Olympic Games, Soccer World Cup, Cricket World Cup, Grand Slam Tennis
Tournaments enjoy global coverage, while the popularity of the local leagues
and competitions are also increasing day-by-day. Globalization has created a
highly competitive sporting environment at the international stage where
hundreds of nations compete to establish their supremacy in sports. During the
last four decades of International Elite Sports Competitions, a number of
nations have been investing considerable resources for the development of
sports, specially at the elite level. For example, the old Soviet Union (USSR)
and German Democratic Republic (GDR) allocated national resources to sports
during 1970s and 1980s in order to produce elite athletes regularly in
different disciplines. Their success demonstrated that the state- regulated and
managed Olympic Development programmes were effective in producing elite
athletes.
This
approach may not be very fun-oriented, which is an essential feature of sports,
specially at the grassroots, but it is effective in producing athletes of
international repute. This approach does not believe in developing a system where
everyone will receive participation opportunity equally, but to establish a
system where the focus will be on producing champion athletes in priority sports.
France
introduced a model of sports development in 1975 when it designed the Sports
Charter, which put stress on the provision of the state support in establishing
elite training institutes and sports facilities. This Sports Charter was followed by the formation of the National Sports Development Fund in 1979 which expanded the
base of funding to the elite athletes. Canada followed a similar path. In the
mid of 1970s, the country started supporting the national sporting bodies with
an objective of producing and improving the performance of elite athletes at
the international stage.
In my next article, I shall discuss some country specific sports developmental models that focus on community as well as elite sports.
