Walking in the shoes of others: Critical reflection in community sport management and physical activity

The term community sport management means different things to different people. Traditionally, to 'manage' community sport was to ensure the effective control of an organisation through a range of hierarchical systems, which would extend to the users of facilities, events and initiatives. However, in recent years this model has come under intense criticism for its failure to deliver meaningful outcomes for marginalised communities, spawning a range of alternatives that place greater emphasis on aspects of relationship-building, community empowerment and political change. In this chapter, we advocate a critical approach to community sport management that encourages students and practitioners to exercise their sociological imaginations, and to actively question the relationship between sport and society. In so doing, we shall deconstruct taken-for-granted assumptions about 'community', 'sport' and 'management', whilst assessing the use-value of this philosophy in tackling contemporary social problems such as discrimination, ill-health, crime and poverty, from the 'bottom up'. Each argument is animated via a series of case studies - often drawn from the author’s own experience, such as Football Unites, Racism Divides, and Positive Futures, that explore the benefits and challenges associated with this approach in practical, real-world contexts. As such, this chapter will not be intended to provide the reader with another set of managerial procedures, but rather a tool-kit of ideas that can be used, where necessary, to accomplish specific strategies of action.