Communication network analysis to advance mapping ‘sport for development and peace’ complexity: Cohesion and leadership

Abstract

Attempts to map the global sport for development and peace field have revealed only some aspects of its complex organisational structure, failing to depict the web of relations in which diverse stakeholders are embedded. Based on the principles of complex systems, this study applies a communication network perspective and the analytical instruments of hyperlink network analysis to advance mapping sport for development and peace complexity and to reveal the significance of the stakeholders’ structure for power relations, cohesion and leadership processes in the sport for development and peace field. The research extends the current mapping by depicting an international network of 520 organisations and 2279 links. The stakeholders differ according to the level of involvement in sport for development and peace practice, the field of main activities, and origins (the global North and South). The density of the network is extremely sparse, which means that less than 1% of all possible ties are realised. Furthermore, it ratifies the leading role of the global North in sport for development and peace efforts. Findings also disclose difficulties in establishing relations between delivery organisations that can be attributed to competitive context and shortage of resources. The study provides clarification of existing power relations and helps to find development strategies and a more inclusive and equitable policy formulation aimed to create equal opportunities for leadership.

Keywords

communication hyperlink mapping social network analysis sport for development and peace

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Bardocz-Bencsik

Doczi

(2019) Mapping sport for development and peace as Bourdieu’s field. Physical Culture and Sport, Studies and Research 81(1): 1–12.

Bastian

Heymann

Jacomy

(2009) Gephi: An open-source software for exploring and manipulating networks. In: International AAAI conference on weblogs and social media, San Jose, CA, 17–20 May. Menlo Park, CA: AAAI Press.

Beutler

(2008) Sport serving development and peace: Achieving the goals of the United Nations through sport. Sport in Society 11(4): 359–369.

Black

(2019) SDP and global development. In: Collison

Darnell

Giulianotti

, et al. (eds) Routledge Handbook of Sport for Development and Peace. London: Routledge, pp. 35–45.

Black

(2010) The ambiguities of development: Implications for ‘development through sport’. Sport in Society 13(1): 121–129.

Burnett

(2017) The Olympic Movement as stakeholder in th UN–IOC parnership: Configurations in Southern Africa. Diagoras: International Academic Journal on Olympic Studies 1: 35–54.

Caldarelli

Catanzaro

(2012) Networks: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Castells

(2010) The Information Age: Economy, Society and Culture: The Rise of the Network Society. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell.

Cilliers

(1998) Complexity and Postmodernism: Understanding Complex Systems. London: Routledge.

10.

Clarke

(2018) Global South: What does it mean and why use the term? In: Global South Political Commentaries. Available at: https://onlineacademiccommunity.uvic.ca/globalsouthpolitics/2018/08/08/global-south-what-does-it-mean-and-why-use-the-term (accessed 17 March 2019).

11.

Coalter

(2007) A Wider Social Role for Sport: Who’s Keeping the Score? London: Routledge.

12.

Cronin

(2011) Comic Relief Review: Mapping the Research on the Impact of Sport and Development Interventions. Manchester: Orla Cronin Research. Available at: https://www.sportanddev.org/sites/default/files/downloads/comic_relief_research_mapping_v12_1.pdf (accessed 17 March 2019).

13.

Darnell

(2013) Sport for Development and Peace: A Critical Sociology. London: Bloomsbury.

14.

Darnell

Black

(2011) Mainstreaming sport into international development studies. Third World Quarterly 32(3): 367–378.

15.

Darnell

Hayhurst

(2012) Hegemony, postcolonialism and sport-for-development: A response to Lindsey and Grattan. International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics 4(1): 111–124.

16.

Darnell

Field

Kidd

(2019) The History and Politics of Sport-for-Development: Activists, Ideologues and Reformers. London: Palgrave Macmillan.

17.

De Maeyer

(2013) Towards a hyperlinked society: A critical review of link studies. New Media & Society 15(5): 737–751.

18.

Dobbels

Voets

Marlier

, et al. (2018) Why network structure and coordination matter: A social network analysis of sport for disadvantaged people. International Review for the Sociology of Sport 53(5): 572–593.

19.

Donnelly

Atkinson

Boyle

, et al. (2011) Sport for Development and Peace: A public sociology perspective. Third World Quarterly 32(3): 589–601.

20.

Freeman

(2004) The Development of Social Network Analysis: A Study in the Sociology of Science. Vancouver: Empirical Press.

21.

Fuchs

(2007) Transnational space and the ‘network society’. Twenty-First Century Society 2(1): 49–78.

22.

Giulianotti

(2011a) Sport, transnational peacemaking, and global civil society: Exploring the reflective discourses of ‘sport, development and peace’ project officials. Journal of Sport and Social Issues 35(1): 50–71.

23.

Giulianotti

(2011b) The sport, development and peace sector: A model of four social policy domains. Journal of Social Policy 40(4): 757–776.

24.

Giulianotti

(2019) The SDP sector. In: Collison

Darnell

Giulianotti

, et al. (eds) Routledge Handbook of Sport for Development and Peace. London: Routledge, pp. 24–34.

25.

Giulianotti

Coalter

Collison

, et al. (2019) Rethinking Sportland: A new research agenda for the sport for development and peace sector. Journal of Sport and Social Issues 43(6): 411–437.

26.

Giulianotti

Hognestad

Spaaij

(2016) Sport for development and peace: Power, politics, and patronage. Journal of Global Sport Management 1(3–4): 129–141.

27.

Hambrick

Svensson

Kang

(2019) Using social network analysis to investigate interorganizational relationships and capacity building within a sport for development coalition. Sport Management Review 22(5): 708–723.

28.

Hamelink

(2014) Equality and human rights. In: Wilkins

Tufte

Obregon

(eds) The Handbook of Development Communication and Social Change. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 72–91.

29.

Hartmann

Kwauk

(2011) Sport and development: An overview, critique, and reconstruction. Journal of Sport and Social Issues 35(3): 284–305.

30.

Hayhurst

LMC

(2009) The power to shape policy: Charting sport for development and peace policy discourses. International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics 1(2): 203–227.

31.

Hayhurst

LMC

Frisby

(2010) Inevitable tensions: Swiss and Canadian sport for development NGO perspectives on partnerships with high performance sport. European Sport Management Quarterly 10(1): 75–96.

32.

Hayhurst

LMC

Kay

Chawansky

(2016) Introduction. In: Hayhurst

LMC

Kay

Chawansky

(eds) Beyond Sport for Development and Peace: Transnational Perspectives on Theory, Policy and Practice. London: Routledge, pp. 1–11.

33.

Hayhurst

LMC

Wilson

Frisby

(2011) Navigating neoliberal networks: Transnational Internet platforms in sport for development and peace. International Review for the Sociology of Sport 46(3): 315–329.

34.

Henry

Mohan

Yanacopulos

(2004) Networks as transnational agents of development. Third World Quarterly 25(5): 839–855.

35.

Huffman

Hillyer

Malnati

, et al. (2019) SDP and education. In: Collison

Darnell

Giulianotti

, et al. (eds) Routledge Handbook of Sport for Development and Peace. London: Routledge, pp. 330–340.

36.

Jacomy

Girard

Ooghe-Tabanou

, et al. (2016) Hyphe, a curation-oriented approach to web crawling for the social sciences. In: The tenth international AAAI conference on web and social media, Cologne, 17–20 May, pp. 595–598. Palo Alto: AAAI Press.

37.

Keck

Sikkink

(1999) Transnational advocacy networks in international and regional politics. International Social Science Journal 51(159): 89–101.

38.

Kidd

(2008) A new social movement: Sport for development and peace. Sport in Society 11(4): 370–380.

39.

Kontopoulos

(1993) The Logics of Social Structure. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

40.

Krippendorff

(2013) Content Analysis: An Introduction to Its Methodology. Los Angeles: SAGE.

41.

Levermore

(2009) Sport-in-international development: Theoretical frameworks. In: Levermore

Beacom

(eds) Sport and International Development. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 26–54.

42.

Levermore

Beacom

(2009) Sport and development: Mapping the field. In: Levermore

Beacom

(eds) Sport and International Development. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 1–25.

43.

Levermore

Beacom

(2012) Reassessing sport-for-development: Moving beyond ‘mapping the territory’. International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics 4(1): 125–137.

44.

Lindsey

Banda

(2011) Sport and the fight against HIV/AIDS in Zambia: A ‘partnership approach’? International Review for the Sociology of Sport 46(1): 90–107.

45.

Lindsey

Bello Bitugu

(2019) Partnerships in and around SDP. In: Collison

Darnell

Giulianotti

, et al. (eds) Routledge Handbook of Sport for Development and Peace. London: Routledge, pp. 80–90.

46.

Lindsey

Darby

(2019) Sport and the sustainable development goals: Where is the policy coherence? International Review for the Sociology of Sport 54(7): 793–812.

47.

Lindsey

Grattan

(2012) An ‘international movement’? Decentring sport-for-development within Zambian communities. International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics 4(1): 91–110.

48.

Lindsey

Kay

Jeanes

, et al. (2017) Localizing Global Sport for Development. Manchester: Manchester University Press.

49.

Lyras

Welty Peachey

(2011) Integrating sport-for-development theory and praxis. Sport Management Review 14(4): 311–326.

50.

McSweeney

Kikulis

Thibault

, et al. (2019) Maintaining and disrupting global-North hegemony/global-South dependence in a local African sport for development organisation: The role of institutional work. International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics 11(3): 521–537.

51.

Nicholls

Giles

Sethna

(2011) Perpetuating the ‘lack of evidence’ discourse in sport for development: Privileged voices, unheard stories and subjugated knowledge. International Review for the Sociology of Sport 46(3): 249–264.

52.

Park

(2003) Hyperlink network analysis: A new method for the study of social structure on the web. Connections 25(1): 49–61.

53.

Pilny

Shumate

(2012) Hyperlinks as extensions of offline instrumental collective action. Information, Communication & Society 15(2): 260–286.

54.

Richelieu

Webb

(2019) A tale of two networks: Contrasting sport for development and peace actor-networks. Journal of Global Sport Management 4(4): 371–391.

55.

Rossi

Jeanes

(2018) Is sport for development already an anachronism in the age of austerity or can it be a space of hope? International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics 10(1): 185–201.

56.

Schulenkorf

Sherry

Rowe

(2016) Sport for development: An integrated literature review. Journal of Sport Management 30(1): 22–39.

57.

Shumate

Contractor

(2014) Emergence of multidimensional social networks. In: Putnam

Mumby

(eds) The SAGE Handbook of Organizational Communication: Advances in Theory, Research, and Methods. Los Angeles: SAGE, pp.449–474.

58.

Shumate

Dewitt

(2008) The North/South divide in NGO hyperlink networks. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 13(2): 405–428.

59.

Shumate

Lipp

(2008) Connective collective action online: An examination of the hyperlink network structure of an NGO issue network. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 14(1): 178–201.

60.

Shumate

O’Connor

(2010) The symbiotic sustainability model: Conceptualizing NGO–corporate alliance communication. Journal of Communication 60(3): 577–609.

61.

Shumate

Atouba

Cooper

, et al. (2017) Interorganisational communication. In: Scott

Lewis

Barker

, et al. (eds) The International Encyclopedia of Organisational Communication, pp. 1–24. DOI: 10.1002/9781118955567.wbieoc117.

62.

Sport for Development and Peace International Working Group (SDP IWG) (2008) Harnessing the power of Sport for Development and Peace: Recommendations to governments. Available at: https://www.sportanddev.org/en/article/publication/harnessing-power-sport-development-and-peace-recommendations-governments (accessed 15 January 2019).

63.

Straume

(2019) SDP structures, policies and funding streams. In: Collison

Darnell

Giulianotti

, et al. (eds) Routledge Handbook of Sport for Development and Peace. London: Routledge, pp. 46–58.

64.

Suzuki

(2019) Non-governmental organizations in the SDP system. In: Collison

Darnell

Giulianotti

, et al. (eds) Routledge Handbook of Sport for Development and Peace. London: Routledge, pp. 70–79.

65.

Svensson

(2017) Organizational hybridity: A conceptualization of how sport for development and peace organizations respond to divergent institutional demands. Sport Management Review 20(5): 443–454.

66.

Svensson

Woods

(2017) A systematic overview of sport for development and peace organisations. Journal of Sport for Development 5(9): 36–48.

67.

Svensson

Andersson

Faulk

(2018) A quantitative assessment of organizational capacity and organizational life stages in sport for development and peace. Journal of Sport Management 32(3): 295–313.

68.

Svensson

Mahoney

Hambrick

(2015) Twitter as a communication tool for nonprofits: A study of sport-for-development organizations. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly 44(6): 1086–1106.

69.

United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) (1999) Standard country or area codes for statistical use (M49). Available at: https://unstats.un.org/unsd/methodology/m49 (accessed 9 April 2019).

70.

Van Dijk

(2005) The Deepening Divide: Inequality in the Information Society. Thousand Oaks: SAGE.

71.

Van Dijk

(2012) The Network Society. London: SAGE.

72.

Van Dijk

(2013a) A theory of the digital divide. In: Ragnedda

Muschert

(eds) The Digital Divide: The Internet and Social inequality in International Perspective. London: Routledge, pp. 29–51.

73.

Van Dijk

(2013b) Inequalities in the network society. In: Orton-Johnson

Prior

(eds) Digital Sociology: Critical Perspectives. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 105–124.

74.

Wasserman

Faust

(1999) Social Network Analysis: Methods and Applications. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

75.

Welty Peachey

Cohen

Shin

, et al. (2018) Challenges and strategies of building and sustaining inter-organizational partnerships in sport for development and peace. Sport Management Review 21(2): 160–175.

76.

Wilson

Hayhurst

(2009) Digital activism: Neoliberalism, the Internet, and sport for youth development. Sociology of Sport Journal 26(1): 155–181.

77.

World Bank (2019) World Bank country and lending groups. Available at: https://datahelpdesk.worldbank.org/knowledgebase/articles/906519-world-bank-country-and-lending-groups (accessed 22 May 2019).