Abstract
Although diversity is an often cited organisational value, its support is often muted when it pertains to boards of governance. The aim of this study is to identify discursive practices that may prevent or limit the implementation of measures to increase gender balance in sport governance at the national and international levels. Drawing on a total of 60 qualitative, semi-structured interviews with board members, we explore both the content of and reasons for discursive opposition to implementing gender balance in the governing boards of international and national sport organisations that purport to value diversity. The results demonstrate that board members justify their resistance to gender balance by drawing on discourses of meritocracy, neoliberalism, silence/passivity, and diversity. Resistance to gender balance in sport governance may in part have roots in the sport capital and habitus of board members, and their ability to utilise that in normalising judgment that may keep women out.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 517-529 |
| Number of pages | 13 |
| Journal | International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics |
| Volume | 13 |
| Issue number | 3 |
| Early online date | May 2021 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 2021 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:This work was supported by the ADVANCED OLYMPIC RESEARCH GRANT PROGRAMME, Olympic studies center [2016-2017]. We thank and acknowledge those who collected data for the two studies: Rubiana Lopes Curry, Donna de Haan, Manon van Liere and Popi Sotiriadou. Two of the authors of the current paper were also involved in the two studies. Financial support for Project 1 was obtained through an Advanced Olympic Research grant.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
Keywords
- Foucault
- Resistance
- discourse
- gender
- governance
- habitus
- sport
- women