Enhancing destination competitiveness through disability sport event legacies

Abstract

Purpose This paper aims to contribute to the event legacy discourse by exploring the nexus between event legacy literature and destination competitiveness by focusing on disability sport events or parasport and addressing an identified gap in the research literature. Design/methodology/approach This is achieved through conducting a systematic review of disability sport events literature; performing an audit of international disability sport events; developing a typology of disability sport events; and outlining a research agenda drawing upon these previous steps. The typology is then placed in context to the destination competitiveness framework to provide direction for both host organizing committees and tourism destination managers. The research framework reflects the complexity of disability sport events with specific reference to the social impact of disability sport events for destinations. Findings Despite calls for increased research into accessible tourism and events, the potential social legacy for communities and destinations from disability sport or parasport events remains absent from most sport, event and tourism literature. The findings and resultant typology from this study provide an interdisciplinary approach to value add to the disability sport event and destination management sectors. The combined understanding of both sectors creates an opportunity to leverage further events through marketing accessibility as a competitive advantage, seizing opportunity for international and national disability events, and the subsequent event accessible tourism and general accessible tourism that improved destination accessibility provides a host city or precinct. Research limitations/implications The disability sport event typology and a research agenda that supports future research are outcomes of this research. Practical implications These insights are beneficial to both researchers and practitioners interested in leveraging the opportunities from disability sport events to support sustainable destination development and competiveness that reflect the needs of a population with diverse access needs, including our ageing population, those with temporary disability and parents with young children. Originality/value This research lays the groundwork to support the desired social legacy for future host communities. From a theoretical perspective, given the paucity of research on disability sport, the typology offers a means to evaluate and monitor the impacts of various types of events from the perspectives of sustainable development, tourism, accessibility, community engagement and public policy. The addition of understanding destination competitiveness and the underlying criteria for accessible destination development provides opportunities to further leverage disability sport event beyond the event itself for ongoing accessible events, tourism and disability employment opportunities.

Volunteers with Disabilities at the London 2012 Olympic And Paralympic Games: Who, Why, and Will They Do It Again?

“…To counter this criticism, we briefly review legacy articles published since the beginning of 2014, which is 2 years after the games concluded. The major articles published since that time can be categorized into: criticism of legacy and reporting women's sport (Packer et al, 2015); tourism legacy and program theory (Dickson, Misener, & Darcy, 2017;Weed, 2014); sustainability and the sustainability of host cities (Fussey, Coaffee, & Hobbs, 2016;Gold & Gold, 2015); legacy cost of delivering the games (Nichols IP: 138.25.168.249 On: Mon, 30 Apr 2018 03:49:51…”

A Case of Leveraging a Mega-Sport Event for a Sport Participation and Sport Tourism Legacy: A Prospective Longitudinal Case Study of Whistler Adaptive Sports

“…For parasport events the legacy potential is reflected in the International Paralympic Committee's (IPC's) Paralympic legacy goals including, "sport structures/organizations for people with an impairment, from grassroots to elite level" [5]. Despite these opportunities, community/grassroots, and para/disability sport participation and legacy research and practice languishes behind the mainstream [6,7]. This translates into more ad hoc approaches to disability sport and tourism, including event leveraging, through inadequate facilitating policies, poor policy operationalization, relatively underdeveloped sport development pathways, inadequate training resources, and inaccessible environments and transport [7][8][9].…”

“…Despite these opportunities, community/grassroots, and para/disability sport participation and legacy research and practice languishes behind the mainstream [6,7]. This translates into more ad hoc approaches to disability sport and tourism, including event leveraging, through inadequate facilitating policies, poor policy operationalization, relatively underdeveloped sport development pathways, inadequate training resources, and inaccessible environments and transport [7][8][9].…”

“…For beneficial sport legacies to remain after MSEs across community and elite sport development pathways and whole-of-life participation, requires a strategic vision to leverage opportunities [10]. Converting the latent potential to an actual increase in sporting participation across the lifespan will also facilitate greater social impacts beyond sport [7,11,12].…”

An application of the sports logistics framework: the case of the Dallas Cowboys

“…The majority of available research in sports event management centers on marketing-related aspects, for example fan relationships (Marques, Nobre, & Gordon, 2018), sponsorship aspects (Olson, 2010), ticket pricing and consumer options (Sainam, Balasubramanian, & Bayus, 2010). Other studies investigate the legacy of sports events (Collins, Jones, & Munday, 2009;Doherty, 2009;Florek, Breitbarth, & Conejo, 2008;Thomson, Leopkey, Schlenker, & Schulenkorf, 2010;Thomson et al, 2019;Wilson, 2015), the destination image of sport events (Dickson, Misener, & Darcy, 2017;Milovanovi c et al, 2019) or the effects of sport event service quality (Jensen, Haskell, & Larson, 2018;Theodorakis, Kaplanidou, & Karabaxoglou, 2015).…”