Leveraging Sport Events to Maximize Community Benefits in Low- and Middle-Income Countries

Abstract

For many years, special events have played an important role as strategic elements within community development. However, to date little work has been conducted on how to maximize the social potential of special events in low- and middle-income countries. In addressing this issue, we reflect on event management processes and leverage mechanisms that have underpinned a community sport event in the Pacific Island nation of Sāmoa, and identify strategies for maximizing beneficial event outcomes. We present findings related to previously identified leverage areas, including sociocultural and participatory leverage, and also suggest new areas that seem particularly relevant in the context of community development, including educational, health-related, and reputational leverage. Finally, key challenges and opportunities for event managers and local communities are discussed, implications for event leverage are provided, and areas for future research are outlined.

Use of photovoice to explore the potential role of youth in contributing to maternal health in rural Wakiso district, Uganda

“…Although such gatherings may not be primarily organised for health activities, their use by youth to health educate those in attendance can contribute to increased awareness in the community. The use of sports in health promotion has not been fully explored in low- and middle-income countries 44 including Uganda. However, there is increasing evidence on the use of sports as a strategy for health promotion 45 which can be embraced by public health officials in Uganda and beyond.…”

Strategic Sustainability Management in the Event Sector

“…For example, the economic sustainability of events has commonly been addressed in terms of outcomes such as investment growth (Luonila & Johansson, 2015;Ziakas & Boukas, 2016), stakeholder value creation (Kwiatkowski, 2016;Maguire & Hanrahan, 2017;Testa & Metter, 2017), repeat visitation (Wong et al, 2015), and consumer behavior (Ma et al, 2011). Social sustainability has commonly been addressed in terms of outcomes such as education and awareness (Harris, 2014;Jiang & Schmader, 2014;Lawton, 2009), inclusive practices (Laing & Mair, 2015;Misener & Mason, 2006), connectedness to location (Ma et al, 2011), building social capital (Davies, 2015;Jepson & Stadler, 2017;Lawton & Weaver, 2015), and health and well-being (Gibson & Connell, 2015;Reid & Ritchie, 2011;Schulenkorf & Schlenker, 2017). Lastly, environmental attendees' proenvironmental behavior).…”

“…In terms of event reputation, researchers identified the importance of stakeholder management, event legitimacy, relationship building, and the ability to generate in-kind support as antecedents for effective event management (see Larson et al, 2015;Musgrave & Woodward, 2016;Schulenkorf & Schlenker, 2017). Given the episodic nature of events (both in terms of the event itself, and potentially the organizational infrastructure that underpins it), extant event management research has tended to deal with event reputation as an outcome requiring maintenance and/or reinforcement (particularly in terms of crisis management and managing the "down time" between scheduled events) (French & Wickham, 2018).…”

Spreading tourists around host countries of mega sport events

“…Sport event tourism has always been an important pillar of the tourism sector (Daniels et al, 2004;Mhanna et al, 2017;Schulenkorf and Schlenker, 2017). This is because it is associated with a wide variety of tourism products offered in event destinations.…”