Little leisure in the Big Society

Is the Asset Transfer of Public Leisure Facilities in England an Example of Associative Democracy?

“…The voluntary provision case studies we have looked at, do indeed exemplify associationalism, coming together to meet their own and local community needs, more efficiently and sensitively, prompted by state retraction from leisure provision. We have seen that despite the time constraints and competing pressures of other leisure priorities [14,31,32], volunteers are stepping up to take on and manage sizeable services and facilities. This development is in line with the associationalism we have long seen in leisure provision, particularly in sport clubs.…”

“…Other authors have expressed concern with regard to how volunteering can be grown to deliver 'The Big Society' agenda [14,31,32]. Our organisations enable this growth in one of two ways: Either by being driven by a core group of volunteers who were giving heavy commitment to their roles; or, in cases where involvement was limited by time, deliberately structuring the volunteering into tasks, to meet the supply of episodic help available.…”

“…Key critiques of the Big Society ideal are that society is different to the 1930s in ways which make associationalism less likely; was the "mosaic of local civic institutions that developed in nineteenth-century Britain" and the early 20th century [13] (p. 812) a product of specific circumstances? It has been argued that people do not have the available time to volunteer, and the time that they do have available is in small packages so is difficult to use and coordinate [14]. The fragmented distribution of leisure time and the ever-competing demands on it can be used to explain trends towards both episodic (time-limited) volunteering, and individual participation (for example in sports) [15] and away from collective activity.…”