Sport, civil society and social integration: The case of Norwegian voluntary sport organizations

Abstract

Voluntary sport organizations make up the largest part of voluntary sector in many countries. Yet, in light of the renewed social and political interest in civil society, we do not know very much about how sport organizations operate and function. Accordingly, this article addresses the question of how voluntary sport organizations contribute to social integration through differences in community structures. First a theoretical framework making it possible to distinguish between various forms of community structures-strong, weak, mediated and pragmatic communities-is developed. Then, the first empirical part describes how members in sport organizations belong to such various forms of communities. Next, the article explains differences in social integration through social background, variation in participation in sports and various recruitment channels. Finally, the article explores how differences in community structures matters for the experience of sport activity, for organizational democracy and social capital (trust and political interests).

Does Membership in Civil Society Organizations Foster Social Integration? The Case of Danish Voluntary Sport Organizations

“…Secondly, the low prevalence of mediated and weak communities in this study distinguishes it from the Norwegian study, where members were more dispersed across all four community types 7 , primarily due to a higher diversification in participation trends than in the Danish case (Seippel, 2005). Without elaborating further on the differences between the Danish and the Norwegian cases 8 , the results from Norwegian sport organizations exemplify the relevance of the complete typology.…”

“…From this table, the distribution of members on the four community structures was established in Table 9. The principle behind the above distribution of members on community structures is derived from Seippel's 2005 study on social integration, where he made the same cross-tabulation and divided members in the same manner (Seippel, 2005). The only difference is to be found in the operationalization of the concept of emotional bonds.…”

“…These typologies are not applicable to this study for two reasons; Firstly, because not all of Brint's community types are relevant to the context of sport organizations; and, secondly, because Brint's approach does not differentiate between community types according to the level and nature of social integration. Instead, the simplified community typology developed by Ørnulf Seippel for the study of social integration in sport organizations will be applied (Seippel, 2005). It utilizes the analytical approach to the community concept introduced by Brint, and starts from the definition of community presented above.…”

“…In the Norwegian study, that has served as an inspiration for this study, social interaction was operationalized as the frequency of participation in the sports activity (exercise and competitions), and emotional bonds in terms of social and material reciprocity (Seippel, 2005). The combination of exercise and competitions captures the activity-related interaction between members, which is the primary form of social interaction in sport organizations.…”

“…In Seippel's study, a theoretical framework was devised and applied to the case of voluntary sport organizations in Norway, where it provided some interesting and useful results (Seippel, 2005). In light of these positive outcomes, it seems relevant to apply the same theoretical framework in order to illuminate the extent to which it can provide equally useful results when applied to the Danish case.…”