London 2012 Olympic legacy: a big sporting society?

Abstract

The Olympic Charter (International Olympic Committee [IOC], 2010. Olympic charter. Lausanne: IOC. Available from:http://www.olympic.org/Documents/Olympic%20Charter/Charter_en_2010.pdf [Accessed 13 July 2011]) asserts that ‘the practice of sport is a human right’ and outlines role 12 of the IOC as being ‘to encourage and support the development of sport for all’. This signals an aspiration to the right to sport for all. Notwithstanding this, the UK Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition government has consolidated and extended a shift in UK sport policy from ‘sport for social good’ to ‘competitive sport for sport's sake’. In December 2010, the government published ‘Plans for the Legacy from the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games’. The first of the four areas of focus is to harness ‘the United Kingdom's passion for sport to increase grass-roots participation, particularly by young people’ and encourage ‘the whole population to be more physically active’. This appears to relate to sport for some, and physical activity for others. Nevertheless, the coalition has signalled a belief in ‘big society’ and democratic not bureaucratic accountability.

This article proposes a theoretical framework of a ‘big sporting society’ comprising three generations of sporting rights. This enables an evaluation of emergent sport policy in relation to the London 2012 Olympic Games legacy and the Olympic Charter. It is argued that the realization of the 2012 legacy relating to the IOC's aspiration to sport as a human right for all, and consequent democratic sporting accountability, necessitates a ‘sport for all’ rather than ‘competitive sport for sport's sake’ policy direction, and the development of all three generations of sporting rights, resulting in a ‘big sporting society’.

Keywords:

• three generations
• human rights
• sport policy
• sport development
• democracy
• big society
• sport for all

Acknowledgement

I would like to thank Susanne Gibson, Carol Osborne, Ann Long, Pat Devine and two anonymous reviewers for their input at various stages during the development of this article.

Notes

1. Since this article was written, the Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt ‘confirmed the second target (to get a million more people doing physical activity) had been quietly dropped shortly after the coalition government came to power. The first target (to inspire a million more people to play sport) … nominally remains in place for now but it is understood that it too will shortly be dropped in favour of a “more meaningful” national measure’ (Gibson 2011).

2. This bill is now progressing through the House of Commons renamed the Protection of Freedoms Bill and is widely considered to be much less ambitious than originally intended.

3. On 27 January 2011, the government launched a 3-month consultation on ‘plans to sell off public forests in the biggest change in land ownership for more than 80 years. The forests sell-off could raise £150–250m over 10 years’ (Vidal et al. 2010). However, a huge campaign ensued and the government backed down very publically when Caroline Spelman, the Environment Secretary said, on 17 February 2011, ‘I am sorry, we got this one wrong’ (Watt 2011). The Guardian also reported that ‘A YouGov poll found that 84% of people agreed the woods and forests should be kept in public ownership for future generations, while only 2% disagreed (Carrington, 2011).’