Locating and mitigating risks to children associated with major sporting events

Despite recent efforts to blend sport and human rights, activism for children's rights in sport has historically been marginalised. The positive 'social legacy' of sport events frequently masks more problematic issues, including child exploitation. We argue that harms to children in hosting communities of major sporting events (MSEs) should be a focus for both research and intervention since the plight of such children is currently a political blind spot. The article examines the evidence for four major sources of risk for children associated with such events: child labour, displacement resulting from forced evictions for infrastructure development and street clearance, child sexual exploitation, and human trafficking affecting children. The weakness of the resulting evidence is explained in relation to the methodological and ethical difficulties of conducting research on such hidden and marginal populations and to the fact that risks to children are often masked by adult social problems. It is argued that much more robust research designs, focused specifically on children, are essential in order to verify the many assertions made about risks to children associated with MSEs. Some mitigating interventions are briefly examined and an action plan for risk-mitigation work at future MSEs is proposed. Finally, drawing on wider debates about Centres and Peripheries in social and economic theory, we question whether major international sport organisations might choose to engage with projects like child protection for strategic rather than humanitarian reasons, using them as a kind of ethical fig leaf in order to bolster their power bases against threats from the margins. © 2014 © 2014 Taylor & Francis.The Oak Foundation under Grant code OCAY-13-052

Service quality at the London 2012 Games – a Paralympics Athletes Survey

Purpose – This paper reports on aspects of service quality at the London 2012 Paralympic Games,from a rather unusual perspective, the athletes. To date there has been little evidence captured about athlete’s satisfaction at sporting events, and specifically about their perceptions of the service quality provided. Design/methodology/approach – Unique ‘full’ access to the London 2012 Paralympics allowed to the collection of data directly from the athletes. The study reports the questionnaire findings from a sample of 250 respondents. Findings – From this study an operational assessment and performance framework has been generated composed of 10 criteria and 73 items or sub-criteria, which can be used as a benchmarking tool to plan, design and compare future sport mega-event. Moreover, the study evidence based the high quality of the 2012 Paralympics Games, as he athletes rated, on a 5 point Likert scale, 64 items in the ‘very satisfied’ category, a very positive set of feedback for the Games organisers. Research limitations/implications – The methodology applied was appropriate, generating data to facilitate discussion and draw specific conclusions from. A perceived limitation is the single case approach; however, this can be enough to add to the body of knowledge where very little evidence has been captured so far and where the objectives were to explore the Paralympics games service quality and performance. Practical implications – This research provides a tangible evidence base to support future sport event decision-makers, planners and designers in this highly complex ‘arena’. In any system, there are always areas for improvement (AFIs), these are highlighted within the paper for further investigation. Originality/value – This is the first paper to identify and synthesize aspects of sport mega event service quality from the athletes viewpoint and informs how well designed, organised and managed the London 2012 Games were from a primary user perspective. The paper makes a defined contribution by developing evidence based recommendations for this important yet under researched area

Finding video on the web

At present very little is known about how people locate and view videos. This study draws a rich picture of everyday video seeking strategies and video information needs, based on an ethnographic study of New Zealand university students. These insights into the participants’ activities and motivations suggest potentially useful facilities for a video digital library

Pathways to physical activity legacy: assessing the regeneration potential of multi-sport events using a prospective approach

Urban regeneration is now commonly cited as the rationale for hosting multi-sport events. However, the concept of legacy arising from these events is contested and the evidence base in relation to benefits for the host community is weak, especially in respect of increasing physical activity and sports participation. A theory-based assessment framework is developed to provide a robust prospective assessment of the likely impacts of the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games on physical activity for the host community in the East End of the city. We identify scope for change, anticipated causal pathways and propose supporting physical activity though better designed environments as a means of generating legacy benefits at population level

Mega-Sporting Events in Developing Nations : Playing the Way to Prosperity?

Supporters of mega-sporting events such as the World Cup and Olympics claim that these events attract hoards of wealthy visitors and lead to lasting economic benefits for the host regions. For this reason, cities and countries compete vigorously for the right to stage these spectacles. Recently, developing countries have become increasingly vocal in demanding that they get the right to share in the economic benefits of these international games. China, for example, has been awarded the 2008 Summer Olympics, and an African nation seems destined to host the 2010 World Cup. The specialized infrastructure and operating expenses required to host these events, however, can be extremely costly, and it is not at all clear that either the long or short-term benefits of the games are anywhere nearly large enough to cover these costs. This paper reviews other researchersÂ’ as well as our own previous work on mega-sporting events such as the Super Bowl and World Series as well as international events like the World Cup and Olympics. Independent researchers nearly unanimously find that boostersÂ’ projections of the economic impact of sporting events exaggerate the true economic impact of these competitions by a wide margin. In particular, in this paper we focus on the particular circumstances that face developing countries hosting these games. Our research suggests that in most cases mega-sporting events are an even worse investment for developing countries than for industrialized countries.Development Planning and Policy; Sports, Gambling, Recreation, Tourism

Cities of culture and the regeneration game

Capital of Culture (ECoC) programme exactly a year on from its inauguration. This event also saw the transition from Liverpool's "Year of Culture 08‟ to "Year of Environment 09" and a simultaneous event in the Austrian city of Linz to which the Capital of Culture mantle passed, along with Vilnius, Lithuania. An estimated 60,000 people congregated at the Pier Head as well as at the Albert Dock and Wirral bank, for a celebration that included sing-a-longs, firework displays, street artists on illuminated bikes and light projections onto a famous refurbished new museum building making up this World Heritage city. This "Light Night" celebration also kick-started similar events held in cities in England and Scotland, with extended opening of venues. The Light Night theme chosen for Liverpool 08's swansong emulates the Nuit Blanche festival celebrated in dozens of cities such as Paris, Rome, Montreal and Toronto - the largest of which attract 1 to 3 million participants over "late night" weekend extravaganzas (Jiwa et al., 2009). These "eventful cities" (Richards and Palmer 2010) reflect a global trend and network that spreads virtually and geographically (Evans, 2011)

How people find videos

At present very little is known about how people locate and view videos 'in the wild'. This study draws a rich picture of everyday video seeking strategies and video information needs, based on an ethnographic study of New Zealand university students. These insights into the participants' activities and motivations suggest potentially useful facilities for a video digital library

THE EFFECT OF SPONSORSHIP ANNOUNCEMENTS ON STOCK RETURNS: DOES INDUSTRY CONCENTRATION MATTER?

The purpose of this paper is to provide an event study based evidence on whether the effect of sponsorship announcements on stock returns differs based on market concentration. The study sample includes 17 sponsorship announcements occured  during the period of  2011 and 2016 for10 firms listed in BIST. In order to test whether stock return is affected by sponsorship announcements, abnormal return (AR), cumulative abnormal return (CAR)  were tested by using t-tests for event window [-5, +5]. According to the results, in [-5 +5] event window 13 events revelaed statistically significant AR and CAR before and after the event day.  Accordingly, sponsorship announcements are associated with stock returns of sponsoring firms. A Mann-Whitney U test indicated statistically  significant difference in abnormal returns between firms operating in non-concentrated industries and firms in concentrated industries. In concentrated markets sponsorship announcements created negative abnormal returns. On the other hand, sponsorship announcements created positive abnormal returns in non-concentrated industries. The study extends the current knowledge through providing empirical evidence for the role of market competitive structure