This book provides a comparative analysis of sport and physical activity policies, processes, and practices across the home nations (England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland) of the United Kingdom. Drawing upon in-depth analysis by internationally recognised experts within the sport policy and management field, and applying a novel analytical framework, this book offers the first comprehensive intra-country comparison of the most significant features of the sporting infrastructure across the home nations. With chapters focusing on each of the four nations in detail, followed by a comparative chapter that traces the evolution of sport policy across the UK, the book examines the differences and similarities across elite, community, and school sport policy. It provides important insight into how sport policy interacts with national and devolved political structures and with socio-cultural factors to drive both elite sporting success and community sport development. The book is essential reading for any student, researcher, policy-maker or sport practitioner with an interest in sport policy, sport development, sport management, public policy, or politics.

It is the essence of human nature to compare, and nowhere are comparisons more commonplace than in sport. This book focuses specifically on the comparison of sporting nations. Making meaningful comparisons (i.e. comparing the similarities and differences between social phenomena based upon empirical observation) is difficult and resource intensive and faces a host of methodological limitations, trade-offs and practical compromises. Despite these ongoing issues, there remains no introductory texts that outline the philosophical, methodological and practical challenges of comparative analysis as it applies to sport. This book is therefore the first of its kind to provide a comprehensive overview of the theory and method of comparing sporting nations illustrated through specific examples and case studies drawn from the comparative elite sport policy/management domain. In doing so, the book provides an important point of departure and reference for anyone seeking to making comparisons and to generate more focus and attention towards the logic of comparative inquiry and methodology within sport.

This book examines claims that the Olympic Games are a vehicle to inspire and increase mass sport participation. It focuses on the mass sport participation legacy of the most recent hosts of the summer Olympics, including Atlanta, Sydney, Athens, Beijing, London, Rio, and Tokyo. It is organised by host city/country and applies an analytical framework to each, addressing the socio-political context that shapes sport policy, the key changes in sport policy, the structure and governance of community sport, the Olympic and Paralympic legacy, and the changes in mass sport participation before, during, and after the Games. The book is important reading for students, researchers, and policymakers working in sport governance, sport development or management, and the sport policy sector.