EVALUATION OF PLAY THE GAME 2015 Global sport: Reform or revolution? Internal evaluation / December 2015 Title Evaluation of Play the Game 2015. Global sport: Reform or revolution? Main author Jens Sejer Andersen Co-authors Stine Alvad, Martin Hedal, Christian Gjersing Nielsen, Madita Schröder, Maria Suurballe Layout Play the Game/Danish Institute for Sports Studies Cover photo Thomas Søndergaard/Play the Game Edition First edition, Copenhagen, December 2015 Price The report is available for free download at www.playthegame.org ISBN 978-87-93375-33-8 Publisher Play the Game c/o Danish Institute for Sports Studies Kanonbådsvej 4A DK-1437 København K T: +45 70 27 55 77 E: [email protected] W: www.playthegame.org and www.idan.dk Quoting from this report is allowed with proper acknowledgements Play the Game 2 www.playthegame.org EVALUATION OF PLAY THE GAME 2015 GLOBAL SPORT: REFORM OR REVOLUTION Play the Game 3 www.playthegame.org Content Introduction: The ninth challenge for Play the Game ................................................................... 5 Preparations and Execution .............................................................................................................. 9 Economy .......................................................................................................................................... 9 Number and composition of the participants .......................................................................... 11 Active partnerships ...................................................................................................................... 12 Idan Development Forum at Play the Game 2015 ................................................................... 13 Participant survey: Very high level of satisfaction ...................................................................... 15 Few gender differences ............................................................................................................... 16 Professions: Journalists are the most happy ............................................................................. 18 Number of presentations ............................................................................................................ 20 Develops in what direction? ....................................................................................................... 20 First-timers are less enthusiastic ................................................................................................ 21 Longer stay, greater satisfaction ................................................................................................ 22 Media coverage with FIFA and European bias ....................................................................... 23 Relevant themes ....................................................................................................................... 24 After the conference ................................................................................................................. 24 Increasing activity on website, app and social media ............................................................. 25 Social media .............................................................................................................................. 25 Conference app ......................................................................................................................... 26 Conclusion: The main future challenges ...................................................................................... 27 Appendix 1: List of participants..................................................................................................... 29 Appendix 2: Program ...................................................................................................................... 38 Appendix 4: Selected comments from the 2015 evaluation ....................................................... 67 Play the Game 4 www.playthegame.org Introduction: The ninth challenge for Play the Game Taking place in a year where the global focus on the shadowy sides of sport seems to have reached an all-time high, ranging from the increasing awareness of systematic doping, over growing public distrust in the positive value of mega-events, to the turbulent, highly medi- atized daily drama related to corruption in FIFA, this ninth international Play the Game conference more than any of the previous ones faced existential questions: Would it be possible to add new insight, new knowledge, and new value to debates on international sport that were already all over the public domain? Did it make sense once again to bring together leading experts and stakeholders from all corners of the world, people who may already have met several times a year in sport’s reg- ular circuit of meetings and events to discuss the same overarching issues? At a time where all sports political taboos seem to be broken, thanks to earlier Play the Game conferences amongst others, could Play the Game once again serve as a refreshing and stimulating forum for dealing with sensitive and difficult issues? It may come as no surprise that we as organizers believe that the answer to those questions is “yes”. It is a subjective answer, but nevertheless supported by the more credible state- ments delivered by over half of the conference participants in an anonymous survey, as well as expressed in numerous emails received after the conference. By all measures, this conference was a success. Even if the conference organizers tend to believe that in terms of quality and quantity there has been little difference between the 2015 and 2013 conferences, a great number of dele- gates with experience from previous years have declared the 2015 conference the most suc- cessful to this date. The following is an internal evaluation and does not pretend to give a completely objective picture of Play the Game 2015. We do however wish to gather and publish our reflections on the outcome of this considerable investment of time, money and other limited resources, partly in order to give our donors a chance to assess whether their contribution was worthwhile, and partly to collect lessons learned with a view to create better conferences in the future. We shall do our best to support our subjective reflections with various kinds of evidence and hope you will find the reading interesting. The overall observations are as follows: Even at a time of great public awareness of international sports politics, perhaps particularly so, there is a need for an independent forum where a wide range of the Play the Game 5 www.playthegame.org main challenges to sport are put under spotlight through a comprehensive, fact- based, focused and multi-stakeholder-based approach. The conference showed that the need for public, open and unrestricted dialogue is particularly relevant at a time where international sport bodies are met with wide- spread skepticism and mistrust. With the growing engagement in sport events and institutions shown by authoritarian states, the need for open debate becomes even more obvious in order to bridge the gap between public perception of sport and how decision-makers in sport see their role. Emphasizing the importance of whistleblowers in sport from the very opening of the conference seemed to have some effect on the post-conference debate in relation to the WADA report on doping in Russia/IAAF. The Skype conversation with the Stepanov couple (re IAAF) and the presentation by Bonita Mersiades (re FIFA) added a human element to the overall sports political deliberations, engaging par- ticipants from the start. The debate at the historic Elsinore Theatre between FIFA presidential candidates, experts and stakeholders is pointed out as a highlight in many individual com- ments. Moreover, the interest from the candidates shows that Play the Game is now established as a forum you want to be seen in, in remarkable contrast to earlier years where there was a perceived political risk in accepting our invitations. The feedback from the participants is once again overwhelmingly positive. 97% de- clare that their overall impression of Play the Game 2015 is “good” or “very good”, and it is remarkable that the score for “very good” now exceeds 60%. Considering the above mentioned questions it is even more comforting that 86% find that the conference gives value to their daily work “to a high extent” or “to some extent”. It was a risk to operate with up to five parallel sessions in order to accommodate all presentations and wishes from previous years to have more room for debate. For- tunately, on a few exceptions, all parallel sessions had a sufficient crowd and a rea- sonable thematic flow. Still, the number of presentations and sessions is one of the factors that many participants regard as challenging. Aarhus served as an excellent host city, offering generous support and excellent co- operation, both in the overall planning at municipality level and through the vari- ous institutions that the conference visited or involved otherwise in the pro- gramme. The number of 345 participants was one short of the total number in 2013 and thus still at a satisfying level. On top of to that are an estimated 40-50 guests or media representatives who paid brief visits without necessarily officially registering. With more time in the planning process it should be possible to reach 400-450 partici- Play the Game 6 www.playthegame.org pants, but it is no end in itself to see the conference