Malmö University Faculty for Education and Society Sport Sciences

Two-Year Master´s Thesis, IV610G, Spring 2021 30 credits

Environmental Sustainability Among Sport Clubs in Lund’s Municipality

Emelie Gullstrand Mads Lyhne Nielsen

Master Exam 120 credits Examiner: Susanna Hedenborg

Sport Sciences Supervisor: Johan Norberg

Date for the Final Seminar 2021-06-01

1. Abstract

Background: It is important to work with environmental sustainability and to reach this goal since protection of the natural environment is necessary. Every day without more knowledge and action gives future generations worse prerequisites to live a sustainable life. This thesis attempts to address environmental sustainability from a local perspective. Through the Swedish municipality Lund’s Municipality’s climate goals ambition for 2030 and their climate policy “LundaEko”, it is explored how the local sport clubs can contribute to the municipality’s ambition. However limited research is conducted related to environmental sustainability and grass-root sport clubs. Grass-root sport clubs are important since they have a direct impact in children and youth’s upbringing. Through the local sport clubs, Lund’s Municipality have the opportunity to reach more citizens in order to affect them to contribute to the climate goals.

Aim: The overall purpose of this study is to analyse the prerequisites for municipalities to use grass- root sport clubs to contribute to environmental sustainability. The study uses Lund’s Municipality in Sweden and the local sport clubs within the municipality as the empirical example.

Methods: Seven representatives participated in this research. Two from Lund’s Municipality, one from the national sport federation’s regional department “RFSISU Skåne” and four from local sport clubs in Lund. The data was collected from semi-structured interviews and documents/policies. Thematic analysis is used to process, organise, and analyse the collected data. Triple bottom line and institutional theory was applied as a theoretical framework, in order to analyse the data.

Results: The research shows that all interviewed sport clubs endorse environmental sustainability. However, the sport clubs are unsure how to approach the topic, due to lack of knowledge, experience and resources. The sport clubs request support in order to initiate environmental sustainability practices from Lund’s Municipality and RFSISU Skåne.

Conclusion: Lund’s Municipality is responsible of informing the sport clubs about their own climate ambitions and the clubs’ opportunities to contribute. The sport clubs are able to contribute by identify and adopt easy applicable environmental values and utilise their status as an institution to disseminate these values to their members through institutional mechanisms.

Keywords: Sustainability, Environmental sustainability, Grass-root sport clubs, Municipalities

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Table of contents

1. Abstract ...... 1

2. Introduction ...... 4 2.1 Introduction to thesis ...... 4 2.2 Introduction to collaboration between the researchers ...... 6

3. Research topic, purpose and questions ...... 7 3.1 Research Topic ...... 7 3.2 Research purpose ...... 7 3.3 Research Questions ...... 8

4. Literature review ...... 9 4.1 Sustainable development ...... 9 4.1.1 Dilemmas of addressing all perspectives of sustainable development ...... 12 4.2 Environmental sustainability ...... 13 4.2.1 The role of sport in environmental sustainability ...... 14 4.2.2 The role of the sport clubs in Lund’s Municipality ...... 17 4.3 Environmental ethics in sport ...... 17 4.3.1 Environmental ethics in the sport clubs of Lund’s Municipality ...... 18 4.4 Cooperate social responsibility in sport ...... 18 4.4.1 Cooperate social responsibility and sport in Lund’s Municipality ...... 20 4.4.2 Cooperate social responsibility and sustainability...... 21 4.4.3 Cooperate social responsibility and sustainability in Lund’s Municipality ...... 22 4.5 Climate actions ...... 23 4.5.1 Climate actions of sport organisations in Lund’s Municipality ...... 26 4.6 Three waves of environmental sustainability ...... 26 4.6.1 Wave one ...... 27 4.6.2 Wave two ...... 28 4.6.3 Wave three ...... 28 4.6.4 The impact of the environmental waves of sport clubs in Lund’s Municipality ...... 28 4.7 Sport policy and sport clubs ...... 29 4.7.1 Political impact ...... 29 4.7.2 The state and the sport movement in Sweden ...... 29 4.7.3 Network governance ...... 30

5. Theoretical Framework ...... 32 5.1 Institutional Theory ...... 32 5.2 Triple bottom line ...... 34 5.3 Application of theoretical frameworks ...... 36

6. Methodology ...... 37 6.1 Research Design ...... 37 6.2 Data collection ...... 38

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6.3 Interview participants ...... 39 6.4 Method of data analysis ...... 40 6.5 Scientific considerations ...... 41 6.5.1 Dependability...... 41 6.5.2 Credibility ...... 42 6.5.3 Transferability ...... 43 6.6 Ethical considerations ...... 44 6.7 Societal considerations ...... 45 6.8 Delimitations ...... 46 6.9 Limitations ...... 47

7. Data Analysis ...... 48 7.1 Theme one: Responsibility ...... 48 7.1.1 Who takes the responsibility? ...... 54 7.2 Theme two: The roles of the municipality and RFSISU Skåne ...... 55 7.2.1 Key areas for Lund’s Municipality and RFSISU Skåne to embrace its role ...... 59 7.3 Theme three: Motivating sport clubs ...... 60 7.3.1 Common perception of how to contribute ...... 63 7.4 Theme four: Prerequisites...... 64 7.4.1 Starting point ...... 66 7.5 Theme five: The sport clubs’ climate contribution ...... 68 7.5.1 Transportation ...... 69 7.5.2 Purchase ...... 70 7.5.3 Recycling ...... 71 7.5.4 Projects ...... 72 7.5.5 Advantages of adopting environmental practices ...... 73 7.5.6 Entering through wave one ...... 75

8. Conclusion ...... 77

9. Discussion ...... 80 9.1 Impact of the data results ...... 80 9.2 How can sport clubs develop their environmental impact in the future? ...... 82

10. Bibliography ...... 84

11. Appendices ...... 90 11.1 Question guide for Lund’s Municipality ...... 90 11.2 Question guide for RFSISU Skåne ...... 92 11.3 Question guide for sport clubs ...... 94

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2. Introduction

2.1 Introduction to thesis

The natural environment is under heavy pressure due to global warming, over-consumption, over- fishing etc. (Trendafilova & Nguyen, 2015). Every living individual must contribute to a healthier planet. It is no different in Lund’s Municipality (LM) in Sweden. In order to improve the natural environment locally, LM has adopted a climate strategy called LundaEko, with the aim of becoming a climate neutral municipality in 2030 (Lunds Kommun, 2020). This thesis is based on this climate policy and its ambition with the interest on how the local grass-root sport clubs can contribute to this climate goal. It is especially interesting to explore since LM does not prioritise the local sport clubs in their climate policy. LundaEko points out the responsible entity for each goal and sub-goal. Every responsible entity is an administration within the municipality; thus no responsibility is directly shared with the local sport clubs in the climate policy (Lunds Kommun, 2020).

It is widely acknowledged that grass-root sport clubs have a significant impact regarding social sustainability. Sport organisations have in many years acted as a platform for social inclusion, both through the daily operations, but also through CSR projects (DesJardins, 2016). Sport organisations have in recent years become aware of another pillar within sustainability – Environmental sustainability. Especially professional sport organisations have started investing time, money and resources into environmental sustainability for several reasons. Cost savings through cheaper energy sources, recycling, waste management etc. are some perspectives. Professional sport clubs with large expenses have recognised the opportunities to cut the expenses through environmental sustainability initiatives (Greenhalgh & Drayer, 2010). Another perspective is to contribute to the society in a similar way as cooperate social responsibility has done in many years. The concept is the same, but it is the natural environment that benefits from the efforts. Hence the name, cooperate environmental responsibility (Kotler & Lee, 2005). Addressing environmental sustainability can also be motivated by the ethical standpoint of a human being. Some people own true concerns about the natural environment, so called “Green ethics”, and use the position in an organisation to address the environmental challenges (Rosenberg, 2018).

However, grass-root sport clubs have yet to approach the challenges concerned with environmental sustainability. Their effect is often limited compared to professional sport clubs, since they have less or no money, time and resources to spend. The core services are far away from focus on the natural

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environment as well, hence the limited prioritising. When grass-root sport clubs are able to act, it is often by small activities that do not have a significant impact in the overall result (McCullough, Pfahl, & Nguyen, 2015). From an academic point of view, little research is conducted on grass-root sport clubs’ general contribution to improve the natural environment, which is why this study is relevant and potentially has the ability to have a positive impact for the natural environment moving forward. Research indicates that fans of sport clubs are more likely to be affected positively by their favourite sport club (McCullough & Cunningham, 2010), which is interesting, since there might be a similar effect from a grass-root sport club towards their members. This research aims to contribute to the area of sport and environment with research on how amateur sport clubs can contribute to improve the climate with the prerequisites existing in such a sport club. This through experiences from the city of Lund in Sweden.

The overall purpose of this study is to analyse the prerequisites of municipalities to use grass-root sport clubs to contribute to environmental sustainability. The study uses Lund’s Municipality in Sweden and the local sport clubs within the municipality as the empirical example. We also seek answers to how LM is able to engage and motivate local sport clubs to become environmentally sustainable. The thesis also attempts to identify what the sport clubs can accomplish from becoming environmentally sustainable and which advantages such efforts entails.

The results of the study are based upon seven semi-structured interviews with representative from sport clubs in Lund, representative from LM and a representative from the national sport federation represented by the leader of the regional department of Skåne in Sweden. The representatives from the sport clubs are either chairmen or the clubs’ leaders from different indoor sports, who are capable of making decisions and have knowledge of the clubs’ daily operations. The data is supported by the existing literature in the field. The data collection attempts to underpin the conclusions with as much reliability and validity as possible by exploring two different administrations in LM. The first representative is working with the climate plan for 2030. The other representative is from the culture and leisure administration working with environmental sustainability and has knowledge about the local sport clubs.

The result can be utilised by every participating organisation in the study. LM can utilise the results to support its existing knowledge on how to motivate sport clubs to contribute to the climate goals. The regional sport federation, RFSISU Skåne (RFS), can utilise the results in order to shape their own future work within the field. Lastly, the sport clubs can utilise the results to get manageable and

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tangible suggestions on how they can contribute and gain knowledge about what they are able to earn from it.

The data results indicate that the sport clubs in Lund are willing to adopt environmental practices. It is achieved by adopting clear values and utilising their position as an institution. However, they are short of knowledge, experience and support from both LM and RFS. The study attempts to identify applicable strategies for sport clubs contribute to environmental sustainability within their limited resources.

2.2 Introduction to collaboration between the researchers

Through the thesis we worked on together, the collaboration was good through the whole process. We sat down together when we wrote the thesis chapters. In every chapter, we shared the different subtitles and wrote alone. Before we wrote the shared subtitles, we decided what should be included in every part. When the writing process of the subtitles were done, we shared the text with each other. The text was discussed and the other person added his/her inputs to the existing text and went through the grammar and language in order to add all relevant information to the text and secure that the language became as identic as possible - something that we hope the reader will experience.

The data was analysed together, and the different themes were divided between us. When the writing was done, we met and followed the same process described above. The text in the two themes were scrutinised and written together in order to secure cohesion in the analysis.

When we collected our data, both of us participated in all the interviews. In the interviews, we shared the responsibility, which means that one acted as the main interviewer and the other as a sub- interviewer. The interview guides were created together for all interviews.

Due to this process, we have been involved in the writing of all the written texts in this thesis, and thereby, we perceive the thesis as made together.

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3. Research topic, purpose and questions

3.1 Research Topic

There is an increased awareness on sports’ impact on the natural environment. This has forced sport entities and providers of sport events to consider their approach to environmental sustainability both strategically and operationally (McCullough, Orr, & Watanabe, 2020). Many professional sport organisations are attempting to integrate environmental sustainability efforts into their strategy at different levels, depending on their progress with the efforts. For example, the English football club Forrest Green Rovers strive to be as green as possible in every possible category including serving only vegan food at their home games (Samuel, 2018). But for many grass-root sports organisations, environmental sustainability has yet to find its way into the strategic and operational level (McCullough, Pfahl, & Nguyen, 2015).

LM has an ambition to become climate neutral by 2030, with the ambition that every citizen in the municipality must contribute to reach the goal. LM has in this relation adopted a climate policy called LundaEko (Lunds Kommun, 2020). In order to reach a large part of the population, LM could benefit from engaging the sport clubs as a tool to accomplish its goals. But what is the status among the sport clubs in Lund’s municipality? Have they reached a level where they are ready to contribute, and what does it take to get them on board? These questions seek answers. Therefore, the research topic in this thesis is environmental sustainability in context to LM’s climate policy and goals for 2030 and the grass-root sport clubs with daily operations within the municipality boarder of Lund.

3.2 Research purpose

The overall purpose of this study is to analyse the prerequisites for municipalities to use grass-root sport clubs to contribute to environmental sustainability. The study uses Lund’s Municipality in Sweden, and the local sport clubs within the municipality as the empirical example. The ambition is to conduct study that can be utilised by the participating entities and other interested parties.

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3.3 Research Questions

The research purpose will be investigated by seeking answers to the following research questions:

I. How – and to what extend - can Lund’s Municipality successfully engage sport clubs to become more environmentally sustainable? What are the possibilities and which barriers exist?

II. How can representatives from sport clubs in Lund’s Municipality work with environmental sustainability?

III. What are the advantages and disadvantages for sport clubs in Lund’s Municipality to become environmentally sustainable?

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4. Literature review

This literature review aims to identify relevant topics, which are going to be utilised in the research. The literature review is primarily based on American research since we were not able to identify much relevant European research, hence the choice of research topic and a justification of the project. The literature about environmental sustainability is primarily on professional sport club level in the United States. These professional sport clubs are far away from the sport entities explored in this research, yet it is our responsibility to build the connection between the literature and the reality of the explored entities. Every topic is finished with a summary of how we want to apply the literature into the research analysis. Even if this could have been placed in the methodology section, we have decided that it is more logical to place it after the respective sections in order to assist the reader to understand the connection immediately, rather than risking that the reader has to scroll between the two sections during the reading.

4.1 Sustainable development

Environmental sustainability is an individual pillar under the umbrella term of sustainable development. Sustainable development is one out of three pillars, with the other two being the economic pillar and the social pillar (United Nations, 2013). Historically, sustainable development emerged in the beginning of the 1980s. The concept emerged as a response to the growing gap between human activities, environmental concerns, and socio-political concerns about human development issues around the world. A growing consciousness about the ecological consequences of what human activities caused and the equality it entailed was built up by politicians. It led to an increasing awareness in wealthy western nations (Robinson, 2004). From the beginning, many environmentalists expressed scepticism about the sustainability movement, criticising the failing approach to acknowledge important environmental goods, virtues, and duties (DesJardins, 2016).

The three pillars within sustainable development entail their own elements that define the pillars, but they intersect in many ways, especially, when businesses and sport clubs have to prioritise between the pillars. The terms are used in different ways by different individuals. Some emphasising development through environmental protection, while others claim that sustainable development is a contradictory concept since they argue that economic and environmental development cannot be achieved at the same time. Environmentalists claim that economic growth destroys the natural planet,

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while some businesses perceive economic development as a prerequisite for environmental development (Dresner, 2008). This ambiguity is also addressed by Drexhage and Deborah (2010) who emphasise that the dominant view of businesses and governments is that economic growth is fundamental to raise living standards all around the globe and break the link between poverty and environmental degradation. A richer world is able to develop markets and technology that are able to create a more ecologically stable world. A view that seemingly is shared by economic growing nations as Republic of Korea and India. Several dilemmas have appeared since the late 19th century. When the knowledge about the serious environmental consequences became evident, it entailed dilemmas on how human beings could manage the sustainable development balance without compromising the living standards. A spiritual view developed with focus on preserving natural areas and preserving resources in general later human use. The preservationists attempted to disseminate the message that human beings needed to adapt to new ways of living. They pointed out that overpopulation and overconsumption were the major issues for the environment and these elements together are major threats for both the climate and the natural resources for future generations. Environmental sustainability versus economic sustainability also intersects with social sustainability. The report from the Brundtland Commission indicated that environmental sustainability cannot be achieved if the problem of poverty is not successfully addressed. If poverty is not successfully addressed, it causes problems for people with a low education level. Missing knowledge about the impact of re-cycling, garbage sorting etc., and lack of environmental-promoting technologies hinders environmental improvements in large parts of the world. The wealthy countries need to take responsibility for third world countries in order to achieve environmental sustainability, according to the report (Robinson, 2004).

The most commonly used definition of sustainable development also suggests that sustainable development can be perceived any different ways:

“Development that meets the need of current generations without comprising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (WCED, 1987, p. 45).

This definition can be perceived as vague and allows individuals to interpret and adapt the definition into their own purposes (Drexhage & Deborah 2010; Robinson 2004). No universal agreement on what sustainable development means exists (Kates, Parris, & Lieserowitz, 2005).

But it has also gained currency in the private sector and it often appears by businesses engaging in cooperate social responsibility (CSR). Several voluntary initiatives have followed since and have

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been formed over the last twenty years, including the World Business Council on Sustainable Development and the Global Compact etc. In sport, these commitments appear in several areas. The most impactful area is the Olympics. The London Olympics 2012 was the first Olympic Games to have an independent assurance body to provide strategic assurance and to monitor the sustainability commitments made by the Olympic committee. The Commission of Sustainable London 2012 delivered working programs of annual thematic reviews, recommendations, and case studies. The purpose was to act as a “critical friend” and ensure that the Games were as sustainable as possible (Simmons, 2013). The London Olympics’ planning of the Games was embossed by sustainable considerations. Past learnings of work methods were applied to the construction work, in order to secure sustainable construction process along with execution and sustainable facilities (Green & Theodoraki, 2013). Specifically, the construction of the Olympic Park and the Olympic village were built with considerations of sustainable utilisation for the future, especially with the environment in mind (Simmons, 2013). The Olympic Park was designed to be transformative in many aspects by making it “a blueprint for sustainable living”.

Other examples of how The London Olympics was able to address the social pillar in sustainable development is through a regeneration of low socio-economic areas in East-London, by staging the Olympic Games in this area of the city. The aim was to provide local people with significant general improvements of well-being and health, education, job opportunities, housing, social integration, cultural entitlements, skills, training etc. One of the objections was to position The United Kingdom, and especially the South-East of London, as the beacon site in the globally competitive environmental technology sector, by hosting sustainable Games (Hayes & Horne, 2011). Among the initiatives, a template for low carbon living in East-London was designed along with the social, economic, and infrastructural problems. The social issues addressed in East-London were among others to inspire the locals to become healthier and fitter, which aimed to make positive personal changes to promote a more environmental and efficient lifestyle for citizens in the area. These projects were initiated with good intentions and clear objections (Hayes & Horne, 2011).

However, there is weak evidence that facilitation of mega-events directly influences and promotes increased lifestyle changes (Cox, 2013). Even though a huge effort to carry out sustainable Games with focus to reduce the carbon footprint was made, there might be more into hosting sustainable Games. The eager to host sustainable Games exceeded the budget around three times. The original budget was estimated at 2.4 billion pounds but ended up with a budget of 9 billion pound. Hayes and Horne (2011) argue that this exceeding of the budget is economic unsustainable, but it indicates that

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there is an increasing awareness within sport on sustainable development, even though there are multiple definitions in businesses and governments.

However, the increased awareness for sustainable development in the private sector entails several issues. Sustainable development is difficult to define and being sustainable does not entail tangible and universal measurement goals in practice. Sustainable development language is being used by some companies to promote unsustainable activities. It makes it difficult for the public to recognise sustainable products. This concept is called “fake greenery” or “cosmetic environmentalism”. The lack of definition and the lack of measurements make it possible for businesses to claim that a particular product is green, environmental responsible, or socially responsible. In addition, sustainability is integrated across different sectors. Governments alone neither have the capacity nor the will to accomplish sustainability alone. Cooperation with the private sector, other countries, and NGO’s is required to succeed. Innovative solutions of technologies and smarter utilisation of the planet’s resources are needed to achieve sustainability (Robinson, 2004). The dispute between environmentalists and economists about what sustainability entails, tend to bring tensions between the parties, which could be a hinder for a common future improvement that will benefit both sides. Environmentalists tend to present the worst-case scenario, while economists tend to present the best- case scenario. Both sides do not consider that there might be other scenarios, and this polarisation prevents that both sides could utilise each other with complete solutions (Dresner, 2008).

4.1.1 Dilemmas of addressing all perspectives of sustainable development

To become environmentally sustainable is not necessarily a simple decision. As the section above illustrates, it is important for sport clubs and businesses in general to consider their own economic situation, as well as the social challenges that need to be addressed. Selecting the organisation’s CSR strategy contains deselection as well. The most common focus in terms of sport clubs’ CSR strategy is the social pillar of sustainable development. CSR practices have been carried out in many years with a large amount of know-how within the area to follow (Levermore, 2010). Thus, social efforts are safe choices to make when the CSR topic is strategically pointed out.

Economic considerations are always vital when money is going to be invested in CSR activities. Economic sustainability is a constant point of attention for sport clubs and businesses (Kates, Parris, & Lieserowitz, 2005). The economic awareness and the know-how from social sustainability potentially hinder sport organisations to adopt environmental sustainability efforts. It can initially be

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costly and require many resources to manage (DesJardins, 2016), especially for organisations that rent their facilities from the municipality. Leaders of sport organisations with awareness of the environment prefer to work with economic or social sustainability instead due to lack of resources or know-how, even with a true desire to address the environment (DesJardins, 2016).

The previous section illustrates many dilemmas and potential reasons why sport organisations deselect environmental efforts. We are going to explore the organisations’ considerations of potentially adopting environmental sustainability, in order understand how the sport organisations can work with environmental promoting activities.

4.2 Environmental sustainability

Environmental sustainability is a growing phenomenon within sport. More sport organisations have become more aware of environmental issues in the later years, and environmentally sustainable initiatives now reflect a broader trend of environmentalism than ever before (Mallen & Chard, 2011). The increasing environmental responsibility is governed by changing societal values and increasing expectations from stakeholders. Besides the expectations from stakeholders, rising institutional pressures and expectations have led sport organisations to adapt into a new way of working with CSR. It is called Environmental CSR or cooperate environmental responsibility (CER) and means that sport organisations have adopted environmental initiatives to improve their organisation, not only on an operational basis, but at a strategic level as well. Several semi-professional and professional sport organisations establish strategic planning of the environmental work, which not only benefit the natural environment and the stakeholders but benefit the sport organisations as well. Economic benefits are related to environmental responsibility through cost saving, media attention, unconventional sponsorships etc. The institutional pressures do not only appear in an intangible manner. There is an ongoing development of legislation and demands from local or national institutions that sport organisations need to respond to. However, many sport organisations are still indifferent to sports’ impact on the environment, even though the sport sector and the natural environment have a bidirectional relationship (Trendafilova & Nguyen, 2015).

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4.2.1 The role of sport in environmental sustainability

Sport organisations have an important role in the global environmental transformation and possess ethical reasons to act in favour of the natural environment. Every business, independent of branch, is interested in profit and growth. The speed of growth entails consequences for the natural environment with elimination of number of fisheries, forest degradation, ocean, beach and air pollution, and global warning being a small number of listed consequences. Sport organisations, especially professional sport clubs, often have a close relationship with the local community and its fans and own the ability to change behaviour of people, since fans with feelings for the club perceive the initiatives to be more legitimate and trustworthy. Fans are more likely to respond to the club’s initiatives rather than interventions from governments. The sport clubs can utilise the close relationship to transform their environmental operations at their own facilities and beyond (Greenhalgh & Drayer, 2010; Trendafilova & Nguyen, 2015). It is in line with behavioural study from Book and Carlsson (2011) who refer to a study with indications that sport clubs are able to affect their fans. An American study on consumer behaviour showed that women are willing to pay an additional $3 if the sport club or the facility own a sustainable ecological profile. A similar study was conducted by Greenhalgh and Drayer (2010) on fan behaviour in relation to CSR at the National Football League (NFL) team Philadelphia Eagles. Results showed that fans, regardless of income, were willing to pay an environmental sustainability fee to support the Eagles’ ecological initiatives.

Businesses generally have a larger customer base than sport organisations. Some businesses might have direct contact with their customers, although the customer base is relatively small and unchanging, while other businesses, especially manufacturing firms, have little contact with their customers. It makes the conditions of changing customer behaviour difficult. Opposite businesses, many sport organisations both have direct and continuous contact with their costumers and continuously inflow of customers that purchase the sport organisations services. Professional sport clubs, semi-professional sport clubs, and grass-root sport clubs all communicate directly with their fans and members. Thereby, they have the opportunity to engage fans and members at their own facilities and beyond their facilities, due to general interaction or existing fan engagement. The clubs often own a relatively large fan or/and member base, which the clubs can benefit from in several settings. It provides sport organisations with opportunities to be environmentally sustainable and affect the fan and member base in the activities which several other businesses do not have. In some cases, the strategy to engage fans and members is not relatively simple. Sport clubs can take a strong stand in favour of environmental sustainability along with increased environmental responsibility

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management. By transmitting its environmental sustainability goals to the fan or member base, and by letting the customers know that they are committed to goals, sport clubs have the ability to affect stakeholders in an ecological way. However, it also has to be underlined with efforts to accomplish the goals (Ioakimidis, Stergioulas, & Tripolitsioti, 2006). There is little evidence that sport clubs can change fans and members’ behaviour by taking the environmental stewardship role. According to Casper, Pfahl and McCullough (2017) and Trendafilova and McCullough (2018) studies showed that spectators for sport events in The United States of America (USA) expected the athletic department to have an environmental action plan and to launch sustainable initiatives. The research indicates that sport has a legitimate platform for behavioural change and to influence everyday fan behaviour. However, sport fans are more likely to adopt the environmental norms at the sport facility rather than adopting similar practices at home.

Sport clubs with a fan base, that have a desire to reach fans with environmental initiatives, come from an eager to contribute, but institutional pressure also plays a part in why sport clubs choose to adopt environmental initiatives. The United Nations, for example, wants sport organisations to use their social platform to influence the fans positively in environmentally sustainable behaviours (United Nations, 2019). Even with many successful projects and efforts by sport clubs to reach the fans, the clubs are dependent on whether or not fans care about environmental efforts, or whether they become inspired to make a difference if the clubs are able to move the behavioural change successfully from the club facilities into the homes of the fans. However, Casper, McCullough and Pfahl (2019) question how big an influence clubs have on promoting at-home environmental behaviours, although their studies suggest that there is some success, which is in line with Trendafilova and McCullough (2018). Furthermore, results from a study from Casper, McCullough and Pfahl (2019) suggest that there are several methods in which sport managers can increase fan participation with sustainability initiatives and promote sustainable behaviours among fans. One of the most essential methods is creating messages that target its fans, promoting sustainable behaviours. It requires that sport managers understand their fan segments better when it comes to sustainability initiatives. The study was focused on in-venue messaging but indicates that messaging entails a significant effect on fan behaviour. The study also indicates that targeted communication towards fans can have an impact beyond the sporting venue. However, it is important to emphasise that grass-root sports clubs are different.

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McCullough and Cunningham (2010) conducted a study on recycling behaviour in relation to sport events. Spectators are more willing to recycle if they have the impression that other spectators are recycling, too, and if the spectators are sensing that other spectators want them to recycle. If spectators experience that recycling is the norm, more spectators feel obligated to follow the majority. This behaviour change can be fostered by the hosting sport club. As mentioned, the data on spectator engagement in environmentally friendly activities is limited and calls for further research (Ioakimidis, Stergioulas, & Tripolitsioti, 2006).

A professional sport team’s day-to-day operation is associated with a huge climate footprint. For example, the 2006 Super Bowl played in Detroit, the USA produced five hundred tons of greenhouse gas carbon dioxide, which include all from transportation to utility usage. At FIFA World Cup 2006 in Germany, each match used up to three million kilowatt-hours of energy, which is similar to the annual consumption of seven hundred European households, with the following five to ten tons of trash. The 2004 Olympics in Athens produced half a million ton in two weeks, which is comparable to a city of one million people emits over a similar period. Schmidt (2006) claims that the abovementioned environmental footprints entail an obligation by sport organisations to address these challenges. Unfortunately, not all sport organisations and their stakeholders are aware of the potential contribution a sport tournament has on climate change (Book & Carlsson, 2011). Sport is generally associated with public health and several other positive outcomes. According to Holman (2012) poor air quality contradicts sport, and poor air quality is traditionally following with a larger sport event. Outdoor athletes could risk inhaling polluted air, which can affect an athlete’s general health as well as the competitive performance. Holman (2012) argues that sport should consider these negative consequences from a human perspective, such as the 2012 London Olympics did. It was the first “public transport Games” where the infrastructure made it difficult to drive to the facilities by car, since no parking lot was constructed in addition to the sport venues. These infrastructural decisions entail a future impact of the way of travelling around in the city for the future.

Cox (2013) argues that sport organisations, especially organisations hosting mega events, should be an appropriate platform to promote environmentally sustainable efforts with concrete actions to follow. Sport fans are more likely to relate to environmental activities if the sport event is labelled as a “green game”. An increased awareness towards the environment is an outcome as well (Casper, McCullough, & Pfahl, 2019).

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4.2.2 The role of the sport clubs in Lund’s Municipality

Section 4.2.1 concerned sport clubs’ impact on fans in terms of raised environmental awareness. Popular sport clubs have better capacity than normal commercial companies to change peoples’ behaviour due to the club’s popularity and their close relations and interaction with supporters.

Far from all sport clubs in Lund’s municipality are semi-professional or professional, but all clubs have one thing in common – they have members, i.e., individuals that take part in the clubs sporting activities several times a week. It is not only the members that develop a close relationship with the club. Especially in the children’s department of the sport, parents are involved through their children. Members, who are a part of the club as well as their parents, arguably have the tightest relationship possible with the clubs, hence the relevance of section 4.2.1. Section 4.2.1 does not provide a complete representative picture of the reality of sport clubs in Lund’s municipality, but it leads us to investigate how the clubs, the local sport federation, and the municipality perceive the influence from the clubs to their stakeholders in order to value the advantages and disadvantages of the clubs’ potential future desire to act environmentally sustainable.

4.3 Environmental ethics in sport

There are three ethical grounds of environmental sustainability according to Rosenberg (2018). Most people agree that negative environmental impacts exist through growth in population, pollution, biodiversity, common lifestyle etcetera. However, exactly how much the natural environment is affected by the abovementioned factors leads to disagreement. Several schools of environmental ethics have been developed due to this disagreement (Rosenberg, 2018).

The three schools are “The dark green”, “The mid-green”, and “The light green”.

The dark green, or the Eco-centric, has a holistic perspective entailing several strands. The general approach allows non-human interests and values to prevail with incorporated ideas linked to the integrity of human and non-human species and eco-systems. The dark green approach is a non- anthropocentric perspective, meaning that all sorts of life on Earth are given an equal value in principle. This perspective does not distinguish between a wolf or an ant, a human or an eagle. The difference between the species is that humans have an obligation, since they are the only species with the ability to reflect upon their role in the larger eco-system (Loland, 2006).

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The mid-green, or intermediate ethics, is mainly an anthropocentric approach to nature, but with recognition of the more intrinsic value of remaining sentient beings. However, when conflicts between human and non-human interests occur, humans judge their own view and needs to be more focal. Several strands exist within the mid-green approach with two strands being central. One of the strands is occupied by people who believe that all human beings should become vegetarians and experimentations with animals should cease to exist. The other significant strand underlines the importance that all spices feel pain and suffer, thus the main focus is to liberate animals (Rosenberg, 2018).

The last approach, which is the light green, is a pure anthropocentric view, meaning that this approach represents a human-centred perspective and is called the light green approach or shallow ethics. The nature exists for the sake of human beings, and all values are created for and by humans. Every ecological discussion, concerning non-human beings, benefits humans, along with the usage of the Earth, which always involves human-centred priorities and interests. It is critical to secure future human generations with the same possibilities as the current generation. People occupying the light- green approach believe that if requirements on sustainability are met, environmental and economic sustainability will benefit from new technologies, which secure that both aspects can be met and human life can continue to indefinitely with human individuals being able to flourish, and human cultures can develop as long as they build on the ideas of complexity and diversity (Loland, 2006; Rosenberg, 2018).

4.3.1 Environmental ethics in the sport clubs of Lund’s Municipality

Participants in the interviews will be asked to relate to their own and the organisation’s environmental ethics. The ethical position will assist us to discover the potential willingness by sport clubs to work more environmentally sustainable, and to what extend they are able to adopt environmental practices.

4.4 Cooperate social responsibility in sport

Sport is an industry such as a stakeholder in the institutional environment. The sport industry has a role to shape sport organisations’ behaviour in areas of social, economic, and ecological perspectives. The sport world has the same responsibility as companies, and the sport world has, during the years, started to work more with implementation of CSR initiatives at different levels. Both in large events,

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in professional sport, and even in local sport organisations (Levermore, 2010; Robinson, 2005; Seth & Babiak, 2010). The sport world is showing that social initiatives mostly have been associated with a CSR perspective (Persson & Normark, 2009).

Persson & Normark (2009) compared how the communication of social responsibility in Allsvenskan in Sweden (highest ranked male football league) differed between the organisations. The result showed that professional and commercialised organisations are working more with presentation and social responsibility as they reach out to the society more frequently compared to less professional ones. The reason is not presented, but it is mentioned that CSR is more common in sport organisations today compared to ten years ago. Especially, social integration has been in focus in the CSR work, which includes following good strategies and being able to reach the social part of CSR, and to be a part of a core organisation. Sport organisations are working with CSR projects, since sport entails important attributes and act as a role model in the development of the society. Sport organisations in Sweden own high responsibilities as actors to contribute, and it is important to consider the target groups and how to reach out to them. Establishing trust and building relations are needed to collaborate with CSR projects among businesses, but also to create an image which should be part of building the brand in an organisation. It is important with clear aims of what the organisation wants to accomplish with the project, and to point out the target groups already in the beginning.

Levermore (2010) mentions that it is more common that sport is a vehicle when deploying CSR programmes for international development initiatives. CSR occurring at all levels, both at a large- scale event like the Olympics and the FIFA World Cup, and at a minor local level. Sport is used in businesses through having CSR initiatives, and the article explores in which sports. A highlight of the opportunities and limitations by doing CSR through sport is also presented, as well as the potentials that sport marked as a social platform is utilised in CSR in the world. Sport has potential to reach out to people and has powerful social contribution. It has also a tendency to have a huge impact of people’s lives when it comes to health, gender, diseases, environmental sustainability, integration, and conflict resolution. CSR in sport through business can only be used in some situations and cannot reach out to all people. Limitations through sport and CSR are that some cases depict sport as a product that can be associated with cheating, corruption, and exclusionary practices. Exclusion can appear since sport can show the picture of wealth and poverty.

Over the years, the sport industry has been developed, and it has become more professional. More sport organisations are using CSR and are working with the initiatives in social, economic, and

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environmental dimensions (Moyo, Duffet, & Knott, 2020). CSR also occurs on all levels in grass- root sport organisations. The focus is often to be difference maker in the local area and in collaboration with the municipalities. That indicates that even amateur sport organisations have experiences in the CSR area, either consciously or unconsciously (Kolyperas, 2012). Kolyperas (2012) investigates the importance of CSR aspects (communication, development, and integration with other strategies) across different football clubs and cultures. A club has unique social responsibilities. The study is not limited to segments; hence it explores CSR activities associated with 38 football clubs. The study showed that CSR initiatives are umbrellas, since it can be protection to cover up the corporate irresponsibility, illegitimate actions, and business issues that can be sensitive. On the other hand, the CSR initiatives are planned initiatives with collaboration, participation, and a long-term involvement. This turns the umbrella upside down and provides a support or a benevolence of future purposes.

4.4.1 Cooperate social responsibility and sport in Lund’s Municipality

Section 4.4 describes CSR in sport and the importance of the role of the sport industry as it can affect many people. The previous research shows that CSR initiatives occur at all levels in the sport world, at large sport events, in professional clubs as well as in local sport organisations. LM has many sport organisations, some of them are semi-professional or professional at senior level (Arfwidsson, 2021). There is also a variety of different sports which results in many members, members’ parents, sponsors, collaboration partners, and other stakeholders affected by the sport industry.

Section 4.4 illustrates how sport organisations have worked with CSR initiatives in the past. CSR is a relevant topic to this research, since environmental sustainability activities in sport varies between pure CSR, CER, and for business reasons in order to earn or save money (McCullough, Pelcher, & Trendafilova, 2020). Therefore, it is reasonable to include the CSR angle in this research and explore this research’s interviewed sport clubs’ considerations about how they perceive their approach to environmental sustainability. In that relation, CSR is a way that many sport clubs are familiar with, as this section illustrates and thereby, CSR literature can be useful in our data analysis.

The CSR literature reviewed in this section is assumable in a larger scale than sport clubs in Lund’s municipality are capable of doing, but the considerations and processes can be scaled down to a manageable level in our analysis.

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4.4.2 Cooperate social responsibility and sustainability

Investments in environmental sustainability efforts can be perceived either as investment in the future to reduce costs, or as an investment in the brand in the local community. The last option is associated with CSR. Environmental sustainability is a pillar in sustainable development (World Comission on Environment and Development, 1987). The sport is focusing on facilities and sport events and is having many people at the same place at the same time in a confined space over a small period. Depending on which sport it is, it can affect the environment in different ways (Chernushenko, 1994; Smith & Westerbeek, 2007)

The environmental responsibility is important for companies to adopt, even in the sport industry. To succeed with CER, sport organisations must have the ability to reach the community. CER initiatives are important since protection of the natural environment is necessary. It is important to identify all environmental responsibilities within a sport organisation as it may create opportunities for cost savings in the end and even enhance the image and brand (Ioakimidis, Stergioulas, & Tripolitsioti, 2006). Everything counts regarding the sport facility and the environmental sustainability as use of energy, needs of venue, team traveling, field maintenance, or if it has to do with a huge sport event. The climate footprints, that negatively affect our environment, happen at different levels. Examples of environmental actions that can be adopted are through incorporation of energy efficient photovoltaic solar panels, ‘green roof’ on facilities, water-conserving-fixtures, recycled building materials, bicycle parking, and convenient access for public transit users and pedestrians (Green Sport Aliance, 2021). Through CSR initiatives, it is possible to learn more about environmental sustainability, and if the initiative is succeeding, it can create a behaviour that can be standardised (Trendafilova, Babiak, & Heinze, 2012).

Sport organisations are adopting more CER initiatives, since the society, to a higher degree, is expecting sustainable and climate actions than it has done in the past (Moyo, Duffet, & Knott, 2020). Adjizian (2020) demonstrates the relationship between a CER initiative and the community. This, to identify the development and that it may be positive at some level. Professional sport clubs with good development strategies have a better chance to succeed with CER initiatives, but there is also a negative effect on communities. CSR in sport usually focuses on social sustainability, and the knowledge level is relatively high within social sustainability.

Professional sport organisations in North America create a standardised behaviour in the organisations, even when it comes to bigger events, by working with environmental activities. By

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having CER initiatives, an organisation communicates the importance to all the stakeholders involved in the organisation. This behaviour can result in a trend of initiatives in CER (Barret, Bunds, Casper, & Edwards, 2019).

Trendafilova, Babiak and Heinze (2012) explore environmental sustainability and the effect of it in professional sport clubs and leagues in North America. The data was collected by conducting interviews with sport executives and partner groups through the clubs’ websites and organisational documents. The collected data showed result of a behaviour in the sport clubs with respect to the environmental management. Media is a key in environmental initiatives since it creates an involvement in the professional clubs. The environmental management affect the organisations and the leagues when working with those CSR initiatives, as it may result in saving money, and building stronger relationships with sponsors/stakeholders. Stakeholders are their fans, local communities, corporate partners, and local communities. It is not only the clubs that are affected by CER initiatives. The society is also affected by a diffused behaviour that can influence other sectors to work more with it, too.

4.4.3 Cooperate social responsibility and sustainability in Lund’s Municipality

Section 4.4.2 describes CSR, CER, and the initiatives that may be developed through sport. Different sport organisations have different environmental footprints. There might be more CER initiatives in this area which can affect and change behaviours among individuals’ part of the sport industry. LM and their sport organisations are working to reach the ambition of a climate neutral 2030. Sport is a part of the municipality and the work since it is a way to reach out to all people in the municipality by having CER initiatives in the sport organisations. Not in the same scale as the previous research mention since limited money is involved in the explored grass-root sport clubs. However, even small changes can be good for the nature. With CER projects among sport clubs in Lund’s municipality, they can support each other to obtain more knowledge about environmental sustainability. We will explore the interest of CER projects in sport organisations, RFS, and in the municipality of Lund and also what kind of support they expect to get from each other.

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4.5 Climate actions

Environmental awareness is subject to increased attention among businesses. A study from Maignan and Ralston (2002) showed that the majority of businesses in The Netherlands, France, the United Kingdom, and the United States mentions the environment as a concern for the company. The awareness is shared by sport organisations, especially for outdoor sports whose main business is dependent on the natural environment (Ioakimidis, Stergioulas, & Tripolitsioti, 2006).

Earlier cases illustrate how some sport organisations are aware of the environment through environmental actions, and how these actions could lead to positive interventions. There are a few sport federations that have established policies to internally promote environmental responsibility within their league. The sport federations have begun to integrate various initiatives to reduce their environmental impact, but sport in general is still in the initial movement of environmental sustainability (McCullough & Kellison, 2018). Leagues are trying to expand an understanding of the negative impact sport clubs have on the natural environment addressed by relevant strategies in order to mitigate the impact. This newer CER movement is driven by increased engagement and changing societal values with increasing expectations from various stakeholders. An interview with a senior sport executive indicated that seeking legitimacy by conforming to institutional pressures and expectations was one of the main reasons that affected the motivation to adopt to environmental practices. Furthermore, CER practices entailed economic benefits for a sport organisation. Institutional pressure is a world-wide phenomenon within CER. For example, FIFA has established a “Green Goal Program” which aims to organise a climate-neutral World Cup. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) decided to incorporate the environment as the third pillar of Olympism, with sport and culture being the other two. The United Nations and The IOC are actively promoting sustainable sport by focusing on cooperate environmental responsibility through global forums on sport and the environment (Trendafilova & Nguyen, 2015).

Campbell (2006) emphasises the institutional mechanisms as a major factor for sport organisations engaging in environmental sustainability. CER behaviour is most likely to occur if strong and well- enforced regulations are in place along with effective and well-organised industrial self-regulations. Furthermore, it requires a broad number of institutional and economic conditions in order to attract sport organisations to CER. Sport organisations are more likely to act responsibly when normative standards, which are widely accepted by society, support such behaviour (Babiak & Trendafilova, 2011).

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Although, leagues initiate institutional programmes that sport teams feel compelled to act on, many pro-environmental initiatives have seen daylight. In North America, the four major sport leagues (National Football League, National Hockey League, National Basket Association, and Major League Baseball) have each established environmental programme. One of the environmental leading teams in North America is the National Football League (NFL) club Philadelphia Eagles. Their stadium is the first in The United States which is capable to of generating one hundred percent of its energy from renewable sources. The energy is acquired from solar panels, biodiesel, natural gas generator, and wind turbines. The Eagles also has a comprehensive recycling programme which entails recycling of plastic, aluminium, and paper products. The San Antonio Spurs in The National Basket Association (NBA) relies upon environmental initiatives as their main CSR platform, by purchasing wind energy to power their stadium and training facilities. Other teams around the major sport leagues in North America are also in for CER, with examples of actions being water-conserving fixtures, bicycle parking, recycled building materials and convenient access for public transit users (Trendafilova & Nguyen, Corporate Social Responsibility and the environment, 2015).

Environmental issues are also addressed by mega-events, like FIFA World Cup, and it also entails dilemmas. For the upcoming FIFA World Cup in Qatar in 2022, the tournament highly relies on natural gas to supply a majority of its activities. Natural gas is the primary and abundant energy resource located, and enormous quantities of natural gas are available. Due to the abundancy, and since the government provides subsidies for energy consumption, the gas price level in Qatar is at a low level, which causes very high energy consumption per capita. With access to high amount of natural gas, and with a mega-event coming up, Qatar has to consider how they are able to ensure that such energy consumption is operated with help from cleaner technologies in order to reduce the carbon footprint. This “obligation” to create more environmentally friendly solutions is not just to keep the carbon footprint at a low level during the tournament, but it is as important to leave a legacy of energy clean technologies that future World Cups are able to develop upon. Similar dilemmas go for water and food consumption. Qatar has limited few water resources, but the general water consumption is at a high level. The arrival of millions of people in the country will put the limited water resources under enormous stress. The host is facing a real challenge to ensure that there will be no water shortage, with an adequate supply of water without depleting the remnant of underground water in the rainless country of Qatar. Qatar also has small resources on food, due to a little food production. The host must consider how they are able feed all the athletes and tourists without major food waste issues (Talavera, Al-Ghamdi, & Koc, 2019).

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General areas professional sport clubs focus on, in terms of environmental actions are recycling, water conservation, leadership in energy and environmental design, waste reduction and energy efficiency (Barret, Bunds, Casper, & Edwards, 2019). The types of initiative differ from organisation to organisation, and their climate actions depend on the facilities they have available. Sustainable facility solutions have been developed by some sport organisations or an external owner (municipality e.g., although more solutions are needed, along with further development on existing solutions. According to Mallen and Chard (2011), the most effective adjustment an organisation can address its facilities on are noise and light pollution, consumption of non-renewal resources (fuel, metals etc.), waste generation from construction of facilities and from spectators’ consumption of natural resources (water, paper, food etc.), soil erosion during construction and from spectators, emission of greenhouse gases by consuming electricity, and fuel and soil and water pollution from pesticide use.

Motivations to pursue some of the mentioned solutions differentiate are two broad forms for CER in sport. 1) operational business practices (OBP) entailing day-day actions with high commitment. The implementation of OBP is a function of facility managers who respond to several motivating factors, e.g. financial cost-benefit, stakeholder pressure and competitiveness. 2) Campaign-based programs which are planned for one period at a time with low engagement. Campaign-based programs deliver focussed event, campaign, or program-centred activities, often motivated by legitimacy among stakeholders. These campaigns are often a product of community relations and/or professional team foundations (Trendafilova & Nguyen, Corporate Social Responsibility and the environment, 2015).

Kotler and Lee (2005) have developed a categorical framework of corporate social initiatives (CSI), which is relevant for CER as well. The categorial framework serves the aim of supporting social causes and to fulfil commitments to CSR. The categorial framework entails six categories of CSI. 1) Cause leverage of corporate resource to increase awareness and concern about social cause. 2) Case- related marketing establishes product sales and donations. 3) Corporate social marketing with focus on consumer behaviour change by targeted campaigns on societal issues. 4) Community volunteering/employee engagement, by encouraging staff to volunteer with non-profit organisations (NGO). 5) Cooperate philanthropy, which involves direct contribution from a cooperation to a charity cause. 6) Socially responsible business practices with the aim of improve well-being in a community and to protect the environment. These six categories are assessed by the professional sport organisations either consciously or unconsciously before engaging with CER and CSR in general.

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4.5.1 Climate actions of sport organisations in Lund’s Municipality

Section 4.5 illustrates some of the concrete climate actions conducted by sport organisations. The climate actions are going to be utilised in the research process, where the mentioned climate actions in section 4.5 act as inspiration in the data collection process and in the data analysis section. We are aware that these solutions are not necessarily one-hundred percent comparable to sport clubs in Lund’s municipality, however, the climate actions can be scaled-down to an appropriate and an applicable context. The applied literature in the previous section is applied due to the small amount of research on community sport (Miragaia, Ferreira, & Ratten, 2017), and since we have not been able to locate adequately amount of research on grass-root sport. However, the previous section will support the upcoming research by adding examples, as we can utilise in the interviews. The potential considerations of potential climate actions are addressed as well. These considerations can be utilised in the data collection process by testing the interview participants awareness of the tendencies, which are calling for environmental actions.

4.6 Three waves of environmental sustainability

The sport industry is behind many other sectors in terms of the development of environmental sustainability. The progression of environmental performance in the sport sector is falling behind due to sport practitioners not engaging and committing to the effort in fear of failing to meet the expectations from stakeholders. At least for professional sport clubs, they have the privilege to apply for membership in organisations like the Green Sport Alliance. A membership in such organisation provides sport clubs with the opportunity to signal their intentions even with sporadic engagement. Researchers have identified that sustainability reporting was not motivated by pragmatism, economic rationalism and a mindset to solve global issues. Sustainability efforts are utilised to communicate in order to increase the value of the organisation and to strengthen the organisation’s reputation and cooperate social position. (McCullough, Pelcher, & Trendafilova, 2020).

However, not all sport clubs are professional and have the opportunity to apply for membership in the Green Sport Alliance, for instance. These clubs can be inspired by figure 4.1 describing the development of an organisation in an environmental sustainability development. Figure 4.1 and the following text is based on the research from McCullough, Pfahl and Nguyen (2015).

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Figure 4.1 The green waves of environmental sustainability (McCullough, Pfahl, & Nguyen, 2015)

The concept of the three environmental waves is built upon the evaluation of common levels of environmental consciousness and complexity of the engagement of sport organisations, based on comparisons across several sport organisations. The environmental sustainability actions are measured from a temporary state, and both the actions and the sport organisations’ position within the wave system can progress and regress constantly.

4.6.1 Wave one

The first wave is launched precisely at the moment a sport organisation recognises the need to act. Whether it is due to external pressure or internal strategy does not matter. A consciousness among the board, leaders, or staff within the organisation begin to occur, and there is a growing desire within the organisation to address the environmental issues. The climate actions initiated in the first wave are low intensity activities. Easy access activities limited knowledge and competencies are often selected in order to jump onto the wave. Typical activities chosen are water reduction efforts, recycling programmes, and waste reductions. These activities are characterised by their ability to be measured relatively easy, along with their low expenses and low complexity degree. The activities are highly visible to stakeholders. However, research discovers that sport clubs are poor at communicating their environmental efforts, and few are measuring their activities (McCullough, Pelcher, & Trendafilova, 2020).

Wave one is a development step with awareness, knowledge, and consciousness is developed, and overall strategies take shape.

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4.6.2 Wave two

The first wave has provided the organisation with valuable knowledge. The organisation has had the opportunity to experiment with solutions which has increased the awareness. There has been growth in the general environmental activities. The organisation has improved the level of assessment and measurement to a more advanced level and the environmental activities are coordinated with external and internal stakeholders to a higher degree. Planning and resource allocation are getting more advanced as well. The major difference between the first and the second wave is that the organisation is moving their activities to a strategic level with planning becoming more formalised. The implementation is nearing a tactical level and measurement plays a central role. The gap between operating in wave one and wave two is significantly large, thus few sport organisations have reached the second wave yet. In order to reach the required level of knowledge to move forward, the organisation has to invest time, money, and resources. Not all sport organisations are willing to invest in environmental sustainability at present time (McCullough, Pfahl, & Nguyen, 2015).

4.6.3 Wave three

Environmental sustainability has become highly normative in this phase of the movement. The organisation operates at a strategic and tactical level, and the structure is in place. There is no finish line for the sport organisation since all processes and development have become automatic. The organisation operates at such a high level that they are able to act as an inspiration and a resource for its stakeholders, who share the ambitions of becoming environmentally sustainable. The organisation does not only attempt to address the sustainability questions internally but has developed the ultimate aim to change fans and members’ behaviour at the organisation’s facilities and beyond (McCullough, Pfahl, & Nguyen, 2015).

4.6.4 The impact of the environmental waves of sport clubs in Lund’s Municipality

There is limited research on member-based sport clubs in a European context, but the environmental wave system is universal and can be used by us to analyse which level the sport clubs in Lund’s municipality are operating at, in order to suggest how they are able to move forward. We assess the environmental wave system to most practical tool for sport clubs and provide us with a valid structure to suggest manageable and realistic future directions for sport clubs in Lund’s municipality.

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4.7 Sport policy and sport clubs

4.7.1 Political impact

There is a similarity between policies and culture in Scandinavian countries. There are some limitations and even opportunities to follow the organisational and political arrangements. To get all included in the sport sector is a challenge. And it is shown that adolescents quit organised sport, therefore, it is important to challenge the structures and institutional relationships to reach the political goals of the sport. Sport organisations must adapt the public policies more thoroughly with support from sport federations to reach a good physical health among the citizens (Skille, 2011).

The state and municipality have impact on sport and athletics. They influence the sport through legal and policy frameworks. The politics have power to affect the sport by being transferred in social relations, which the sport is about. By having a good political leadership, it can result in a transformation to change the view of a society. An example of this is when the impact of political pressure affects both the sport and athletes in Montenegro. The institutionalism shows that the authorities decision-making dominated policy framework can intact for many years. When there is a normative framework or an organisational structure, it can affect and limit an athlete’s development, which in the long term also reduces the democratic capacity of the sport movement (Begovic, Bardocz-Bencsik, Oglesby, & Doczi, 2020).

4.7.2 The state and the sport movement in Sweden

Public support of the sport is important in order to promote physical activity and health among citizens. Sport clubs engage people of all ages in sport activities and at different levels. Promoting sport and physical activities among young people will have a positive effect on health in Sweden. The sport policy goals are to give all people the opportunity to be physically active and perform sport to reach a good health, and to support an independent sport movement based on non-profit engagement. Then to give all people positive experiences with sport as an entertainment (Norberg, 2019).

The sport movement in Sweden is a movement that creates positive values for the society. Therefore, it is the state and municipality that have been actors to make the sport into being a huge part of the society, since they have supported in a manner that make it easier for the sport in different forms. The state in Sweden uses the sport as a tool to reach the Swedish government’s goals. The public support

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to the sport is distributed in various forms. Mainly, the support is from organisations supporting the sports members’ affiliates and chancellery, and activity support to the local sport clubs. Even support for development and projects. The municipalities contribute the sport financially of facilities, cash, subsides, and intangible support. All these different supports to the Swedish sport have different purposes (Norberg, 2019; Bergsgard & Norberg, 2010; Riksidrottsförbundet, 2019). The way the state and municipality are working relates to this thesis and LM because LM hope that the local sport clubs will contribute to achieve their stated goals. It is through the state that the financial contribution is distributed to the Swedish sport, then it is RFS’s responsibility; RFS receives the money as it will give to the sport clubs later. To secure that RFS distributes the support to the sport clubs, the state has some requirement that needs to be fulfilled.

A way to perceive sport policy is through governance, among others. The state is a” helping hand” to the sport movement traditionally. To reach the governance perspective, it would go with new support as a “handshake” instead. This means that the sport movement and the state come together to address common challenges in society (Norberg, 2019).

4.7.3 Network governance

Network governance is about steering. The network can be organisations, individuals, or teams. The steering is often built on social contract/policy and compromises and can be both internal and external. The arrangements can create dependency and interdependency in the non-profit sport sector, but in the end, it is often a result of the external pressure, which can be political or financial. Network governance is about strategies and structures, and to influence decisions and actions to the stakeholders. Governing through network governance is by having a good partnership and a collaboration between the stakeholders. The network mainly focuses on a strong relation between organisations, as in the sport world would be the governing bodies make decisions and actions that create value, which organisations will work from. Network governance implies that the boards need to act like leaders and work more with steering, which is going to create a better guiding for the sport organisations and a possibility to shape them to reach the value that is in the pipeline (King, 2017). The large multisectoral is an example of where network where network governance has good impact. The multisectoral organised and coordinated the relationships in the 2010 Olympic Games. It did this to clearly decide the stakeholders’ central network. The committee and government group are the

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main groups that are the actors steering and making the decisions that other stakeholders will work from (Parent, Rouillard, & Naraine, 2017).

Inglés-Yuba, Puig, and Labrador (2016) investigate the effect of collaborative network governance and sustainability in the protected mountain areas development. The result illustrates that if the network and collaboration work between the stakeholders, then the sustainable development is better in the protected mountain areas. The result shows that having a collaborative network, makes it possible to reach a better result to obtain a better sustainable development. The governance is like a hierarchical control with a combination of social coordination and with a network that is structured and with strategies.

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5. Theoretical Framework

Two theoretical frameworks are chosen to underpin the data analysis. 1) Institutional theory, and 2) Triple bottom line theory. The reasoning for the two chosen theories is elaborated below.

5.1 Institutional Theory

This research is anchored in the 2030 climate goals from LM. It is thereby relevant to choose a theoretical framework that makes it possible to analyse the data from the municipality’s point of view. Although this research also seeks to identify how sport clubs can operate with environmentally sustainable solutions, this research also seeks answers to how sport clubs can contribute to the municipality’s climate goals. LM has the ambition that every citizen must contribute to accomplish the goals (Lunds Kommun, 2020). Therefore, it is arguably the municipality’s responsibility to include every citizen within the municipality border, which makes new institutional theory relevant in order to analyse the data results. Institutional theory is also relevant since every participating organisation in this study are institutions.

There are four central features which define an institution. The following four features are based on the book from Peters (1999).

1) The most central part of an institution is that it has been stable and has existed for a long time. Stability could be understood in several ways. Stability could be in form of a group of people meeting up for a cup of coffee on the same day of the week, in the same place, and at the same time over a longer period, but it could also mean stability within an organisation. LM, as we know today, has existed since 1971 (Lunds Kommun, 2020).

2) The institution is a structural feature of the society- and/or polity. The structures could either be informal or formal. The informal structures are a set of shared norms, while the formal structures could consist of an agency in the public bureaucracy, a legal framework, or legislature.

3) An institution must have an effect on the behaviour of its members directly or indirectly through formal or informal structures, as mentioned above. The members should perceive the institution as important by attending its activities.

4) The members must share values and meaning in some sense. The central model of the institution is depending on a relatively common set of values.

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Both the municipality (Peters, 1999) and a sport club fulfil the features to a great extent.

The fourth feature is especially interesting from the municipality’s point of view. There are definitely shared values and meanings in many areas, but there are arguably different ethical standpoints regarding environmental sustainability (Rosenberg, 2018). Therefore, the municipality has to create a common set of values for all citizens in LM, in terms of the importance of contributing to the municipality’s climate goals. The fourth feature suggests that there must be shared values in some sense. For example, some people value the importance of Social CSR highly (Fehsenfeld, 2015), while others value the importance of public health highly (Rich & Evans, 2005). There are certainly also citizens in LM who value environmental sustainability as important. But according to LundaEko, the environmental sustainability document from LM (Lunds Kommun, 2020), every citizen must contribute to the climate goals, which means that every sport club in Lund must contribute as well. For LM, it entails a work over the next nine years to disseminate the importance of the local climate and that actions are needed. This could be done through the elements that new institutional theory entails, which are described in the four features above. The dissemination of values can be done through formal structures as legislation and the establishment of legal framework(laws), which is the most obvious option if a change in the population’s behaviour is needed. It could also be accomplished through informal structures, such as information and efforts which seek to voluntarily change people’s attitudes towards the environment and in favour of the climate goals. Either way, new institutional theory makes it possible to use the data to analyse how LM is able to succeed with their own ambition in relation to the sport clubs located in the city. In relation to sport, financial contribution from a municipality is a method to get sport clubs to do different projects in favour of the changes a government, or a municipality, wants (Sjoblom, 2015).

Since, both the municipality and a sport clubs are categorised as an institution, both institutions have the capacity to affect the behaviour of their members, as feature three suggests. In order for the municipality to succeed with the climate ambition, it has to be able to change its citizens’ climate behaviour and attitude. Here, institutional theory is an appropriate theory to analyse how and if the municipality is able to affect its citizens through the sport clubs.

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5.2 Triple bottom line

The triple bottom line term was coined by Elkington (1994) and is based on results from a survey of international experts in CSR and sustainable development. The results highlight the growth trend from 1999 to 2001 and show the CSR and SD framework. The Brundtland Report (UNWCED, 1987) was the initiator to express inevitable expansion of the environmental agenda of sustainability. The social and economic dimensions of the agenda would have to be addressed and integrated more from an environmental need. This as a start to put pressure on the businesses and help them to utilise the environmental part and start to work with their environmental issues (Elkington, 2004).

The triple bottom line is a way of assessing business performance based on the three dimensions; financial, social, and environmental. Many companies have adopted the theory to evaluate their performance in a broader perspective to create a better business value. Traditionally, businesses have only focused on the financial perspective, but in later years, the social and environmental pillar have become more important. The three dimensions are categorised as the three Ps: people, planet and profits. This development is an outcome of consumers’ willingness to pay more for a product if the product is manufactured under reasonable conditions where workers are paid with fair wages and manufactured in an environmentally friendly perspective (Slaper, 2011).

Figure 5.1 Triple Bottom Line 3P Formulation (Arslan & Kisacik, 2017)

The concept of triple bottom line mainstreams, and the idea of sustainability is including people, planet, and profit. Triple bottom line is about measurement of the business, and the three dimensions are measured in the following ways.

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1) Profit: The traditional measure of profit and loss account. The dimension presents the impact from an organisation’s operation application on the economic system and is focusing on value and growth of the economy. Companies should avoid financial problems and should be able to enable the economic sustainability and to provide a good benefit to the society. This through providing services and goods cheaper and with high quality (Arslan & Kisacik, 2017).

2) People: Measures how socially responsible a business is and has been throughout the history. It is about applications of fair to labour, human capital, and society. Ignoring companies’ social responsibility will have a negative effect on the performance, since the application of justice is important when wage system and health insurance are relevant as they add value to the society. Communication between managers and employees needs to be straight forward and in a clear manner (Arslan & Kisacik, 2017).

3) Planet: Measures how environmentally responsible the business is and has been in the past, this to not endanger environmental sources for the next generations. Measured environmentally responsibility is about the protection of humans’ health, quality of plants and animals, air, water, and soil, and all this is a scope of environmental sustainability. Companies should pay attention to this by having applications to follow to minimize the risk of damage to the environment (Arslan & Kisacik, 2017).

The theory suggests that businesses should put equal attention to the social and environmental dimension as they do to the financial part. This is the reason for choosing of this theory. This thesis focuses on how sport clubs in Lund’s municipality can contribute to achieve the municipalities climate ambition 2030, with environmental actions and initiatives. This theory is applied to give the data results an understanding on how the clubs can implement the environmental aspect by getting a result of where they are today in the three dimensions; economic, social, and environmental. Then it will be possible to present improvement needs for the sport clubs so they will be able to work from an environmental dimension in the future with the ambition to reach green manner, since LM is working towards the goal of reaching a climate neutral Lund in 2030. Therefore, this analysis is only applied in the data analysis themes where the sport clubs’ reality and possibilities are analysed.

We are aware that this theory is not fully applicable in the research, and it does not match the reality of the explored sport clubs. Arslan and Kisacik (2017) emphasise how the three different dimensions illustrated in figure 5.1 should be measurable. Few grass-root sports clubs have the ability to measure the social and the environmental dimensions. The theory is therefore adapted to some extent in order

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to underpin the analysis in the best possible way. The idea of all dimensions that can be measured is replaced with an idea of how the planet dimension can be measured.

The theory also suggests that all three dimensions weight equally in an organisation. That is not the case for the majority of grass-root sport clubs. The environmental dimension is not prioritised as highly as the profit and people pillar (Dresner, 2008). The use of the model is therefore adjusted to how the sport clubs are able to prioritise it more in the future, and what it takes to do it.

5.3 Application of theoretical frameworks

The two chosen theoretical frameworks serve two different purposes in the analysis. Institutional theory is the main theoretical framework, which appear mostly in the analysis. Institutional theory supports the analysis with how the different interviewed entities are able to govern their members towards an environmentally sustainable future. This is the baseline of the analysis. It is supported by the usage of network governance, which is applied to support the understanding of the analysis results. Network governance is placed under “previous literature”. It could have been applied as a theoretical framework, but we assess that it is not used adequately to be perceived as a theoretical framework.

Triple bottom line is applied to support the analysis by looking at how the different entities are able to work environmentally sustainable in the future. Triple bottom line illustrates the different elements the different entities have to account for on a daily basis, and how these both can support and hinder the environmentally sustainable work in an organisation.

In sum, another to outline the usage of theoretical framework is that institutional theory is used in a theoretical perspective, while triple bottom line is used to analyse the practical way forward.

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6. Methodology

6.1 Research Design

An exploratory research design is chosen for this research. An exploratory approach does not intend to provide a definitive answer on an existing problem. Usually, this design is chosen to study a problem that has not clearly been defined yet, or it undertakes investigation of a problem/phenomenon at a preliminary stage. The research design is usually conducted to determine the nature of a problem and seeks better understanding of the problem. An exploratory design will develop and generate new ideas and assumptions within a field or a problem and is typically used to determine which research that would be feasible in the future (Dudovskiy, 2020). LM had an environmental sustainability project in 2020 aimed at the sport clubs in the city with activities at seven different clubs, but the sample size and the experiences are limited (Stellansdottir, 2021). Due to the limited sample size and the general limited research on environmental sustainability in grass-root sport clubs, it is a difficult task for us to provide a definitive answer through this study. Since there is limited research in this subject area and in Lund’s municipality, the ambition with the chosen research design is to provide the participating parties with an understanding of the challenges in order to promote ecological sustainability through local sport clubs.

This study’s ambition is to explore through people’s experiences. Since we strive to conduct an applicable research for the participants, their experiences are important in order to deliver a research with results that seem manageable for every participant. In this relation, we will take the approach of first understanding how the participants perceive the broader topic of environmental sustainability. Secondly, we will explore how the individual entities imagine to applying the challenges within the topic to their everyday operations (Stebbins, 2001). For LM, the challenge it can apply is how it is able to involve the sport clubs in its climate ambitions. For the sport clubs, it is about how they can involve themselves in the municipality’s climate ambitions and the benefit they gain from it. For RFS, they are provided with knowledge about how they can cooperate with the municipality and the sport clubs to improve their effort within the area.

Our applicable ambitions are in line with how Dudovskiy (2020) perceives exploratory research design to generate new ideas and assumptions within a field of research. In this research, these ideas and assumptions will hopefully lead to further research within grass-root sport and environmental

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sustainability in the future and hopefully tangible and manageable tools to lift the climate ambitions within LM.

6.2 Data collection

The data collection technique is semi-structured interview. The data analysis from the semi-structured interviews is the primary source to answer the research questions and draw a conclusion from the study. We assess semi-structured interviews provide the best possible solution to explore an area with little research, by giving the participants the opportunity to elaborate on topics that are significant to the research (Jones, 2015). This study’s ambition is to be applicable and to provide all participants with manageable answers and solutions. Thus, qualitative research through semi-structured interviews is preferred to offer more insightful data collection, semi-structured interviews allow the interview participants to become more of informants by providing data from their own perspective (Jones, 2015). Through data of the participants own experiences, we are able to provide answers to the research questions that seem more applicable to the interview participants, since the words are their own. Our job is to reason the information by applying the chosen theoretical framework and the previous literature. Unexpected data might emerge from semi-structured interviews. The advantage of semi-structured interviews within the exploratory research design is that it offers the flexibility to elaborate on suddenly emerging topics. Topics that would not be possible in a tighter structured interview frame or through quantitative research. Furthermore, the chances of unexpected data to emerge through interviews within a relatively unexplored topic are big, hence semi-structured interviews are suitable in the chosen research design.

The disadvantage with semi-structured interviews is to maintain the balance between the information the participants provide with few interruptions and the purpose with the interview (Dudovskiy, 2020). It is important to capture as much relevant information related to the topic as possible. The choice of qualitative interviews provides a smaller sample size compared to the possible outcome from a quantitative study, which might get some readers to question the reliability of the research. A broader baseline of data result could definitely have been collected through a quantitative research (Jones, 2015), however, we do not assess the research to become more reliable through quantity. The aim is to provide applicable research.

The data collection also consists of a couple of policies from LM and RFS.

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6.3 Interview participants

The interview participants are listed below. We have chosen three different perspectives. 1) The municipality’s perspective, 2) the perspective of the sport clubs, and 3) the perspective of the sport federation. The municipality perspective and the sport clubs are the most obvious choice since the research is based on the municipality’s climate policies. The sport clubs are one of the explored entities in this research, hence the choice. The regional sport federation, RFS, is chosen since it is the umbrella organisation for all sport clubs in Sweden and is one of the closest stakeholders to the interviewed sport clubs. Two participants are chosen from LM. All the interviews are conducted together with one acting as the main and the other as a sub interviewer. The interview participants are:

- Mira Ganslandt Norsell, environmental coordinator in Culture and leisure administration in Lund’s Municipality. Interview is conducted via Zoom from Copenhagen, Denmark and Svedala, Sweden. Time 26 minutes and 52 seconds. Main interviewer Mads Lyhne Nielsen. Interview was conducted Tuesday 2nd of March. - Thea Ohlander Arfwidsson, project manager climate neutral Lund 2030 in Lund’s Municipality. Interview is conducted via Zoom from Copenhagen, Denmark and Svedala, Sweden. Time 24 minutes and 8 seconds. Main interviewer Mads Lyhne Nielsen. Interview conducted Wednesday 10th of March. - Patrik Karlsson Regional sport leader in RFSISU Skåne (The regional sport federation in Skåne, Riksidrottsförbundet). Interview is conducted via Zoom from Malmö, Sweden and Svedala, Sweden. Time 39 minutes and 9 seconds. Main interviewer Mads Lyhne Nielsen. Interview was conducted Friday 5th of March. - Björn Göransson club leader in EOS Basket. Interview conducted via Zoom from Copenhagen, Denmark and Svedala, Sweden. Time 40 minutes and 24 seconds. Main interviewer Emelie Petra Gullstrand. Interview conducted Friday 12th of March. - Nils-Ola Nilsson club leader in the handball club of H43 Lund. Interview conducted partly face-to-face in Lund, Sweden and partly via Zoom from Svedala, Sweden. Time 41 minutes and 24 seconds. Main interviewer Mads Lyhne Nielsen. Interview conducted Thursday 18th of March.

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- Nils Ihse chairman in LUGI Badminton. Interview conducted via Zoom from Copenhagen, Denmark and Svedala, Sweden. Time 26 minutes and 34 seconds. Main interviewer Emelie Petra Gullstrand. Interview conducted Tuesday 16th of March. - Johan Malmbjer club leader in the floorball club IBK Lund. Interview conducted via Zoom from Malmö, Sweden. Time 23 minutes and 59 seconds. Main interviewer Emelie Petra Gullstrand. Interview conducted Monday 22nd of March.

Norsell is chosen, since she is working in the Culture and Leisure administration, which has contact with the sport clubs, but through the role of climate coordinator is able to answer questions regarding the sport clubs. Arfwidsson is project leader in climate neutral Lund, who works with the climate policy this research is based on. Arfwidsson is able to answer more general question about the climate actions in Lund’s municipality.

6.4 Method of data analysis

Thematical analysis was used as the method to process, organise, and analyse the collected data. The advantage with thematical analysis is that this method is not anchored in one specific theoretical approach. When the qualitative data was collected, the data was processed through four steps. 1) Familiarisation: We got to memorise the interviews inside and out. 2) Coding: Every interview was coded. Relevant information received a label and named for later usage. 3) Theme development: The labelled codes were analysed. We attempted to recognise patterns in the interviews that was utilised to answer the research questions. 4) Naming: The chosen themes were recognised and received a name. The name was used as headings in the data results section (Braun, Clarke, & Weate, 2017).

This method was chosen because it has the ability to identify patterns in people’s practices, behaviour, and experiences, which are related to the perspectives and views on a certain phenomenon. This study focusses on people’s attitudes towards environmental sustainability efforts in grass-root sport clubs. A sport club is driven by people, and these people’s attitude, experiences, knowledge, and behaviour are decisive for a sport club’s choice to engage with environmental sustainability, hence the applicability of thematic analysis. Thematic analysis categorises the data and structures data from the three different types of organisations (municipality, sport federation and sport clubs) (Braun, Clarke, & Weate, 2017). Thereby, the data was applied within the relevant themes in order to underpin the data from the other organisations.

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6.5 Scientific considerations

Previous research provides attempts to map the existing literature within the chosen areas. However, the existing literature mainly focuses on professional sport clubs and how they have been working with environmental sustainability. Little research has been conducted on grass-root sport clubs and how they are able to apply environmental sustainability with their available resources. There is also limited research available on how municipalities cooperate with local sport clubs. In general, it is a relatively undiscovered area which needs to be discovered further. Our research will hopefully lead to future questions that will be answered by research within the same area.

6.5.1 Dependability

The dependability refers to consistency and reliability of the findings in a research and the documentation through the process. It allows someone outside to follow the research review and criticise it (Silverman, 2013; Smith & Sparks, 2016).

The interviews were conducted using an interview guide from the start and with open questions, this to not affect the participants’ answers. Thus, open questions were used as a tool to create independence between us as researcher and the informants. The answers from the interviews illustrate a similar pattern from the interviewed participants from the local sport clubs, LM, and RFS. The sample of the collected individuals to the interviews can be criticised since it is in total seven interviews that are analysed in this thesis. To avoid dependability, there would be conducted more interviews with sport clubs. However, due to limited time, plan A was to interview the chosen interviewees, and since they pattern in the data results was similar, we assessed that two or three more interviews would not have strengthened the dependability significantly. If the data results pointed in several directions, more clubs would have been interviewed as plan B. Therefore, the four conducted interviews with sport clubs were assessed to be adequate. We assessed that two interviews from two different administrations in LM were adequate, since this study is rooted in LM’s climate ambitions. Similar assessment covers the choice of sport federations. More sport federations could have been interviewed, but it would not have strengthened the dependability if another regional department of RFS was interviewed, since the sport clubs in LM belong to the chosen sport federation. To avoid a decreased dependability, the number of interviews is within the frame of the chosen research design (Dudovskiy, 2020).

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To decrease the dependability, representative from other indoor sport clubs could be a part of the study, since the research shows that different indoor sports have different prerequisites regarding material, access to facilities and opportunities of operating environmentally sustainable.

The interviewed sport clubs have a similar size based on members. This was prioritised by us in order to conduct a reliable study as possible. The advantage is that the sport clubs are similar in size and give approximately the same prerequisites, which makes this study dependability towards the interviewed sport clubs and other with similar size. The drawback is that we are not aware whether the results would have looked differently if four small clubs were interviewed along with the chosen participants, or if four smaller clubs were chosen instead. Both large, medium, and small clubs in an adequality number could have strengthen the dependability even further.

6.5.2 Credibility

The credibility is important to refer to establish trustworthiness, believability, or reasonableness and appropriate in the study. It can, for example, be an agreement between the participants and the researchers (Silverman, 2013; Smith & Sparks, 2016).

To gain a high credibility in the study, the chosen data method seeks to understand the environmental sustainability in LM, RFS, and the sport clubs. The research is a relatively new subject to explore in a Scandinavian context. It makes it difficult to know how the study develops. We are fully aware of that. Based on the chosen data method, we are convinced that the interviews will be the best way to collect material to the study. The study mixes interviews from LM, RFS, and sport clubs in the data collection. The individuals that have been interviewed from the different organisations are selected to be the most relevant and competent person to provide answers that will be of a high credibility.

The interviews are done in Swedish and when the transcriptions are made it can be a language barrier that could affect/or be a risk for the result of the transcriptions, since one of the researchers are Danish. He translated the interviews from Swedish to English.

Only one participant wanted to accept the quotes we selected for the final paper.

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6.5.3 Transferability

The transferability is synonymous with generalizability and implies that the result or findings of a research can be transferred or applicable to other situations and contexts (Silverman, 2013; Smith & Sparks, 2016).

There is no guarantee for this study to fully be transferable. In total, there are four interviews collected with local sport clubs which can be perceived as inadequate. However, based on the indoor sport clubs that have been interviewed, a similarity is identified in their answers, since there are similar answers from four different individuals. Based on the interviews, they indicate that the answers could be similar in other indoor local sport club that is not a part of this study. Therefore, it is not possible to guarantee that the answers will be the same from other sport clubs even if it indicates that based on the result that is collected in this study.

We cannot guarantee that other municipalities in Sweden can use the climate policy as LM, since they may not have the same prerequisites as LM in the engagement, ambition financials, and knowledge. This means if a similar study will be conducted, the result perhaps would turn out differently. Therefore, when reading this study, the reader should be aware of the fact that the result could be different in other municipalities.

The reader also has to be aware that the weaknesses of applying qualitative interviews can decrease the transferability. Sometimes it can be difficult for the reader to understand how themes are developed and why we as researchers have chosen one theme over another. Significant themes are identified by us; however, it is not necessarily the most significant themes. The themes are identified from elements, which we as researchers perceive as important (Bryman, 2018), but the interview participant has perhaps emphasised other areas as being important. Our ambition has been to be as open as possible to the information acquired from the interviews. All the themes are developed during the analysis. Previous literature was read before the interviews, which can make the reader perceive us as biased in developing the themes in a specific direction. It has been difficult for us to ignore previous literature when we had to identify relevant themes, but there are themes in this study, which was not identified in the previous literature beforehand.

However, due to the locally anchored research and the applicable approach, the overall transferability is valued to be strong. All of the involved organisations should be able to utilise this research. Other organisations in other municipalities in general have the same prerequisites in relation to grass-root

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sport clubs (McCullough, Pfahl, & Nguyen, The green waves of environmental sustainability in sport, 2015).

6.6 Ethical considerations

Our ambition was that this research can be utilised by the explored parties and other who are interested in the future. All participants have been handed an informed consent after they have accepted the interview invitation, which is the right procedure according to Palmer (2017). The participation in the study was voluntary. Protection of the participants was secured. The participants were offered the opportunity to be anonymous, however, no one wanted to be anonymous, which we perceived as a strength for the thesis. That all participants wanted to participate with name and organisation is good for the results of the thesis, since the topics did not touch upon sensible information, such as their own income, interviews with children etc. Therefore, we were very critical in terms of the interviews. The participants were asked of their permission to record the interview. This to create a safe environment for the respondent and make the individual to feel comfortable, which hopefully created more open and free answers. By recording the interviews, the answers were reproduced in a reasonable and correct way. It also ensured that registration errors did not occur. To secure the participants’ integrity, the recorded interviews audio files was saved on a password protected computer, and the same goes for the transcriptions.

We were aware that none of the explored local sport clubs have initiated any environmental sustainability projects or initiatives yet. Some of the participants might therefore be uncomfortable with exposing limited awareness. In this relation, our job was to create an environment of trust and show that we were curious. Our ambition was to be perceived as a resource to move forward with potential projects. We strived to approach the interviews with a critical mind in order to optimise the data results, thus we were aware that some participants might be offended by the approach, since we had more knowledge in most interviews. However, it is difficult for us to evaluate our own critical approach. Our ambition is that the reader will experience our critical approach in our analysis. We have, among other things, placed a responsibility to realise the climate ambitions and have attempted to address areas for all entities to improve. We are aware that readers possibly can react negatively and perceive it as critique. However, that is not the case. We attempt to address the challenges as respectfully as possible.

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In an area of limited knowledge, the interviews might develop in a way where the participants want each other to act on certain areas. The readers will also experience that we provide results and suggestions on how every participating organisation can improve their environmental sustainability work. We are aware that these results and suggestion do not to a fully extend match the prerequisites and resources available in the organisations. However, the research questions invite for suggestions, and our responsibility in this study was to provide the results and create awareness about the participating organisation’s state of mind, in order for participating organisations to utilise this knowledge to promote environmental practices. Therefore, our job was critically to analyse the results and provide a way forward for the organisations. The analysis can therefore appear boorish to some of the actors. We must therefore clearly state their good intentions with the project, and we attempted to write a constructive thesis.

We were aware that other significant areas exist, that the participating organisations must address as well. However, this research aims to provide answers in the main interest of environmental sustainability. Once again, this can be perceived with mixed emotions from the organisations. We attempted to address this by aiming for applicable research that seems manageable for the participating organisations.

To build trust between the respondents and us, the respondents was informed about the main purpose of the study. They also got a guidance of the study and information before the interviews that it was voluntary to participate.

6.7 Societal considerations

This study strives to get knowledge of how local sport clubs in LM can contribute to accomplish the climate goal for 2030. The study has an impact on both sport and society. Everyone is affected by environmental footprints. Thus, this study is relevant to the general society because every citizen and organisation must contribute to leave our successors with liveable planet. This study can provide members, staff, leaders, and boards with knowledge about how they are able to address the environmental issues within their organisation, which benefits the humanity and planet in general, although the reach of this research is relatively limited. If this study is able to engage more grass-root clubs in environmental sustainability, there is a possibility that it spreads to other sport clubs not targeted in this research and initiate a movement where it becomes usual practice in a sport club. Thereby, this research is a small puzzle in a broader societal context. It is widely recognised that sport

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clubs are able to positively influence its member (Trendafilova & Nguyen, 2015), hence the environmental contribution from sport clubs’ matter. Through initiatives, it is possible to learn more about environmental sustainability, and if the initiative succeeds, it can create a behaviour that can be standardised. This study focusses on sport organisations and municipalities, which means that the result can help other organisations to become aware and to help them start with similar work in their organisations to improve environmental sustainability.

This study is rooted in the climate policies from LM. Thereby, the results from this study can provide the municipality with knowledge on how to collaborate with the local sport clubs. Other municipalities can utilise the results as well. As well for the regional sport federation RFS, there is yet to put climate actions to their sustainability policy. RFS’s work disseminates to all sport clubs in Sweden, hence the potential reach of this study is huge.

6.8 Delimitations

Our ambition was to make this research applicable within the framework of the thesis. Therefore, we had chosen to focus on indoor sports. According to Karlsson (2021) and Norsell (2021), there are different prerequisites for indoor and outdoor sports. As an example, outdoor sport played on artificial turf has a bigger climate footprint than indoor sport. Thus, it becomes difficult to conduct a dependable study based on a small sample size within frame. If the data collection were based on two indoor clubs and two outdoor clubs, the data results could possibly point in two different directions without underpinning each other at all. It can be accepted; however, a larger sample size was needed, which means more time was needed.

The study has a geographical delimitation. The research is based on LM’s climate ambition; hence, the study took place within the municipality’s boarder. We could have chosen to collect data from other municipalities and sport federations, even clubs with experience with environmental sustainability, but it was not prioritised.

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6.9 Limitations

The study did not account for the political prioritisation, workflows etc. within LM. We have analysed upon the information acquired from LM’s representatives, hence the attempt to provide as manageable suggestions. Even if these suggestions are perceived as manageable for us and the interview participants, there is no guarantee that LM chooses to apply the results into their daily operations. It was not possible to explore LM’s workflows and decision-making within the timeframe.

We wanted to interview the former project leader from LM’s time-limited project in 2020. This project leader worked with seven different local sport clubs within environmental sustainability. Her experiences from the work would have been valuable in this research. Unfortunately, she was not able to participate in the research. However, she contributed with some mail information, which was utilised in the study.

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7. Data Analysis

The data analysis is divided into to five themes. Theme one) Responsibility. Theme two) The roles of LM and RFS. Theme three) Motivating sport clubs. Theme four) Prerequisites. Theme five) The sport clubs’ climate contribution. These five themes are identified in the thematic analysis. The aim of the research is to conduct a logical analysis with a progressive configuration. The analysis is initiated by placing the responsibility of who owns the responsibility to involve the sport clubs, or if the sport clubs have the responsibility to involve themselves. When the responsibility is placed, the aim is to describe the roles of RFS and LM and how they are able to support the sport clubs. The third theme aims to identify how the sport clubs can adopt environmental practices. Theme four maps the sport clubs’ prerequisites in order identify what the sport clubs can do, which will be analysed in the fifth theme. Every theme is finished with a brief summary that aims to emphasise the most central elements of every theme.

7.1 Theme one: Responsibility

The research shows that all interviewed sport clubs endorse environmental sustainability. Thus, all clubs are willing to contribute to LM’s climate goals. However, the municipality is currently not prioritising the sport club’s potential role to accomplish its goals. The municipality acknowledges the importance of sport clubs to make a difference within social sustainability, but it is not convinced that it is fair to put further responsibility on the sport clubs at the moment. The sport clubs in the city are not mentioned with one single word in the municipality’s ecological policy LundaEko, although several areas are mentioned (Lunds Kommun, 2020):

“It is difficult, they have an important role, but at the same time, we cannot put too much responsibility on them (…) “Their job is to take care of the children, not think about the environment.”- Mira Ganslandt Norsell, Lund’s Municipality

LundaEko states that all citizens must contribute to the municipality’s climate goals, yet all of the stated sub-goals have not any ordinary citizens, sport clubs, or any other organisation as responsible of accomplishing the goals (Lunds Kommun, 2020), which is in line with Norsell, when she comments on who owns the responsibility:

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“I believe that this is the municipality that has the responsibility and must take the responsibility” - Mira Ganslandt Norsell, Lund’s Municipality

RFS’ Patrik Karlsson recognises the importance of the sport clubs in terms of environmental sustainability, but he agrees with Norsell that the main responsibility is placed elsewhere:

“Their purpose is to do sport” – Patrik Karlsson, RFSISU Skåne

LM and RFS, which are two of the sport clubs’ stakeholders, share the perception that the main responsibility does not lie the sport clubs, but want them to contribute somehow at the same time. RFS recognises its responsibility as well and has published a sustainability policy recently. The sustainability policy addresses both the social, economic, and environmental pillars and consists of a total of five pages. The policy consists of main areas with required climate actions, but there is yet to be decided on concrete actions to reach the goals (Riksidrottsförbundet, 2021).

With both the municipality and the sport federations sustainability/climate policies, both institutions have enforced formal structures, which should result in positive change towards the environment from the citizens in LM’s case, and for all sport clubs in Sweden concerning RFS. Both institutions are attempting to share the values that the environment is important, and actions are needed in order to improve the climate. But the importance of the topic and the values that both LM and RFS are attempting to spread among its citizens and members does not reach the sport clubs according to the representatives from several interviewed sport clubs. Nils-Ola Nilsson from H43 Lund criticises RFS’s sustainability policy and the municipality’s effort:

“RFSISU Skåne’s policy is too weak, too thin, and too vague. It is not enough. I think the municipality must take the responsibility in this and be in charge of this and include sport clubs into it.” – Nils Ola Nilsson, H43 Lund

As previously mentioned, LM acknowledges that it has the responsibility, and that it should be the one to reach out to the municipality. According to Norsell:

“I think the sport clubs are very important, and they are going to do a very big difference, but it is us as the municipality, who has to reach out first to help because they have a responsibility.” – Mira Ganslandt Norsell, Lund’s Municipality

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Despite LM’s opinion that it would not put too much responsibility on the sport clubs, since they already carry huge societal burden, all four clubs express a willingness to adopt environmental responsibility on different levels and terms, but all interviewed clubs share the opinion that both LM and RFS do not do enough to reach out, although LM suggests that it is their responsibility to do so. Nils Ihse from LUGI Badminton states:

“I think that the municipality and Riksidrottsförbundet should be better at sharing their material.” – Nils Ihse, LUGI Badminton

Johan Malmbjer from IBK Lund states it very clearly when he is asked about who owns the responsibility to initiate the communication:

“The municipality, first of all” – Johan Malmbjer, IBK Lund

These statements indicate that LM has yet to reach a level, where it has partly succeeded to address the importance of its climate goals towards the sport clubs. Similar indications come from the other interviewed clubs. They think that the municipality is responsible of communicating its ambitions to the sport clubs. LM is an institution that has existed since 1971, a stable institution that can be understood in several ways (Lunds Kommun, 2021). It has impact to affect the behaviour among the citizens in the municipality and to affect different stakeholders. LM needs to have members that share the same values to be able to improve the results of the work with environmental sustainability. In institutions, there are shared values and meanings, and the ethical standpoints are different when it comes to environmental sustainability (Rosenberg, 2018). That is the reason why the municipality wants to disseminate common values for the citizens and from that, include the sport clubs into work/projects with environmental sustainability. If the municipality wants every citizen to contribute to its goals, it must be able to govern the citizen’s behaviour towards more climate conscious choices and attempt to create norms in the society according to Peters (1999). In order to reach every citizen, the municipality could utilise communities or institutions, which are already founded and established, such as the sport clubs. If the municipality is able to engage the decision makers in the sport clubs, it can potentially reach many thousands of members and their families through contact with relatively few people. According to Trendafilova and Nguyen (2015) and Greenhalgh and Drayer (2010), fans of sport clubs are more willing to carry a certain type of environmental sustainability behaviour with them in their private life compared to interventions from governmental controlled entities, such as a

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municipality. There is arguably a closer relationship between a club and its members since they have chosen to become members and thereby part of a club. Every sport club in Lund has coaches attached to its youth teams. Coaches and instructors are one of the most impactful adults for children, besides their parents, and thereby possess the ability to affect the behaviour of the children in a more efficient way (Ekholm & Dahlstedt, 2017).

LM could utilise network governance as well, by including the sport clubs and imprint the municipalities climate values (Provan & Kenis, 2007). Thereby, they are able to steer towards a specific set of values, norms, and behaviour through external institutions (Peters, 1999) in order to inform and motivate more citizens to contribute to the climate ambitions. But as illustrated earlier in this section, Norsell has the opinion that LM cannot put too much responsibility on the sport clubs, especially with the tasks within social sustainability, as the clubs are already lifting (Ekholm, 2019). But Arfwidsson from LM has some general thoughts about why LM does not go all in on the climate questions:

“I think that the politicians think that it is very important, but I also think that they are a bit scared of making unpopular decisions. Lot of the climate work is about making unpopular decisions (…) and as politicians, it can be very uncomfortable to make these kinds of decisions if their voters do not appreciate them, because if they make a decision that leads to them to not be re-elected. Are they ready for that?” – Thea Ohlander Arfwidsson, Lund’s Municipality

This statement is not necessarily related to sport clubs, but it is possible that politicians consider that interventions in sport clubs within environmental sustainability is too far away from the core services of the clubs. Thus, decision makers might become unpopular. As Karlsson stated: “Their purpose is to do sport”. Norsell also recognises the limitations referring to a study conducted in environmental studies and football:

“The research showed that many are willing to do sacrifices for the environment, but there is a limit of course. At the same time, it requires harder decisions.” – Mira Ganslandt Norsell, Lund’s Municipality

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The risk from the municipality is that rules and regulations might repel the sport clubs rather than attract them. According to Nilsson, the municipality must motivate the clubs to take part of the in efforts:

“I do not think you should impose it as demands on the clubs. That kind of rhetoric, I do not think, is promoting the clubs’ will and interest” – Nils-Ola Nilsson, H43 Lund

According to Peters (1999), there are several ways for a public institution to impose new values, norms towards the members of society. One method is to impose rules and legislations. However, as Nilsson emphasises, regulations will not necessarily motivate the sport clubs to deliver on certain climate goals. On the contrary, such strategies might create negative effects for the decision-making politicians, who also have to nurture their own interests of getting re-elected and keep their positions. They possibly take the risk of repelling the sport clubs and their members, instead of motivating them to contribute. The sport clubs are a part of a local institution (the municipality), and they are already contributing to other important tasks within social sustainability (Henry, 2010). But the sport clubs’ responsibility is to do sport, as Karlsson mentioned, and Norsell emphasises that they do not want to put too much pressure on the sport clubs. Therefore, it is a sensible topic to impose more demands from a municipality’s point of view towards the sport clubs, since the sport clubs have not necessarily chosen to be a part of the municipality’s institution, but they still need the municipality’s facilities to carry out their activities. The other way to be a part of an institution is if a person with their own will choose to become a member of one, for example a sport club. Then this person is more willing to adapt to formal structures of the institution, such as demands and rules (Peters, 1999).

The municipality needs the sport clubs and the other way around. The municipality should therefore consider applying informal structures in order to get the municipality to contribute to the climate goals. This is also what every interviewed clubs become attracted to, which increases their interest to participate. This is specifically going to be analysed upon separately later in the analysis, but Norsell is aware that it might be the most appropriate way forward:

“Perhaps we must be able to lure with financial contribution. It should be done with carrots not whips, I think. We must give them the right prerequisites, it is very important.” – Mira Ganslandt Norsell, Lund’s Municipality

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There is another stakeholder that also carries a responsibility regarding the environmental sustainability questions according to the interviewed sport clubs – RFS.

“I will take Riksidrottsförbundet as an example, they are an umbrella for Swedish sport and I do not think that they are clear about what they want to accomplish (…) We need more governance and guidance as a club on how we can work with this, and RFS SISU Skåne should be a guide for us on regional level by visiting us and educate us about this because I think that the sport clubs need that.” – Nils-Ola Nilsson H43 Lund

In general, RFS carries the responsibility and shows the way for the sport clubs as the umbrella organisation it is. According to Karlsson, environmental sustainability is a relatively new topic to RFS, and climate activities in the sustainability policies are still pending, but there are several examples on social sustainability activities on RFS’s website (Riksidrottsförbundet, 2021), which also appears around sport clubs in general in Sweden (Ekholm & Dahlstedt, 2017). As Nilsson indicates, RFS usually leads the way in the development of sport. RFS wants everyone in Swedish sport to develop within social sustainability (Riksidrottsförbundet, 2021), and if RFS and LM are compared in an institutional theory context, they possess the same role – they have the position as an institution above the sport clubs and are important stakeholders for the sport clubs regarding their main operations. The issue between RFS and LM’s climate ambitions is that LM is ahead if RFS regarding these questions, which is natural, since RFS is concerned about sport, while the municipality is concerned about a variety of society related issues.

The sport clubs do also recognise that they have a responsibility to address environmental sustainability, even though they perceive their responsibility as minor compared to LM and RFS. Björn Göransson from EOS Basket talks about their responsibility:

“I understand that we must take our part of the responsibility. What makes it difficult for us, is that we are many, and it is limited what we can effort to pay for that. There are many people that do things.” – Björn Göransson, EOS Basket

When asked about what the clubs could do to begin the process, Nilsson answers:

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“We should be able to contact both the municipality and RFS SISU Skåne on Monday” – Nils-Ola Nilsson, H43 Lund

7.1.1 Who takes the responsibility?

As the section above indicates, it is not clear among the sport clubs who will provide them with information regarding environmental sustainability actions. It is also unclear who owns the main responsibility. The sport clubs agree on the fact that one of their stakeholders must take the first step to include the sport clubs. Usually, they receive their instructions from RFS as described by Nilsson, but they have not reached the same level of awareness within environmental sustainability as LM yet. Norsell describes how she does not want to put too much responsibility on the sport clubs, which results in no one taking responsibility in including the sport clubs at all, including the sport clubs themselves, hence limited action has yet to be done.

LM recognises that they own the main responsibility within their municipality’s climate goals, but it is prioritising its resources elsewhere. But according to Stellansdottír (2021), LM had a project in throughout 2020, with the aim to involve the sport clubs and address the challenges concerning environmental sustainability. LM was in contact with seven clubs in the project period. A plan to engage the sport clubs was therefore launched in 2020, but according to Norsell, the sport clubs do not have a direct contact person within the municipality anymore, although activities to inform some sport clubs exist.

Since LM is ahead of RFS, it must be LM’s responsibility to include the sport clubs in its climate plan, in order to meet the ambition of motivate every citizen to contribute. Although LM does not want to put more responsibility on the shoulders of the sport clubs, there is a willingness among several interviewed clubs to adopt environmental sustainability. However, they need one of their main stakeholders to create the path for them, which should be the municipality in this relation. It is obvious that LM has the responsibility for its own policies, but if RFS was operating with environmental sustainability already, LM could affect RFS to take more responsibility in order to accomplish its goals. It is difficult to motivate all sport clubs in the city alone.

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7.2 Theme two: The roles of the municipality and RFSISU Skåne

LM and RFS have important roles in relation to sport clubs, regarding environmental sustainability. The interviews indicate that the sport clubs are uncertain of who holds the main responsibility towards the clubs. As analysed upon in “Responsibility” section, the responsibility in this specific case is on LM, since it has initiated its climate ambitions for 2030 as Norsell speaks about, when addressing its own role:

“It is very difficult. We are working on a new environment programme now “The new LundaEko” and in this, we have attached a communication strategy. Communication must be a tool to reach our target, and it mentions how we should be able to reach all citizens. It is about to get all target groups and stakeholders on board.” – Mira Ganslandt Norsell, Lund’s Municipality

Norsell is pointing out that communication is the useable tool in being able to reach out and work with environmental sustainability. The potential of reaching many people through their local sport clubs is huge, and it is therefore important that LM, through communication, is initiating contact to the clubs and their stakeholders. Hence the main priority is to provide them with the tools they need to join the climate ambitions. Nilsson requests that the communication from the municipality to the sport clubs include a curiosity about how the club think they are able to contribute:

“You can sit in an office in an environment administration and guess what is needed and be sport interested, but I think that seeking the dialogue with the sport clubs is important if you seriously mean that the sport clubs are important. It is mutual. (…) This is a mutual responsibility, but they must approach us and show us that this exists, because there are not many who are finding their way into the municipality’s website as I have done, it does not happen.” – Nils Ola Nilsson, H43 Lund

The important first step was already taking by LM’s project in 2020 (Stellansdottir, 2021), and now the effort must be continued by LM to avoid resources being wasted. LM could draw the attention from the club by providing them with project funding according to Arfwidsson in the statement below. It was also suggested by Stellansdottír (2021). She suggests that it can be done through “Miljöanslaget”. This knowledge should be on top of the list in the communication towards the clubs.

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“As a municipality, you can be a good example to advice clubs and suggest what they can do to work with this. It is that kind of things. You provide them with economic contribution for good ideas or contribute with good ideas if they do not have them already. Try to spread good ideas.” – Thea Ohlander Arfwidsson, Lund’s Municipality

For an institution to govern through financial contribution, is in line with Sjöblom (2015). According to Arfwidsson, the municipality is responsible to provide sport clubs with information and recommendations about environmental sustainability. Moreover, the municipality also has an additional role in supporting clubs with financial contributions. The municipality should assist the clubs, and in the meantime, the clubs need to know what and how to work with environmental sustainability. Another tool for LM is to provide the clubs with a with an overview with the climate impact. Arfwidsson explains:

“I think that the first step is an analysis of which impact you have as an organisation in order to see it. (…) the municipality should in theory assist with an analysis of the club’s impact (…) if you want to change things, you need to know what the baseline is.” – Thea Ohlander Arfwidsson, Lund’s Municipality

By offering an initial analysis, LM could be able to create awareness about environmental sustainability in such a significant way, that more clubs feel that they need to act without any kind of direct or indirect intervention. This is also a method to build natural ownership from the sport clubs. Partly ownership in the overall municipality goals, and partly the goals the involved sport clubs set themselves. Suddenly, new values, norms, and behaviour begin to emerge. This is an example of how informal structures are created effectively in an institutional theory setting (Peters, 1999). Karlsson outlines the possibility of providing the sport clubs with a climate overview as well:

“We need to decrease the energy usage in Lund’s Municipality, how do your energy usage look like? What can you do there and how can we stimulate to build lamps and windows? But it is not just about tell a lot of good ideas, but also support the clubs in the process. I believe that this is very important.” – Patrik Karlsson, RFS SISU Skåne

The sport clubs have traditionally focussed on social inclusion and less on the environment (Persson & Normark, 2009), making environmental sustainability a relatively new phenomenon for sport clubs

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(Trendafilova, Babiak, & Heinze, 2012). LM can benefit by focussing the communication on the local climate and how local actions are needed. It should be assisted by suggestions on how to work with it. Education, good communication, guidance, and support is required by the clubs and these elements are recognised by LM as well and will be elaborated on section 7.3. This strategy puts LM in a closer dialogue with the sport clubs regarding a common goal. It provides LM with control about the process and if it has affected the sport clubs into adopting similar values, which is needed in an institution (Peters, 1999). LM possesses the most significant responsibility if it wants to succeed with the environmental sustainability goals outlined in LundaEko, but LM needs help from its stakeholders. It is difficult to imagine LM successfully affecting the behaviour, norms, and value in the direction it wants with 125.941 citizens currently living in the city (Lunds Kommun, 2021). LM can benefit with assist from RFS, which perhaps is the sport clubs’ most important stakeholder. RFS has also enacted a policy regarding environmental sustainability but has not reached the same level as LM regarding strategies and actions. RFS recognises its responsibility, but have in mind that this is difficult for the sport clubs:

“We have an important role. We must inspire and address this, but we must also support them to make it as simple as possible. (…) I do not really know that, but create guidelines, education and support. Perhaps we need to have persons who are experts and can advise. But the municipality also sits with this knowledge as well. How are they able to support the clubs in this?” – Patrik Karlsson, RFS SISU Skåne

Although RFS acknowledges its responsibility, it is not able to employ a person who can support the sport clubs. Thus, RFS is still limited in order to have a powerful effect on the sport clubs in Lund’s Municipality and put the main responsibility on LM, but LM already to supports the process:

“Yes, but it requires money to employ such a person. We get money to address one area and to employ a person for that. If we have a person who works to get money in for projects, and that is maybe what we need in the future, that we through sport adds experts with local or regional support. – Patrik Karlsson, RFS SISU Skåne

Karlsson mentions that RFS has the responsibility to, first of all, put actions to its own environmental sustainability ambitions to be able to support and engage sport clubs to do the same. RFS can support financially but also through a policy that can be helpful for a sport club. RFS must also have an action- plan to be able to inspire sport clubs. The action-plan should operate as a guideline, manageable to follow. RFS needs a person working with environmental sustainability area to get a better

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understanding, but it requires money to employ such a person. Signal from Karlsson is that it might be possible in the future, but it does not benefit LM at the moment. Clubs with questions about environmental projects should be able to seek guidance from RFS regarding education, support, and develop more initiatives. Both the roles of RFS and LM are important for the sport clubs to get an understanding of what is important to work with in the environmental area. RFS is an umbrella for the sport clubs and has, as the municipality, a role that can affect the sport club’s behaviour. It is needed to have a policy with actions, as a guidance for the sport clubs. Contributing with financially support and knowledge is something the clubs need to be able to affect behaviours among their members and create a behaviour towards environmental sustainability that can be standardised (Trendafilova, Babiak & Heinze, 2013; Barrett et al., 2019). Nilsson addresses RFS’s role very clearly:

“Riksidrottsförbundet must do so much more, so it is not just phrases and nice documents.” – Nils-Ola Nilsson, H43 Lund

Nilsson is requesting more support from the municipality and RFS, material for inspiration and guiding. The sport clubs need education in environmental sustainability, therefore, support from the municipality and RFS is needed. Financial support is also necessary to be able to work with this. As Nilsson has mentioned, RFS is the umbrella for Swedish sport and if it does not have clear indications of what to accomplish then it becomes difficult for the sport clubs to find inspiration and guidance on how to work with environmental sustainability. A policy should not in general be weak and a sport club needs a strong policy that governs and guides them. The sport clubs also need to be educated. RFS together with LM have informative roles. The municipality should also be a role model, inspiring, and informing the sport clubs by including them into this kind of work. This by having educations to increase their knowledge. Malmbjer expresses his opinion regarding this:

“We could get a lot more support from Riksidrottsförbundet and the municipality. We need advice on how it has worked in other clubs. (…) I know that Lund wants us to travel by public transport. How? There is one kilometre to the hall, here is something you can do and hand out to the members. It could be a ticket to test it, so it does not cost 8 SEK x 10 players every time we go to practice. Do small things and do it well!” – Johan Malmbjer, IBK Lund

Malmbjer mentions that LM and RFS could be more supportive since the clubs need advice and guidance. Education is needed and better communication between all included parts.

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Communication is not only needed between the clubs and RFS or LM. LM could benefit from reaching out to RFS as well. A collaboration regarding education would support RFS to obtain the knowledge required to put actions to its policies. With external help from LM, RFS receives an occasion to elevate within environmental sustainability. Communication between the institutions would create a collaborative behaviour which benefits the possibility to reach the environmental goals. It would be clearer and easier for the sport clubs to work with environmental sustainability through having guidance documentation and needed education and creates transparency for the sport clubs.

7.2.1 Key areas for Lund’s Municipality and RFSISU Skåne to embrace its role

All interviewed clubs have stated that environmental sustainability is a new challenging area. It has become more common to adopt environmentally sustainable practices, and we need to address this as soon as possible, since the environmental footprints become larger. Simultaneously, we want to hand over the best prerequisites for future generations (McCullough & Kellison, 2018). The sport clubs’ answers indicate that they want the municipality and RFS to act, take more responsibility since their role is to get sport clubs to work with project that concerns the environment and to standardise a behaviour among Lund’s citizens (Trendafilova, Babiak & Heinze, 2013; Barrett et al., 2019). There is an agenda, but if the institution of LM wants to be able to reach it, LM could strongly benefit from the sport club’s contribution. Therefore, the goals and policies should be presented in a clear manner for the sport clubs. Communication, information, knowledge, education, and support are important to work with to include sport clubs. However, the presented answers from the sport clubs indicate lack of education and support in this area. If the municipality truly wants to get all citizens to be a part of the agenda and reach the goals, then collaboration and support from LM and RFS are needed through:

- Including sport clubs - Supporting the clubs (financially) - Spreading knowledge - Educating (environmental sustainability) - Listening to the needs of the sport clubs

With cooperation, the chances of reaching the climate goals for 2030 increase through a higher participation rate among the citizens. The sport clubs interfere with many people and affect them. If

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LM wants to succeed in achieving their climate ambitions, they can profitably initiate stronger communication with the sport clubs by listening curiously to how the sport clubs think they are able to contribute and inform the sport clubs about the possibilities to contribute. Thereby, LM increases the chance of more sport clubs initiating CER projects that can positively affect members in order to include more citizens to contribute. The role also includes being supportive. LM should consider relocate resources towards the sport clubs or employ a person who is able to focus more on the sport clubs, such as they had in 2020 and utilise the knowledge and experience from that project.

7.3 Theme three: Motivating sport clubs

With the assumption that LM has the responsibility to include the sport clubs in Lund, this section aims to answer how that can be done. As the analysis above illustrates, there is a will among all interviewed sport clubs to get involved in environmental sustainability. The limitation in the current situation is that the municipality does not have a person employed to work with the sport clubs according Norsell:

“We have no person who is working daily with the sport clubs. I work 30 % strategic, I am not out at the sport clubs (…) Maybe, we will visit the sport clubs and show them the movie, but we do not have that opportunity, we are going to do that via guidelines.” – Mira Ganslandt Norsell, Lund’s Municipality

The first part of this analysis is based on the statement from Norsell, while the second part will look at the opportunities beyond the current resources in LM.

One of the main elements, that several interviewed clubs are requesting, is communication. If LM wants every citizen to contribute, the sport clubs can be one of its key external stakeholders in that process. But the clubs are not satisfied with the level of communication from LM according to Göransson:

“I think that we are pretty bad at it. And it is not that the municipality’s goals are obviously clear through their communication either. I try to think about in my private life, but it is not that the municipality´s goals are clear, even though we have a lot of communication with them.” – Björn Göransson, EOS Basket

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However, there is an element of self-reflection in that statement suggesting that the sport clubs are not good enough either. Environmental sustainability is low on the list of priorities for several interviewed sport clubs. It is, among other, illustrated in this statement from Nilsson, when he was asked to prioritise the different pillar within the concept of sustainability:

“Social 1. 100 %! 2. Economy. 3 Ecology.” – Nils-Ola Nilsson, H43 Lund

The low priority might affect the way the sport clubs prioritise to read through the information from the municipality. Malmbjer provides this answer when he was asked about if LM has communicated its climate goals:

“I have to be honest; I have not read it, I am not good at reading everything in detail.” – Johan Malmbjer, IBK Lund

We are not aware if LM has communicated its climate goals to the clubs, but the two abovementioned statements indicate that even if LM has done it, it is far down the agenda, that potential mails and other sorts of communication regarding LM’s climate ambition are neglected by the clubs, since it is far away from their core services. The municipality should therefore consider rethinking its methods of communicating with the clubs in a way that is realistic within the resources available. One suggestion from the clubs is to motivate them to apply for project funding within the municipality. Another suggestion is to advice the clubs about the opportunities by outsourcing the climate communication to the sport clubs’ direct contact persons:

“And the names as Mads mentioned for me today, that you have contact with, are not names I am familiar with at all. It says something about that the Culture and leisure administration as we work with, it is mostly about the traditional tasks as booking and the ongoing handball business, so it is still a very long journey to get this together and get closer to each other:” – Nils-Ola Nilsson, H43 Lund

According to Stellansdottír (2020), there is a fund within LM where the sport clubs are able to apply for project funding within environmental sustainability. The fund is called “Miljöanslaget”. The sport clubs could definitely benefit from that piece of knowledge, since all interviewed clubs do not have the opportunity to employ an extra person to handle this topic. Almost everything is handled by volunteers, meaning that it limits the resources and time. Depending on how much money a club can be granted, they might suddenly be able to employ a person to handle these questions. But it is not

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just done by that. The sport clubs are short of knowledge and need advice to be able to identify areas that could be addressed within their resources according to Malmbjer:

“We as a club always want to go in front with questions, even if it is about climate. We want to go in front and show our members that it is the right way to go. But, as I said before, it is quite difficult when you do not have knowledge. I believe that there should be a lot that we can do, but we need some help or advice.” – Johan Malmbjer, IBK Lund

Knowledge is one of the main elements as every interviewed sport club address as their biggest barrier of becoming environmentally sustainable. They simply do not know where to begin. The sport clubs need a direction and they need their main stakeholders to provide it. LM through Norsell recognises LM’s role of providing the sport clubs the needed knowledge stating:

“We can also educate. We educate many youth leaders. We can tell them that they also are a part of this. (…) For me, it is about to spread knowledge.” – Mira Ganslandt Norsell, Lund’s Municipality

Arfwidsson acknowledges the possible effect the sport clubs can have regarding creating norms, changing behaviour, and promoting new healthy values on behalf of the environment, which are needed to accomplish the goals. Her thoughts about the sport clubs’ role in the climate ambitions are:

“I think they could play a very important role, both in educate them, but also what they pass on to their parents. When I think of sport clubs, I think of children. Of course, there are adults who are part of clubs as well, but not in the same scale. (…) If you are ready to change the attitude in the clubs, I think it would spread to the society as rings in the water. I think there could be one of many ways to change the attitude.” – Thea Ohlander Arfwidsson, Lund’s Municipality

Looking beyond LM’s current resources, it needs to address the lack of knowledge in the sport clubs, if it should have an opportunity to get the sport clubs to engage. There are several ways it can be addressed, either through the clubs’ direct contact persons or by hosting seminars where clubs can participate in education, perhaps online in order to save money for facilities and

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accommodation. It requires more resources than currently allocated, but it is a relatively cheap solution for LM. It can also be perceived as an investment, and investments are needed if LM really is serious about its climate ambitions, which are targeted to be accomplished within the next nine years.

7.3.1 Common perception of how to contribute

The desire among the sport clubs to get involved is present, and the municipality acknowledges the role. With LM’s ambition to get every citizen to participate, it needs external help. It is very ambitious to believe that every citizen understands the climate goals and automatically is going to consciously contribute. LM should strongly consider using network governance as a method to reach as many citizens as possible, a solution Arfwidsson implicitly suggests in the section above. Network governance, in this case, entails that the municipality uses the sport clubs as a resource to govern the citizen through a closer relation. Usually, network governance can be accomplished in two ways. Either through approach from the leading institution (LM) to the network institution (sport club), or the network institution approaches the leading institution. In LM’s case, the network institution is not aware of the climate goals, and it is therefore obvious that LM initiates contact with the sport clubs (Provan & Kenis, 2007).

Since LM allows themselves to be ambitious in a highly significant area, the climate, some form of governance is necessary to ensure that the citizens engage in the collective goals that need to be addressed. Through network governance, LM can involve more sport clubs to take ownership by creating the sport clubs’ own goals within the same topic. Thereby, LM is able to lift the municipality’s goals to common goals in other part of the society, which somehow will spread to a large part of the sport clubs’ members (Provan & Kenis, 2007).

“In general, they have an informative role, to inform the clubs that it exists. It is very important. Then the clubs must integrate what they think are suitable in terms of their ambitions and strategy. But I also think it is important, that they listen to what the sport clubs can contribute with.” – Nils-Ola Nilsson, H43 Lund

If the club is able to integrate, what they think is suitable in terms of strategy and resources, the chance of getting more clubs on board is significantly higher and is in line with how some perceive successful network governance. The disadvantage with network governance is that LM distributes part of their responsibility to another management organ, which makes it difficult to monitor the

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development and control of the behaviour. Environmental sustainability might be a hot topic when it is addressed initially, but the spirit to accomplish the sport clubs’ new climate goals is in danger of fating out over time due to lack of result, or a board that does not take the agreed responsibility seriously enough (Provan & Kenis, 2007). The outcome of the effort to network govern can become a waste of time compared to output of the effort.

7.4 Theme four: Prerequisites

LM, RFS, and the sport clubs can have ambitions on behalf on each other, but if the clubs do not have the necessary prerequisites, then it does not matter. Elements such as knowledge and support are prerequisites already identified, as well as external support, the sport clubs need. The sport clubs also need internal prerequires, which is going to be analysed in the upcoming section.

The interviewed sport clubs have different prerequisites. EOS Basket is the only sport club in Lund which owns their own sport hall. It hands them several opportunities along with several challenges as well. EOS Basket wants to contribute, and one of their major challenges is the energy usage in the sport hall. Göransson expresses his thoughts about the current situation in their club:

“Our energy consumption is huge. We own this hall and uses a lot of energy. Both electricity and heat. A normal house could have as many solar panels on the roof, but it is not possible on a big sports hall.” – Björn Göransson, EOS Basket

Göransson mentions solar panels as a possibility to adjust their energy source to solar energy, but such an investment seems unsure for a sport club. Göransson adds:

“When you do an investment, you should be able to calculate the payoff in 5 to 10 years. It is not possible for us to do now in the calculations we have made. It will be a huge investment we have to wait 15 years perhaps, before we know if it will pay off, economically (…) Our income is another people’s money. Either the members or the sponsors. They pay for us if we can say it like that. We cannot sell more things for example.” – Björn Göransson, EOS Basket

When environmental sustainability priorities are far away from the core activity, an investment costing several millions seems far away to be profitable. In EOS Baskets’ case, there are cost savings to collect on longer term, which would support the idea of the triple bottom line theory. An equal

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prioritising is one parameter that triple bottom line theory is built upon (Elkington, 2004). In this case, an investment in solar panels would seem obvious in order to save money in longer terms and would be perceived as an equal prioritising between the environmental pillar and the economic. However, such a large investment for a sport club is not valued to make sense for EOS Basket and its stakeholders. The idea, that triple bottom line theory suggests that pillars should be valued equally, can be challenged by this specific research and the investigated types of sport clubs in this study. As already identified previously in the analysis, the interviewed sport clubs obviously value the social and economic pillar higher than the environmental. The idea of an equal valuation of the pillars should therefore be perceived differently in this research. The triple bottom line theory is also used as performance indicator within the three pillars in a business. Neither of the interviewed sport clubs have performance indicators on the social and environmental activities, only their economic performance is evaluated. The application of the triple bottom line theory in this analysis is therefore to understand, as prioritising and evaluation of the value the three different pillars entail. Especially with focus on the environmental pillar, which is illustrated through the EOS Basket case.

The other interviewed sport clubs do not own their own sport hall, instead they are renting the municipality’s facilities, which decreases several factors in order to decrease their climate footprint, since it is the municipality that administrates the facilities. The ownership of facilities is the only major differences between EOS Basket and the other sport clubs, otherwise many similar prerequisites were outlined during the interview. The major prerequisites are resources and time, which caused by the economic situation:

“Everybody in the board is working, and we do not have the opportunity to employ somebody, we must take those who volunteer.” – Nils Ihse, LUGI Badminton

The difference between LUGI Badminton and the three other interviewed clubs is that LUGI badminton does not have an employed club director, neither on part nor full-time to manage the daily operations, but the issue surrounding resources is still a challenge in the other clubs as well. Thus, it is challenging at the moment to prioritise the engagement in environmental sustainability with the decreased knowledge they have within the area.

The identified prerequisites for the interviewed sport clubs do not differ from the general prerequisites from other grass-root sport clubs. It is time, money, and resources that limit the sport clubs from expanding their operations, which creates potential new initiatives a question of prioritising. The

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upcoming analysis on the opportunities the sport clubs have concerning the environment is partly based on the current available resources and partly on the opportunities investment in environmental sustainability contains.

7.4.1 Starting point

“I want to do small things (…) but everything takes time and must be prioritised.” – Johan Malmbjer, IBK Lund

This statement belongs to Malmbjer. He and the other interview participants want to contribute, but in reasonable terms and with small actions in the beginning. It is an obvious place to begin according to McCullough, Pfahl and Nguyen (2015). A typical entrance to the environmental sustainability area for sport clubs is to enter via small and easily accessible initiatives, also described as “the low hanging fruits”. The easy entrance is described as “wave one” by McCullough, Pfhal and Nguyen (2015) and is illustrated in figure 7.1.

Figure 7.1 The green waves of environmental sustainability (McCullough, Pfahl, & Nguyen, 2015).

Wave one is a logical place to start with limited resources available. Awareness is adopted at this stage. For the sport clubs, this awareness and knowledge can be obtained from external sources, such as LM and RFS. We have previously identified that the required knowledge should be provided by the municipality in this area. When the clubs have obtained sufficient knowledge, they are ready to reach out for simple activities. Firstly, the club is able to identify key persons within the organisation who possesses knowledge within the area. Malmbjer talks about IBK Lund’s motivation:

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“We want to do it and we have talked about this week since we have a girl in the Lady’s team who works with it in Lund’s Municipality, and who drives many of those questions.” – Johan Malmbjer, IBK Lund

The identification process requires a minimum of resources and can provide the organisation with knowledge and confidence to adopt environmental sustainability practices. The identification process can also convince the same people to become a driving force for the project within the sport clubs. As Malmbjer describes, IBK Lund has a player in the lady’s team who works with these questions in the municipality, which gives them better prerequisites than other clubs might have.

“When you look at a club, there might be someone among the parent or leaders, who actually knows something about that, we can utilise their knowledge.” – Patrik Karlsson – RFS SISU Skåne

The natural environment is often an area where people with strong environmental ethics are driven by passion and not only through their professional work. People described with “dark-green” ethics by Rosenberg (2018) place the natural environment above any other factors. If the sport clubs have persons with dark-green ethics within the organisation, they do not necessarily already have to possess the required knowledge and skills, they can learn it along the way. This example is very much in line with the general idea of a grass-root sport clubs, where passion is one of the most essential driving forces (Croix, Ayala, Sanchez, Lehnert, & Hughes, 2020). This person could be a current leader or parents e.g. It is worth the time for the club to search for such a person within the organisation.

Another activity to initiate environmental sustainability practices is to obtain clear values and actions that seems very clear to the members:

“Another challenge is, that our actions have relatively low effect. The biggest difference is to affect our members. That is our biggest difference. It feels a bit strange that we should limit our emissions. It is more about go in front and show our members the way (…) It is not our responsibility to educate our members, but it is more about, that us as a club takes more conscious choices. Then I think that the members can relate to how their badminton club are doing and think about if they are able to do that at home.” – Nils Ihse, LUGI Badminton.

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By identifying, obtaining and worshiping certain values, the sport club has enforced informal structures with the purpose of disseminate the new values in order to institute a wanted behavioural change. Actions to promote the new values are needed, but they do not necessarily need to be as comprehensive as if the target were to decrease the sport club’s emissions, as Ihse mentions. It is more or less the same institutional mechanisms as LM uses in order to get its citizens to contribute (Peters, 1999). The difference is that the members are closer associated with a sport club than the municipality (Ekholm & Dahlstedt, 2017).

There are several ways for sport clubs to contribute. Ihse’s statement suggests that a contribution is everything from obtaining values, which is going to be preached to the members, and decreasing the emissions that provides a result, which can possibly be measured. LM has yet to decide which role the city’s sport clubs should play in the climate ambitions, but due to the potential positive influence, the sport clubs can have on its members, it should be strongly considered which role the sport clubs should carry.

“At the moment, we are thinking about how we engage every part of the society and how we can show what they contribute with.” – Thea Ohlander Arfwidsson – Lund’s Municipality.

This statement indicates that it has yet to be decided how the sport clubs can contribute. It is mentioned earlier in this analysis, that LM does not want to put too much responsibility on the sport clubs, and the sport clubs already have many other activities away from their core activities. Based on this analysis, LM, RFS, and the sport clubs should decide on the role. Thus, it becomes easier and more tangible to settle on which sort of actions the sport clubs can adopt.

7.5 Theme five: The sport clubs’ climate contribution

Our experiences from the interviews were that the representatives from the sport clubs had little knowledge about environmental sustainability. When asked about what they could do, not many suggestions came up. However, the same themes came up in all interviews. Since the overall ambition with this study is to conduct applicable strategies, the upcoming analysis is based on the statements from the interview participants in order to make the suggestions tangible and motivating. The suggestions are anchored in the chosen theoretical frameworks and the literature.

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7.5.1 Transportation

A focus area mentioned by several actors in this research is transportation. Sport clubs travel a lot in connection with practices and matches. There are some dilemmas concerning transportation due to the size of the country, which is outlined by Göransson from EOS Basket in this statement:

“The same for transport, but we cannot place people on a train to Luleå, if they are going to play in Luleå. We cannot say to them, that they have to travel two days before the match and then two days home again, it does not make sense.” – Björn Göransson, EOS Basket

However, it is an area that three out of four interviewed sport clubs show they are already aware of and already address, including EOS Basket.

“When our elite players travel together to matches, then it is the club that pays, which gives us the ability to affect it. We always travel by train within Sweden. Sometimes we have travelled by flight, when we have to travel all the way up to Umeå for example.” – Nils Ihse – LUGI Badminton

This statement from Ihse illustrates how LUGI Badminton already governs within transportation. Since the clubs pay for the transportation, they own the right to decide how the teams have to transport for matches. This also illustrates an example of how the club unconsciously operates within wave one in figure 7.1. In an area where clubs already might have formal or informal policies concerning the natural environment, they also hold the opportunity to communicate the transport policy to their members from an environmental perspective. Since this serves the purpose of an economic and environmental question, the perspective should be emphasised from an environmental perspective rather than an economic perspective. It disseminates positive climate values towards the members and becomes a conscious climate choice that strategically can be utilised in a very simple way.

An established climate-oriented transportation policy is simple and occupy a minimum of resources. It should be manageable to establish and monitor.

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7.5.2 Purchase

Another low-cost and low-resource initiative is to investigate the purchase channels. Two out of four interviewed sport clubs emphasise the potential of taking climate conscious choices regarding the suppliers. Göransson reflects on their purchase channels:

“We are buying a lot of cheap t-shirts from Asia. I have a bit of a bad feeling because of it. I read how much it takes to manufacture a t-shirt or a pair of jeans and we buy a lot! Can we do something else instead? Definitely, we are buying thousands every year.” – Björn Göransson, EOS Basket

Clothes and equipment are major negative contributors to the natural environment within the world of sport, but more climate-oriented clothes and equipment suppliers might be attached with higher costs (McCullough, Bergsgard, Collins, Muhar, & Tyrvainen, 2018). Nonetheless, it is an area where the sport clubs have a direct opportunity to affect their climate footprint through the negotiations with their equipment and clothes suppliers. Such actions pass the main priority from economic to environmental prioritisation and equal the balance between the different perspectives, such as suggested in the triple bottom line (Arslan & Kisacik, 2017). However, it is difficult to equal these priorities, with the environmental pillar still to find its way closer to the social and economic priorities and level of knowledge.

Besides clothing, equipment is highly relevant to address according to the sport clubs. In badminton, shuttlecocks are used in large number:

“We spend half a million SEK on balls, it is a pretty large amount. (…) I know they are about to develop plastic balls, that have longer durability than normal shuttlecocks, which also should work on a higher level. In the future, I think that transportation between us and China are going to decrease, when we get balls with longer durability (…) I think we use thirty balls in a practice of two hours perhaps.” – Nils Ihse, LUGI Badminton

Ihse is already aware of this upcoming technology and expresses a will to buy these new shuttlecocks when available. As well for shuttlecocks, they hold a potential for improvement, both from an economic and environmental perspective. Longer durability means less money spent, and less money spent means less transportation needed. It opens up for cost savings and a conscious environmental

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choice regarding purchase of equipment. If an analysis is conducted on the equipment used within the organisation, there will certainly be several areas which can be addressed successfully to benefit the economy and the environment. The use of “glue” in handball, the use of rings and nets in basketball, the use plastic sticks in floorball, and the use of tape in all of the mentioned sports are examples of environmental improvements in indoor sport related to equipment. However, the sport clubs might face a scenario where the suppliers sit in the favourable negotiation position, which limits the sport clubs’ opportunities to affect the outcome in current and future contracts (Sanchez-Garcia & Lopez-Hernandez, 2020), but according to Ihse, there are some areas where the sport clubs should be able to affect the suppliers. Nonetheless, the sport clubs can relatively easily create an overview of the sponsors, which environmentally sustainable options they have, and perhaps act by investing more money into sustainable equipment.

7.5.3 Recycling

LM has a recycling concept for sport equipment called “Fritidsbanken” or “The spare time bank” in English. Fritidsbanken is a library where children and other interested have the opportunity to go down to a location and borrow free sport equipment for fourteen days. The old equipment is delivered by citizens (Lunds Kommun, 2021). Fritidsbanken is mentioned by Karlsson when asked about potential initiatives by the clubs:

“A concrete thing that is popping up is recycling (…) There is something called “Fritidsbanken (…) It creates a good baseline for the children and the clubs to reach out with their sport activities (…) It is also a possibility to brand its sport clubs and activities.” – Patrik Karlsson, RFS SISU Skåne

The key word in Karlsson’s statement is “recycling”. The sport clubs can successfully take advantage of Fritidsbanken. The concept is already established, and it is an opportunity for the sport clubs to use the concept as a recruitment platform as well as Karlsson suggests. By utilising Fritidsbanken, the sport clubs are able to combine all three elements in the triple bottom line theory and create an approximately equal balance. By branding its activities, the sport clubs contribute to healthy activities and perhaps in longer terms if they are able to recruit the participants, which is beneficial to the social element. Recruitment results in new members and thereby increased income. Finally, recycling of equipment contributes to environmental sustainability.

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They clubs can adopt this concept internally as well:

“We actually have a project similar to how Fritidsbanken works in Lund, where people can hand in their things, and where others can buy it cheap. We only have to cover our costs. It could be shoes and everything that can be used again. It took some time, but it is a though about how we can work, and it is very good both for cost savings and sustainability.” – Johan Malmbjer – IBK Lund

The sport clubs have a lot of children and youth members who are growing up fast, and continuously become too large for their clothes and equipment. By collecting old equipment in house, the sport clubs are able attract potential new members, who want to test the sport, but normally do not have the opportunity to test the sport, since they do not have the required equipment at home, such as indoor shoes. And when the children want to start, they might benefit from cheap equipment, as hockey sticks and rackets, instead of buying completely new equipment. It might attract socially vulnerable children from segregated areas, for example, which adds to the social performance. But in the context of environmental sustainability, it creates a constant flow of usage of the equipment, which secures an approximately full utilisation of the equipment before it is binned. Malmbjer refuses to earn money on it, but the clubs are able to make a small business out of it to compensate the time they put into it.

In terms of education of proper values towards the children, the sport club can utilise its institutional position to legitimise recycling, through such initiative, beyond the sport club’s sphere. Thus, the children might be more likely to recycle in their future choices.

7.5.4 Projects

This section looks beyond the current resources of both the sport clubs and LM, since potential project funding has yet to be applied for.

As touched upon earlier in the analysis, LM has a fund called “Miljöanslaget”, where clubs and other organisations are able to apply for project funding directed towards environmental sustainability projects (Lunds Kommun, 2021). Potential funding gives the sport clubs a potential to expand their organisation in order to work with the project. Since lack of time money and resources are among the current needs in the sport clubs, project money is among those elements requested to launch environmental initiatives:

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“I prefer that the municipality releases some money, so the clubs are able to try to work with sustainability in project form.” – Nils-Ola Nilsson, H43 Lund

The majority of the interviewed clubs wants to start with small and tangible initiatives, but project money makes it possible to look beyond the abovementioned suggestions and apply solutions, that will offer more than education of values and low resource initiatives, perhaps elevate to wave two in the future, as illustrated in figure 7.1. Especially in the configuration of the project, the sport clubs need expert help from external sources, such as LM or RFS, in order to identify the right idea to pursue. This external help might come from an analysis of the climate impact:

“I think that the first step is an analysis of which impact you have as an organisation in order to see it. (…) the municipality should in theory assist with an analysis of the club’s impact (…) if you want to change things, you need to know what the baseline is.” – Thea Ohlander Arfwidsson – Lund’s Municipality

It is unrealistic to believe that LM should be able to provide such an analysis for every sport club in the city, but they could target a couple of clubs that show interest in initiate projects. An analysis and ideas to follow should provide the targeted sport clubs with knowledge to write a project application. These ideas or advice are appropriate in relation to a project application, and it takes a minimum of resources under the condition that the analysis is not conducted. However, if LM wants to utilise its resources in the most appropriate way, an analysis should be conducted to make sure that the potential project is accurately targeted to make an impact.

7.5.5 Advantages of adopting environmental practices

If the sport clubs have to succeed in adopting sustainable practices, they request starting with small and manageable initiatives. Initiatives as McCullough, Pfhal and Nguyen (2015) describe as low hanging fruit and is categorised as actions within wave one. LM is facing a dilemma going forward. On one hand, it does not want to put more pressure on the sport clubs. One the other hand, the interviewed clubs show willingness to contribute to the climate goals if they are shown the path by relevant stakeholders. A method to successfully affect sport clubs to contribute is through low resource initiatives. The clubs can obtain clear values that are compiled and preached to their members. As well as the municipality can use the sport clubs in network governance, the sport clubs can utilise their youth leaders in the same way to disseminate their environmental values. This method

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does not require many resources for the sport clubs, which the municipality can utilise to avoid its worries of putting too much responsibility on the sport clubs due to the low demands.

The sport clubs do not necessarily spend loads of resources when they consider being environmentally sustainable. It is as important to take conscious choices, communicate the choices, comply the choices, obtain the choices as values, and finally, disseminate them to their members.

The sport clubs have yet to enter the area of environmental sustainability. Although it might be another area to address by the sport clubs, there might be potential new sponsors if the clubs perceive it as an opportunity to be innovative and attractive to both new and existing sponsors:

“Partners who want to be a part of the journey. I think there are companies who want to be a part of that. You have to make it exclusive from the beginning to be a part of this and allow them to be a part of this.” – Nils-Ola Nilsson, H43 Lund

According to Levermore (2010) and Miragaia, Ferreira and Ratten (2017), companies have in general become more attracted to sport organisations that have a broader purpose than their core activities when companies have to decide on where they should place their sponsorships. Malmbjer shares the opinion that there is an economic potential with adopting environmental practices:

“Sponsors today will sponsor you if a club does good things and stand for good values. Therefore, it is easier for us to say to a sponsor that we work like this, then a sponsor will sponsor us. If we say that we won 8-5 in the weekend, it is not important.” – Johan Malmbjer, IBK Lund

Since two of the sport clubs acknowledge the value of adopting environmental practices, questions could be asked about why these two clubs specifically are passive and wait for external guidance instead of seeking it themselves. Nilsson recognises that they could approach LM and RFS as soon as possible. Malmbjer mentions that they already have a recycling program in the organisation similar to Fritidsbanken. For two clubs, already conscious about the economic opportunities, they should consider utilising these opportunities to find sponsorships in relation to this knowledge or acknowledgement. The sport clubs have to find sponsors throughout the whole year anyways (Levermore, 2010), thus environmental sustainability should be utilised in this process.

By utilising their environmental activities and the social activities in the chase for sponsorships, the sport clubs are able to merge all three pillars together with equal value. Another essential element in

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triple bottom line theory is measuring the performance within the three mentioned areas (Arslan & Kisacik, 2017). It is very difficult to measure the environmental pillar since it is an area with little knowledge. It is not possible to measure it the same way as the economy, but by agreeing sponsorships with environmental sustainability as an important factor, the sport clubs are suddenly able to measure how much money from sponsorships that has come from environmental sustainability practices. The same measurements can be conducted within the social performances.

The potential to attract more sponsors from environmentally sustainable practices is present. Thus, the sport club should perceive this as an opportunity rather than an extra burden. The clubs can be rewarded by being proactive.

7.5.6 Entering through wave one

An institution, as a sport club, has other possibilities to contribute to the municipality’s climate goals, rather than spending a lot of money and resources. Instead, the sport clubs could utilise their status as an institution and obtain clear environmental values. These values should be complied and preached to the coaches, leaders, and members in an attempt to create informal structures. The aim with the environmental structures is to disseminate the newly adopted environmental values. These values aim to create new norms and behaviour that result in a direct positive impact in relation to the participation in the clubs, but hopefully go beyond the clubs’ spheres and affecting the environmental behaviour in the private life. This is a simple, comfortable, and manageable way to enter wave one in environmental sustainability.

A simple tool to emphasise the importance of the newly adopted values is to make conscious choices and communicating them to their members. Simple and applicable areas, such as transportation, recycling, and purchase, entail several environmental considerations. Even when the choices are not taken in favour of the environment, these should be communicated and highlighted if they entail any environmental advantage at all.

Looking beyond a simple entrance to environmental sustainability, the clubs have the opportunity to apply for money at Miljöanslaget. Depending on the how much money the club is granted, they have the possibility to strategically plan for a future in wave two and beyond. Due to the project money, they now have resources to address initiatives with direct impact on the clubs’ climate footprint.

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The sport clubs could also prioritise resources to initiate environmental sustainability practices. Since few clubs have yet consider this area, there are potential to become a “first mover” within the area. Through complying clear values and act these values, the sport clubs that dare to allocate resources first, might be able to get rewarded with new modern sponsorships.

Environmental sustainability is not only about advanced solutions and resource draining initiative. It can be approached in innovate and simple ways. Simultaneously, the value and interest of the club increase for companies.

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8. Conclusion

The study aimed to analyse the prerequisites for municipalities to use grass-root sport clubs to contribute to environmental sustainability. The study used LM’s in Sweden and the local sport clubs within the municipality as the empirical example. The result shows that Lund´s local sport clubs have the ambition to work with environmental sustainability at their own clubs. Therefore, the sport clubs request more support and guidance from LM and RFS in being able to work with the environmental sustainability and becoming a part of the municipality’s ambition to become climate neutral in 2030 according to the climate policy LundaEko (2020).

It became central in this study to place the responsibility related to involving the clubs in the environmental work. No clubs have initiated initiatives beforehand, and it was unclear for all involved sport clubs who had the responsibility to involve them. According to the clubs, it was an external actor, either LM or RFS. Usually, sport clubs look towards RFS, but since RFS has not done anything else than creating a sustainability policy without actions yet, RFS is not ready to support the sport clubs yet. LM acknowledges that it has the responsibility to address these questions in its own climate plan. Thereby, LM cannot expect support from neither RFS nor the local sport clubs, in order to involve these. If LM wants to prioritise the sport clubs in its climate ambitions, it possesses the role of motivating the sport clubs to participate.

LM can motive its local sport clubs to become more environmentally sustainable through network governance. Trough network governance the municipality is able to affect and disseminate environmental sustainability values to the local sport clubs. The municipality’s behaviour about its values is going to affect the sport clubs and make them engage in its work to become climate neutral in 2030. From that, the sport clubs will affect their members’ behaviour concerning the environmental values. In order to motivate the local sport clubs to contribute to the environmental issues, LM should be clear about its climate ambitions, even though sport clubs are currently not a priority. LM wants every citizen to participate, thus it has the responsibility to give every citizen the opportunity to participate. In this relation, the first step is to make the sport clubs aware that these ambitions exist, due to the potential positive effect they hold. The sport clubs also request knowledge and advice on how to contribute. LM is way ahead of RFS and the sport clubs in addressing environmental issues. Hence, LM is responsible to provide the sport clubs with the knowledge and inform them about the opportunities with the financial contribution the municipality can contribute with. LM already has

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persistent dialogues with the sport clubs regarding booking and the clubs’ daily operations. Environmental material and knowledge can be provided through the sport clubs’ contacts persons in the municipality.

However, challenges can occur if LM continuously chooses not to prioritise the sport clubs’ potential impact related to its climate ambitions. If LM decides to rely on the sport clubs, it may face challenges if LM provides the sport clubs with knowledge and solutions, if the clubs do not have neither the time, the resources, nor the competences to adopt. The sport clubs request that LM asks the sport clubs what they are capable of and that LM provides them with possible solutions rooted in their capacity.

The representatives from the sport clubs can work with environmental sustainability through implementing clear environmental values or a policy. The policies and values should be worshiped through actions. These actions are related to transport, purchase, and recycling. These areas can be directly affected by the clubs’ decision makers. The transport can be affected through policies of how the teams are able to transport for matches, and when the transport is paid by the club. The club’s suppliers can be selected based on their ability to offer environmentally friendly products. Finally, old equipment and clothes can be gathered and borrowed/bought by potential new members. Through these policies and actions, the sport clubs can utilise their status as an institution to disseminate these values to their members, in order to make everyone aware of how the club is working and acting when it comes to environmental sustainability. The ambition is that the members will comply these values at the clubs’ facilities and beyond. Thus, more citizens in LM are now affected to contribute to the climate goals.

The sport clubs might also benefit from going green. There is an opportunity to apply for financial contribution from the municipality through “Miljöanslaget”. And like social sustainability activities, the sport clubs become more attractive to their sponsors if they brand themselves on other things than their core activities. There is a potential to gain new sponsor agreements based on the environmental actions. More money will support the clubs in addressing the disadvantage of becoming environmentally sustainable, which is lack of resources. Currently the sport clubs do not have the resources to have a person from the board, from the office, or an extra employee to spend their time or knowledge to work with environmental sustainability. It is a question of where to start. Do you invest money to earn money, or do you want to have the money first? The sport clubs participating in this thesis do not assess that they can invest money, time, and resources in areas as environmental

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sustainability, since it is too far away from their core activities. With this mindset, there is a risk that they will never become environmentally sustainable, unless LM or RFS offer them money to adopt environmental practices, which seems unlikely.

This study’s ambition was to be applicable for the participants’ organisations and other. Thus, the answers stated in the conclusion are easy and assessable based on the participants’ own ideas. Every suggestion in this thesis is provided with the sport clubs’ limited resources and different prerequisites. The suggestions are also identified with the ambition that LM and RFS are able to use the data results in their continuing work. To sum up, the conclusion aims to answer the research questions in a way that every involved entity in this research is able to utilise the results. Every suggestion stated in this conclusion is classified by low number of extra resources needed, which hopefully motivates every entity to develop on this thesis.

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9. Discussion

The discussion section is divided into two minor sections. The first section is the discussion based on the thesis. The second section is suggestion of future research.

9.1 Impact of the data results

One conclusion of the thesis is that LM is able to utilise the sport clubs to contribute to its climate goals through network governance. The sport clubs are prepared to adopt environmental actions as well, but they need guidance and knowledge from elsewhere. First of all, knowledge can be acquired from information. The interviewed sport clubs mentioned that they were not aware of LM’s climate goals, and that LM wants every citizen to contribute. The challenges occur in relation to LM’s prioritisations. LM does not specifically prioritise sport clubs in its climate policy. The data results indicate what the sport clubs need to prioritise in relation to environmental initiatives, but if LM continues not to prioritise the potential impact of the sport clubs outlined in this thesis, or if LM does not recognise the value the sport clubs provide to the climate goals, it will probably take years before the ongoing rising awareness of the environment reaches the sport clubs.

We recognise that LM has the budgeted resources available, and the same goes for the prerequisites of the sport clubs. Since this study’s ambition was to be applicable, we have explored how several involved parties can utilise the results of this thesis. However, the data results provide every involved entity with possibilities moving forward. From the sport clubs’ point of view, the suggestion on how they can apply environmental actions to their operations is based on their own statements of what they believe they are able to do. One of the most emphasised ways to apply environmentally sustainable practices is through adopting clear values that the organisation complies and disseminate to its members, either through policies or actions. This is in line with studies from Greenhalgh and Drayer (2010) and Trendafilova and Nguyen (2015), which show that people close to the clubs are more likely to be affected positively by sport clubs’ environmental actions, both at the facility and beyond. Examples mentioned in the analysis section are through transport and purchase. These are actions that do not require a large portion of resources but is a way of working similar to network governance on member level. Through utilising the sport clubs’ status as an institution, they are able to work with elements attached to institutional theory in order to affect the norms in the club and the values and behaviour of the members, such as Peters (1999) explains the institutional mechanisms.

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According to McCullough, Pfahl and Nguyen (2015), the most effective way for sport organisations to adopt environmental practices is to apply easy applicable methods that do not necessarily require a lot of knowledge and experience. The institutional approach should be relatively easy to implement if it is prioritised. However, the sport clubs may still need external support to identify the areas where they can make the most significant effect. The sport clubs may also still need external influence from RFS or LM in order to become motivated and entering the environmental sustainability area. It is possible that a few clubs become inspired by this research and initiate initiatives, but both RFS and LM should be more interested in inspiring a broader movement, where it becomes almost as normal to have environmental sustainability in the project portfolio as social sustainability.

Through the reasoning above, the results of this thesis offer sport clubs tangible, manageable, and applicable strategies on how to embrace environmental sustainability. The strategies are universal and can be utilised in every other sport club in Sweden and in countries with similar structures, which gives this thesis relevance beyond its research aim.

LM can utilise this study to identify how it is able to cooperate with the sport clubs in the city in order to increase the chances of accomplishing its climate goals for 2030. Through the interviews, the representatives from LM expressed the importance of affecting the sport clubs, which possibly have climate ambitions, although LM has yet to prioritise them. These results outline valuable information on how the sport clubs imagine how they are able to contribute, but also what motivates them to do so. RFS can harvest the some of the same learnings as LM, but what differs RFS from LM is that RFS’s sustainability plan is missing actions, also within the environmental pillar (Riksidrottsförbundet, 2021). This thesis’ results provide RFS with considerations on how it can agree on actions in its sustainability policy, since the results are presented by the clubs themselves.

However, this thesis does not provide measurable suggestions. It is not possible to directly see the impact from the solutions. Thus, it becomes intangible. When LM, RFS, or the sport clubs choose to allocate money and resources for a project, measurement is a part of the evaluation. When it is impossible to measure the effect of the allocated money and resources, there are other areas that could be prioritised instead, for example, social sustainability where the effort can be measured by new members, among other parameters (Ekholm & Sol, 2019). Neither does this research provide indications if these suggestions have the wanted effect on its members. For example, through the institutional approach of implementing values to the organisation, that is disseminated to its members, there are no indications that these values will be well received by its members. Thus, it is unclear if

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such an effort has a reasonable yield. This is arguably relevant in a research that aims to be applicable. Interviews at member level could have been relevant to enlighten how such actions would affect the members.

Another element of the conclusion is that the sport clubs can benefit from environmental sustainability actions by becoming more interesting to potential sponsors. This answers the research question of what the sport clubs can be motivated from by being environmentally sustainable. It is positive if it motivates the clubs to embrace the environmental challenges, but it is not enlightened if the potential sponsors share the same perception. The study could have benefitted from interviews from companies to verify this conclusion and in general if companies are more likely to sponsor sport clubs with an environmentally sustainable profile.

In general, this research contributes to an important gap in the literature With the power of an institution as a sport club, it is highly relevant with research on how sport clubs on grass-root level are able to contribute to the climate, which is the prerequisite for human life on the planet in long term (Drexhage & Murphy, 2010). However, more research is still needed. Specific suggestions to future research are located in the upcoming section.

9.2 How can sport clubs develop their environmental impact in the future?

The data results showed that the interviewed sport clubs have yet to enter the field of environmental sustainability. The data analysis therefore focussed on how sport clubs are able to identify and initiate initiatives through wave one (McCullough, Pfahl, & Nguyen, 2015). Obviously, more research is needed. Within LM, there is potential to conduct the same study with the same research questions for outdoor sports. According to Karlsson (2021) and Norsell (2021), outdoor sport clubs using artificial turf have a bigger climate impact than indoor sports. Since outdoor sports operate in the nature, there might be other prerequisites that affect the opportunities for those types of clubs. With research on both indoor and outdoor sports, LM is able to more precisely target its initiatives, if it chooses to focus on the sport clubs in the future.

One of the suggestions in this thesis was that the sport clubs can apply for project funding. It is not elaborated on what the sport clubs can do with the project money. A future study should focus on how the sport clubs can approach environmental sustainability at a project-based level. In addition,

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the discussion section addresses how this research lacks measurable suggestions. Measurable suggestions can be a part of such research.

In general, more geographically broad research is needed to determine if the tendencies in other parts of Sweden and in Scandinavia are the same. Perhaps, a similar project in Northern Sweden could look different, even though we have the conviction that the suggestion based on the data results is universal. What a broader geographically research could provide is adding data results to enlighten the area even further.

Finally, based on the sustainability policies from RFS, research on how RFS can approach environmental sustainability can also be conducted in order to successfully address its goals in its relatively new policy from 2021.

It is a field with little research; thus many more suggestions and future research can be stated. The abovementioned is assessed to be the most urgent and relevant ones in relation to this specific research.

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11. Appendices

11.1 Question guide for Lund’s Municipality

Section Main questions Topics within questions

Ethical position • Which position • How do Lunds municipality define ES? does Lunds’ municipality has towards ES? • Which resources does they use to improve?

Ambitions • Which role do the sport clubs have in Lunds’ municipality’s climate ambitions for 2030 •

Initiatives • How does the • Economic or support? municipality work with sport clubs at the moment? • What is the municipality able to improve their efforts with the sport clubs?

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The role of sport • Which role • How important are the sport clubs in this does the sport picture? clubs have in • Which knowledge do the sport clubs need to Lunds have to work with ES? municipality’s • Do the sport clubs have any kind of climate collaboration in the ES area? ambitions • How do you think the ES work will affect • How does the the sport clubs in the future? municipality motive sport clubs to engage?

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11.2 Question guide for RFSISU Skåne

Section Main questions Topics within questions

Ethical position • Which position • How do RF define ES? does RF has towards ES? • Which resources does they use to improve?

Ambitions • Which • Role does RF has in order to get the clubs to ambitions does work with this? RF have with ES? • Why have you not addressed this before?

Initiatives • How does RF • How can ES help the clubs? think that they can work with ES? • How does RF think the clubs can work with this?

The role of sport • Which role • How important are the sport clubs in this does the sport picture? clubs have in • Which knowledge do the sport clubs need to Lunds have to work with ES? How do we provide municipality’s them with knowledge? climate • How do you think the ES work will affect ambitions? the sport clubs in the future?

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• How does the RF motive sport clubs to engage?

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11.3 Question guide for sport clubs

Section Main questions Topics within questions

Ethical position • Which position • How do Lunds municipality define ES? does you have towards ES? • Which resources does they use to improve?

Role of sport • Which role • How important are the sport clubs in this does the sport picture? clubs have in • Which knowledge do the sport clubs need to Lunds have to work with ES? municipality’s • Do the sport clubs have any kind of climate collaboration in the ES area? ambitions • How do you think the ES work will affect the sport clubs in the future?

Ambition • Have you had • What does it take to motivate you to begin? considerations • What are the advantages and opportunities regarding ES by going green? Members? Sponsorships before? Or etc? which considerations have you had?

Initiatives • What can sport • Which support does the municipality provide clubs do to you with? improve their • Which support does RFSISU Skåne provide environmental you with? efforts? • What do you need to become sustainable? • What resources • Are you ready to adjust your operations, if are required? the municipality demands it?

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