Sociology of Sport Journal, 2019, 36, 311-321 https://doi.org/10.1123/ssj.2018-0164 © 2019 Human Kinetics, Inc. ARTICLE “I Feel We are Inclusive Enough”: Examining Swimming Coaches’ Understandings of Inclusion and Disability Andrew Hammond Ruth Jeanes University of British Columbia Monash University, Melbourne Dawn Penney Deana Leahy Edith Cowan University and Monash University, Melbourne Monash University, Melbourne In this study, semi-structured interviews were conducted with eight Victorian swimming coaches to examine the discourses of disability1 and inclusion that they expressed in relation to their current coaching practices. Analysis specifically pursued links between neoliberalism, ableism, elitism, classification and inclusion in coaching, with the intention of exploring what discourse relations are possible, imaginable and practical within what have been referred to as neoliberal-ableist times. Findings reveal that coaches replicate and reproduce elitist, ableist assumptions about the body and sport. The discussion prompts a consideration of how rationalities and techniques of inclusion are limited under the prevailing political context. This paper explores the effects of “neoliberal-able rationality” are central to this research and then expand upon our theorization sport policy and swimming coaches’ understandings of inclusion and application of the concept of neoliberal-ableism to critically and disability. Recent research has highlighted how economic examine sport and inclusion. policies underpinned by neoliberal rationalities of government often see sport as a tool that can be used to alleviate social problems Neoliberalism that are conceived to be a social and economic burden on the state (e.g., juvenile delinquency, obesity, homelessness, unemployment We define neoliberal rationality as a governing rationality through and so on) (Gard, Dionigi, & Dionigi, 2018; Hall, 2006; Parnell, which everything becomes “economized.” As Wendy Brown has May, Widdop, Cope, & Bailey, 2018). Our research specifically explained, neoliberalism is an undertaking of governmentality ’ responds to Bush and Silk’s(2012) call to critically examine how (Foucault s term) where: fl ’ neoliberal governing rationalities in uence coaches thoughts and human beings become market actors and nothing but, every beliefs of inclusion in the disability context. We draw on the work field of activity is seen as a market, and every entity (whether of Goodley and his critical concept of neoliberal-ableism (i.e., the public or private, whether person, business, or state) is gov- fusion of the concepts of neoliberalism and ableism) to explore how erned as a firm. Importantly, this is not simply a matter of these rationalities infect coaching policies and practices related to extending commodification and monetization everywhere— inclusion in the sports coaching sub-culture of Victorian swim- that’s the old Marxist depiction of capital’s transformation of ming. Goodley (2017)defines neoliberal-ableism as a “state of everyday life. Neoliberalism construes even non-wealth gen- economic, cultural and political life” where people who can only erating spheres—such as learning, dating, or exercising—in participate in society if they “manage to demonstrate normalcy and market terms, submits them to market metrics, and governs abilities to become part of the capitalist marketplace, ready and them with market techniques and practices. Above all, it casts willing to work” (p. 177). How our theorization of neoliberal- people as human capital who must constantly tend to their own ableism was defined and applied as a central concept in this study is present and future value (Brown cited in: Shenk, 2015, para 6). expanded upon in the sections that follow. The paper reports findings arising from a qualitative study We acknowledge that neoliberalism has never been one logical, involving eight club-level coaches in the state of Victoria, sound doctrine, and that the concept has had many iterations Australia. The aim of this research was to explore how coaches (Brown, 2018). We have drawn on neoliberalism to emphasize understood inclusion and disability in relation to their practice, and that market-based thinking elevates the rights and political concern how contemporary neoliberal-able rationalities of government of individuals and families over the collective “will of the people” influenced these understandings. The analysis and discussion (i.e., policies for tax cuts coupled with austerity in the public sphere that we present explores the limitations of current rationalities and the weakening of democracy) (Brown, 2015, 2018). Therefore, and techniques of inclusion, as expressed by the participants, under a key problem with neoliberal rationalities of government is the prevailing conditions of neoliberal-ableism. The following that through an emphasis on market values such as competition, sections address the concepts of neoliberalism and ableism that they create fertile ground for austerity policies that seem to Hammond is with the School of Kinesiology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada. Jeanes, Penney, and Leahy are with the Faculty of Education, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia. Penney is also with the School of Education, Edith Cowan University, Perth, Australia. Address author correspondence to Andrew Hammond at [email protected]. 311 Unauthenticated | Downloaded 09/25/21 02:39 PM UTC 312 Hammond et al. disproportionally affect those in our community who are acutely resources (Goodley, 2017; Goodley & Runswick-Cole, 2015). marginalized (such as people with disabilities, people of color, As Goodley (2017) suggests “the demands of ableism fitthe women) (Dean, 1995, 2010; Goodley, 2014; Goodley, Lawthom, discourse of neoliberalism—each feeding off one another to incite & Runswick-Cole, 2014). Our research has explored how neolib- individual accountability and reduced state support, to be capable eral rationalities of government produce particular kinds of coach- and self-sufficient,” (p. 117). In this research we borrow from ing subjectivities and coaching practices that are framed in relation Goodley (2014) to highlight how neoliberalism is inextricably to market terms and market metrics. It has sought to illustrate why linked to regimes of ableism and how the tenets of neoliberal- this is problematic from a disability inclusion perspective. ableism specifically produce but also limit the conditions of possibilities (Leahy, 2012) for inclusive coaching in the context Ableism of Victorian swimming. In the following section we discuss how inclusion has come to be theorized and enacted in neoliberal-able Alongside the application of neoliberalism, we apply an ableist lens times particularly within sports contexts. to examine coaches’ interpretations and understandings of inclu- sion. We specifically draw on Kumari Campbell’sdefinition of ableism to define the concept as: Sport Under the Conditions of Neoliberal-Ableism In this paper we explore how coaches in Victoria variously re- a network of beliefs, processes and practices that produce a enforced and, in some instances, productively “resisted” the invis- particular kind of self and body (the corporeal standard) that is ible normativity produced by neoliberal-ableist rationalities that projected as the perfect, species-typical and therefore essential Wickman (2007) and others have described. The effects of neolib- and fully human. Disability, then, is cast as a diminished state eral-able rationalities sensitize us to the realities and limitations of of being human (Kumari Campbell, 2001, p. 44). inclusion under these conditions. Goodley (2014) suggests that by problematizing disability against the Under the conditions of neoliberal-ableism, inclusion policies background of ableism, disability emerges as a site of otherness and often illustrate a utopian vision whereby anyone can be included, marginality in conjunction with other identities, performances, and but in practice due to the emphasis on market-based values who can processes (including those relating to ethnicity, class, gender, sexu- become included is often very narrow. Following Miller and Rose ality, and pan-national identities). Ableism thus allows us to make (2008) these optimistic (they argue government is endlessly opti- “ ” “visible” norms that are often invisible (DePauw, 1997; Kumari mistic) utopian visions will inevitably perpetually fail. For Campbell, 2009; Wickman, 2007). In this study we use ableism to instance, in their study, Hammond and Jeanes (2018) highlighted ’ help explain why disabled people are often excluded and marginal- that these optimistic utopian visions (Miller and Rose sterm)of ized from sport structures and why an elite few disabled people inclusion led to the most abled athletes being privileged within become included. We suggest that in order to understand how disability sport, as they were most likely to meet external standards ableism functions in sport, we also have to grasp how the current of normalcy. We argue that under the conditions of neoliberal-able politics of neoliberalism links with schemas of ableism to produce rationality sport can only ever produce what Barton (1997) has neoliberal-able governing rationalities that powerfully shape the field referred to as integration, as opposed to a more progressive and of possibility for coaches and their practice. subversive form of inclusion: [Inclusion] is about responding to diversity; it is about listen- Neoliberal-Ableism ing to unfamiliar voices,