15.02.2018 – Governing bodies of sports such as national sport federations rely on the collaboration of their members. Since, however, regional entities and local sports clubs possess high degrees of autonomy, their objectives may differ from the ones of the national sport federations.

Using a case study approach, Marcel Fahrner and Christoffer Klenk (University of Bern) examine the nature of multi-level policy implementation aiming to improve our knowledge about the underlying coordination mechanisms across different levels. Their analysis reveals the complexity of policy implementation and shows, that both – local sports clubs and regional governing bodies – play a crucial role as intermediaries in the policy implementation context. Moreover, the study identifies several options for regulating multi-level policy implementation processes in sports.

The research paper was recently accepted for publication in the International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics.

Fahrner, M., & Klenk, C. (2018). Multi-level policy implementation: Exploring organisational coordination — the case of the German Swimming Federation’s National Training Framework implementation. International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics, doi 10.1080/19406940.2018.1447499, forthcoming.