Abstract
ABSTRACT In this paper, we seek to advance understandings of the contemporary global ‘sport for development and peace’ (SDP) sector, with respect to volunteers and volunteering in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Volunteers play a critical role in organizing and delivering SDP social intervention programmes across the world; most SDP volunteer work is undertaken by local young people who are often presented as a current peer or future community leaders. Specifically, we utilize a unique combination of the concepts of antinomy and liminality to examine systematically the ‘in-between’ positions, roles, and experiences of SDP volunteers. Our analysis spotlights three sets of antinomy. First, categorical antinomies relate to the liminal or in-between positioning of volunteers in terms of their socio-demography (e.g. between adolescence and adulthood), status within NGOs (as neither paid employees nor programme user groups), and their standing between NGOs and communities. Second, the structural antinomies of volunteers relate to the empowering/disempowering aspects of development, positioning between the international development and national public sectors, and their standing between civil society and the private sector. Third, the social antinomies of volunteering centre on their relations with the development NGO, links to donors, and volunteer positions in regard to programme sustainability. The paper draws on an extensive interview- and fieldwork-based research into SDP in three diverse locations (Kosovo, Rwanda, and Sri Lanka) as part of a wider cross-cultural research project on the global SDP sector. The findings may be used as an analytical framework for future research into volunteering, in other SDP locations, in other fields of sport, or on wider social and development sectors, such as in education, community and youth work, leisure and recreation.
Highlights
The global Sport for Development and Peace (SDP) sector is comprised of organizations, governing bodies and actors which mobilize and organize sport in the service of meeting non-sport goals
These liminal antinomies mirror in part the broader in-between positions of many young people in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) who are seriously affected by poverty, deep social divisions, state fragility, and histories of conflict
We present our research findings, which organize the antinomies of SDP volunteering into three broad areas
Summary
The global Sport for Development and Peace (SDP) sector is comprised of organizations, governing bodies and actors which mobilize and organize sport in the service of meeting non-sport goals (see Giulianotti et al, 2019). Such goals include gender empowerment, education and health promotion, and peacebuilding and conflict resolution, and are usually aligned with the global. Substantial research has examined these structural and organizational aspects of SDP, usually from a variety of critical sociological and development studies perspectives on North-to-South relations (Darnell & Millington, 2019; Giulianotti et al, 2019). Benefitting in particular from anthropological approaches and influences, diverse scholarship has recently examined how SDP is constructed and experienced within local or host communities, for example through the influence of local cultural identities, social structures, and knowledge systems; socially inclusive leadership in SDP programming; and, south-south development cooperation through sport (Collison, 2016; Collison et al, 2019; Giulianotti et al, 2016; Nicholls et al, 2011; Richards, 1997)
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