A network approach to international sporting success

A policy network relies on stable patterns of social relations between interdependent actors, which take shape around policy problems and/or policy programmes . This research project aims to demonstrate the utility of a policy network-based view to further understand the elite sport policy context, i.e. which actors are involved, how do they interact, which resources they share or bargain, and if it is different from sport to sport. It will particularly focus on a conceptual model called SPLISS, first developed by De Bosscher, De Knop, & Van Bottenburg (2006 & 2007) , which has identified 9 sport policy areas (pillars) into 144 detailed critical success factors, aiming to describe how inputs (pillar 1) and throughputs (pillar 2 to 9) are developed within involved actors. Furthermore, it will attempt to advance understanding how networks affect both policy processes and policy outcomes. For such purpose, social network analysis will be taken as method, which uses a set of integrated techniques to draw the patterns of relations among actors and to analyze their structure. The case selection will be carried out based in a more successful/less successful criteria on international sporting context.