Voluntary Work in Sport

Introduction

If sport should be judged from what we hear in the media, sport is first and foremost related to professionalisation and commercialisation. Europe's major football clubs trade top players at incredibly high amounts, and the income for this comes mainly from sponsors and TV stations who pay enormous amounts to broadcast a game. Simultaneously, a growing number of people exercise in commercial fitness gyms where professional instructors advise them on the right way to exercise. The old ideals of amateurism and voluntarism within sport seem to be outdated if we are to believe the media.

However, the media paint a one-sided picture of sport. Because even though parts of the sports world is dominated by strong professionalisation and commercialisation, voluntary participation, voluntary work, is still a paramount feature of sport as seen widely in Europe and all over the World.

Sport is a variety of many different kinds of activities for different purposes and for different groups of people in many of these voluntarism is indispensable:

• Sport or play for fun for children: In Denmark two in three children begin going to sport or organised play - in a sports club, which is run by volunteers, before they are of seven years of age.

• Sport or physical exercise - for the health for the elderly: These pictures are from clubs in Copenhagen by the name of "Movement for the elderly" run by older volunteers

• Sport for competition for young people: These pictures are from the largest roller-skating club in Denmark, from this part of Copenhagen, with approximately 1,000 members totally run by volunteers.

What is voluntary work?
But what is understood by voluntary work? We have many names for the things we like. This goes for voluntary work as well: philanthropy, altruism, community work, voluntary work, ideal work and honorary tasks (in German: Das Ehrenamt). Despite this, a common understanding of the notion has been established through the 1990's: Voluntary work is defined as

• Voluntary activities

• Which are unpaid or paid for with a symbolic amount

• The voluntary activities must be carried out for people other than the family 

• For the benefit of other people,

• and have a formal character, i.e. be organised or agreed.

How is the extent of voluntary work in sport?
Investigations in Sweden and Norway show, that the voluntary work in sport and other fields of society - makes a total of 7 to 10 pct. of the total employment in the society. In the European Union the average is 4 pct. In Denmark I have estimated that about 90 pct. of all work in sport is done by volunteers. So voluntary work has great economic importance in society in general and in sport particularly.

However, the general impression is that the voluntarism in sport and in society as a whole is in decline: that it has become more difficult to recruit volunteers, that still more work is paid for, and that it is particularly the young people who desert the voluntary ideal. Many perceive voluntary work as a reminiscence of old times, and only few devoted and idealistic people spend their time on it. People only think about themselves and do not bother to do anything for others. This is what many leaders say when they have to explain why their organisation has difficulties convincing their members to take on voluntary work. This perception is in line with several theories relating to social studies, which claim that society has undergone an individualisation, a change to new forms of organisation and a public and private economy take-over of a number of social relations. How different these theories may seem, they seem to indicate a drop in preparedness to do voluntary work in an organisation.

However, several investigations from the last ten years show that more people are engaged in voluntary work than at any previous time. In Denmark, the investigations show that a growing number of Danes do voluntary work in associations and organisations - approximately one fourth of the adults. We see the same picture in a number of countries, among others Norway, Sweden and the USA.

Only a couple of comparative studies have been made of voluntary work in different countries. A study from 1995 shows that the differences between the European countries in the study are surprisingly small except the countries in Eastern Europe and Germany (East and West Germany), which are considerably below the European average. 

But if we look specifically at "sport and recreation", greater differences will show. The studies show that in the Nordic countries, volunteers are active to a much larger extent within sports, recreation and culture than in Central and Southern European countries and UK where voluntary work is of a social kind, i.e. voluntary social work.

The problem today is not whether people will do voluntary work but rather where and under what conditions. Investigations show that the extent and nature of the voluntary work vary a lot

• in different fields of society and

• in different types of associations

The value and importance of voluntary work 
But why is voluntary work valuable? Is it not just old ideals, which are now out-dated? Is it not about time that sport keeps up to date along with the rest of society, where the tasks are undertaken by trained and paid persons?

1) First of all, voluntary work is all things equal cheap, because the volunteers are not paid for their work or work for a token payment. Let us imagine that voluntary work is paid for by a moderate pay of 13 EURO per hour. I have calculated the total cost of voluntary work within sport in Denmark at about 650 million EURO. It is about twice the support allocated by the public sector to sport as recreation in Denmark, and it is about half the total resources for sport organised on a voluntary basis in Denmark. If the leaders and many coaches did not do voluntary and unpaid work, the price for sports activities would be much higher. Comparisons show that it would cost three times as much to do sports activities if these were carried out by paid workers than activities where training and coaching is done by volunteers. This would probably mean that less people would chose sports activities, but first and foremost it would mean that many of the social activities related to sport would disappear because it would be too expensive.

2) Secondly, organisations run by volunteers are more efficient and work better than professional organisations at least when we talk about clubs and small voluntary organisations, which is typical in sport. Partly because it is assumed that the volunteers are more involved in the objectives and tasks of the organisation than the professionals, and therefore they are more preoccupied with spending their money on these objectives. Partly because voluntary organisations use the members\' many qualifications, professional experience and contacts to others, i.e. persons and institutions which are important to the organisation. The chairman may be the managing director of a private business and have good contacts to other businesses, the treasurer may work in a bank, some of the coaches have a diploma in education, and other members are good at designing web pages. In Denmark, many sports clubs have sophisticated web pages, which are developed by members with competence and interest in the field and without costs to the organisation. While professional organisations use few persons with high competencies within specific areas, voluntary organisations use many persons for relatively short periods of time with very different competencies and job, education and life experience.

3) Thirdly, the voluntary involvement is an important prerequisite for the organisation of sport that becomes still more differentiated and specialised. The public sector is inclined to introduce sports activities aiming at a wide group of citizens as a condition for political support and legitimacy. And the commercial sector will only offer sports activities for which there is a large demand and from which money can be earned. In the voluntary sector other motives and incentives are decisive factors. Here it is the interest and involvement in an activity irrespective of the number of people interested in it that is the decisive factor.

4) But is voluntary work just a cheap and efficient way of organising sport. No, in my opinion it is not the most important reason to maintain voluntary work within sport. Voluntary work has a specific value and quality in as much as its basis is a "personal and moral obligation" instead of an "obligation created by law or by contract". Voluntary involvement is based upon certain values or a certain ethic, they be religious, political or humanitarian, or upon strong interest in and commitment to a certain field, for example a sports activity. Voluntary work is mainly based upon "general knowledge based on experience", unlike professional organisations which are based mainly upon "specific professional knowledge" acquired through education and training. In modern society we see each other to a larger and larger extent as "roles", defined by law or by contract. This development has had many positive effects on society, and I am happy that the doctor who is supposed to give me a medical exam has great professional experience, but there is also a danger that this bureaucratisation and professionalisation of society spreads to all parts of society

5) Finally, voluntary work has an important democratic function. In general, voluntary organisations play an important part to the citizens' possibilities of being heard, present points of view etc. As the political parties lose members and the media take on the part as opinion maker, it becomes important to have such democratic channels. But democracy is not only about choosing leaders, expressing opinions and presenting arguments. It is also about committing to and taking responsibility for communities large ones as well as small ones. And here the voluntary work has special meaning in modern society. On the one hand, modern man has freed himself from the traditional ties where moral standards of how to act in relation to each other were formerly founded (in particular religion). On the other hand, we have become more dependent on each other and the world that surrounds us, so standards are necessary to define how to act socially responsibly. 

When we work on a voluntary basis, we learn that we are interdependent, we have confidence in each other and we acquire standards for reciprocity. Or put in another way: through voluntary work, we acquire the "ethics of dependence and of social obligation". Modern democratic welfare policy is not primarily about "treating" and "servicing" the citizens. It is much more about "giving competencies" to the citizens, i.e. provide the citizen with the possibility of participating in society to the benefit of the individual itself and others. Therefore, the extent of voluntary work is an indicator of democracy almost as important as participation in election.

Now, this may give you an idyllic, almost romantic impression of the value and societal importance of voluntary work. But some of the qualities of voluntary work are also its weaknesses:

• Voluntary work is often an uncertain and insufficient resource which does not have the necessary professional knowledge in particular in relation to society's weak and marginal groups.

• The personal commitment to voluntary work has the weakness that it is the subjective, personal interest which is decisive for what things are done and what initiatives are taken instead of the needs and wishes of those who are at the beneficiaries of voluntary work

• Voluntary work and voluntary organisation tend to be self-sufficient a small reserve primarily concerned with its own narrow interests and needs and not concerned with external needs and interests.

What determines the extent and nature of voluntary work?
How can we explain and understand the involvement in voluntary work and why do so big differences exist between countries, cultures, sports and sports clubs when looking at voluntary work? 

Most studies have tried to explain the extent and the nature of voluntary work from people's personalities and motives for taking on voluntary work. Studies have thus shown that the will to do voluntary work has a positive connection to people's self-esteem, empathy, morale, and self-strength. However, it is not possible to understand people's motivation detached from the specific situation or context in which such voluntary work is carried out. 

Firstly, the involvement in voluntary work is determined by the social arenas in which the individual moves: where you live, where you go, if you work etc. The recruitment is mainly done through close social networks family, colleagues, and friends in the club, neighbours. People volunteer when they are encouraged to do so, while ads and campaigns do not make people volunteer. We also know that the more active a person is on the job and in the spare time the more he/she is involved in voluntary work. People who work 50 hours a week are more active than people who only work 30 hours a week, who, in turn, take on much more voluntary work than those who do not have a job at all. So my claim is that those who volunteer are not more motivated in advance. It is something you become in a certain context. I usually compare voluntary work to love. It is not something you are more or less motivated for it is something you become often to the great surprise of most people in a specific situation and context.

Secondly, studies in Germany, Norway and Denmark show that there is a clear connection between the size of an organisation and its structure on the one hand, and the extent and nature of voluntary work on the other. Some forms of organisation further voluntary work while other forms of organisation do the opposite. Studies of sports clubs in Denmark show for instance that the relative importance of voluntary work is small in large and often old clubs where the majority of the members do one of the major sports (gymnastics, swimming, badminton and tennis), while the degree of voluntarism is high in specialised and often new clubs with many volunteers and where it is easy to make people volunteer. Furthermore, the tradition of voluntary work differ from sport to sport.

Thirdly, the overall organisation of society is of course of great importance to the part played by voluntary work, i.e. the distribution of tasks between market, the public sector, families and voluntary organisations. There are simply major differences from one country to another as to the involvement of the public sector, the strength of the commercial sector, how much is left to the voluntary organisations and clubs and how much the public sector supports and regulates the voluntary sector. For many years, the general assumption was that the voluntary sector and the extent of voluntary work are smaller in a society with either a large private economy sector (or market sector), for instance in the USA, or a large public sector, as we see it in the Nordic countries. In recent years, research has shown, however, that it is not that simple. On the contrary, a large international comparative study of the size of the voluntary sector indicates that exactly in a society with a large public sector or a large private economy sector we also find a large voluntary sector and much voluntary work. 

Societies with both liberal values and a large public sector seems to improve voluntarism in sport and in society in general.

How can the State improve voluntarism in sport?
If voluntary work is so important for sport such as I claim how can the government then improve voluntarism in sport? 

Firstly, economic support from the public sector is an important basis. International comparative analyses of non-profit or voluntary organisations show that on average 40 pct. of the income comes from the public sector. In Denmark it is estimated that half of the spending on voluntarily organised sport is financed by the public sector in the form of premises and facilities (provided free of charge) and direct financial support. 

Second, despite economic support from the state, a high degree of autonomy from the state is a prerequisite for people to work voluntarily and unpaid. In principal we can distinguish between five types of "freedom", which the state must respect, if we want a large and flourishing voluntary sector provided that the activities are legal:

• The ideological freedom: The freedom to work for ideas and goals they believe in.
  
  
• The organisational freedom: The freedom to choose their own way of organising the activities (but in a democratic way)
  
  
• The economic freedom: The freedom to decide how to spend the money some prefer to use part of the money to hire professional assistance, other prefer to spend money on sports apparatus
  
  
• The freedom of "appointment". E.g. the freedom to engage people without an official, approved education
  
  
• The freedom of methods: The freedom to choose their own teaching method, training methods, etc.
  

Voluntary work or voluntarism is an old ideal which has to balance between economic support and some demands from the public sector and the necessary autonomy and freedom like this old women on stilts. 

Thank you very much for your patience.