On Chinese Sports Associations: Reform of Sports Associations under the Transformation of the Relationship between the State and Society

Author: Huang Yaling
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-10-01
Features: Under the planned economy system, China's sports government departments held "limitless power" and were responsible for almost all aspects of sports, from macro to micro, which was the reason for the expansion of sports government institutions. Since the reform and opening-up, the sports government departments have undergone several reforms, but they were all based on the old power structure and management system of the State General Administration of Sport. Overall, these reforms were merely simple mergers and did not fundamentally address the power relationship between sports government institutions and social organizations. Sports associations are still controlled and covered by government power, being (name without substance) as appendages with no real authority, existing as ("" - registered but powerless) and "isomorphic" subsidiaries, failing to truly fulfill the role that sports associations should play. This study explores the fundamental issues in the development and reform of China's sports associations from the perspective of the state-society relationship theory, and through a comprehensive diagnosis of sports associations, lays a certain theoretical foundation for their reform and development, proposing practical reform methods and approaches. The main methods used in this study are: literature review, survey method, comparative method, induction and deduction, and interview method.
Main Conclusions: The essential characteristics of China's sports associations are "weak," rather than "strong." Characteristics such as "umbrella organization traits," "non-governmental and non-social nature," "resource differences," "functional misalignment," "conflict between rationality and legitimacy," "goal performance orientation," and "horizontal closure of connections" are the alienated products of the isomorphism between sports associations and the government. The traditional Chinese culture and the historical background of the planned economy have nurtured a special sports association system with historical rationality, allowing China's sports to bypass the disputes between the government and social organizations due to resource scarcity. Under new historical conditions, the original system has gradually exposed its defects that constrain sports development. The sports associations under the "command system" have satisfied the government's "centralized control" while actually tying the government's own hands. The reform of sports associations is an inevitable choice for the market economy and also a necessary choice for social development. The significance of sports association reform lies not only in the coordination and development within sports but also in aligning with the system required by the larger society. Reforming sports associations aims to realize the functions of managing and serving sports, forming a "good governance" where the government and society jointly oversee sports, meeting the cultural needs of diverse groups after social differentiation, and creating a "social constraint" on the power of sports government departments. The reform of sports associations is driven by internal "need for reform," external pressure from "social coordinated development" requiring reform, and the "environment for reform" provided by the transformation of the state-society relationship. Under the right "environment," the ( -) of pressure and motivation will ultimately lead to fundamental changes in China's sports association system. The transformation of sports associations from "powerless formal types" to "empowered effective types," and from "dependent types" to "autonomous types," is essentially the path toward government decentralization, independent development, self-reliance, promoting civil society development, improving social supervision, and reforming legal systems.
Keywords: state society sports associations sports reform