April 2007

THE POWER OF SPORT Sport and Cohesion

Toolkit (Pilot work in progress) Institute of Community Cohesion
Sport has the power to change the world. The power to inspire, the power to unite people in a way little else can Nelson Mandela cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 1

Sports And Community Cohesion Toolkit

Contents Foreword Introduction and aims Aims of toolkit Role of iCoCo How to use this toolkit Part One: Policy context and background Sport and Community Cohesion Community cohesion and parallel lives A process of separate development? Special initiative or mainstream activity? Sport and social capital Sport and culture in the UK Part Two: Profile on football and community cohesion Part Three: Practical tools for understanding sport and cohesion Good practice case studies Practitioner network Useful links Reference material How to contact us cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 2

Foreword

The Power of Sport

The power of sport is simply huge. It can transform peoples lives in so many ways. It can improve personal health, build teamwork and even turn the most disaffected of young people into disciplined athletes. Sport can also change communities. Sport can unite communities and the country as a whole - in common cause. The way we even think of our Nation can be defined by our sporting heroes Kelly Holmes wrapped in the Union Jack, after winning two Olympic Golds, or England winning the Ashes, Amir Kahns supremacy in the boxing ring and of course our footballers performance determining the mood of the Nation. But sport can also just reflect societys divisions too. All of our inequalities are reflected on the sports field and, all too often, sports activities are completely divided failing to grasp the opportunity to build bridges between communities. This prompted David Miliband to propose: We need to use the six years up till 2012 to promote sporting activity across racial and religious boundaries. Sport should be a great unifierover the next six years we should be aiming to reduce to zero the number of people who play only with and against people of their own race and religion. Get it right and the legacy from the Olympics will not just be medals, or sporting infrastructure, or regeneration in East London, or a positive image of Britain abroad, but vital bridges between communities who have used sport to promote tolerance and understanding.
David Miliband MP, Scarman Memorial Lecture, 31st January 2006. cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 3

Introduction and aims

This toolkit has been prepared by the Institute of Community Cohesion, supported by Sport England East Midlands and the IDeA. It is intended to draw attention to the hugely significant role that sport can play to promote community cohesion, whilst also taking forward the Governments other key targets in terms of increasing participation and performance in sport and improving health and well-being. Sport can change peoples lives in so many ways, but it can also change the perspective of whole communities and develop their sense of belonging. We hope that the role that sport can play will not simply be championed by those involved in sports the players, clubs and societies, development workers and others working in the sports industry they already know the power of sport. We would like to see the main service providers also recognise what sport can contribute too much wider processes of social regeneration and change. We do not claim that it is only sport that can do this and there are many similarly inspiring arts, music and other projects that can also serve to unite communities and inspire harmonious community relations. But the opportunities for sport have never been greater and we need to ensure that these opportunities are now fully grasped. The aims of The Power of Sport toolkit can therefore be summarised as: Aims To clearly establish and promote the power of sport in the cohesion agenda To present sports activities as a non-threatening, safe, environment, across ethnic and religious divides, which are capable of building trust and respect To enable the widest possible participation, facilitate more equal access to sporting opportunities and to promote successful role models from all communities To create a stronger association between the success of individuals and teams and an identification with a multicultural society. To develop sporting activity as a means of building social capital particularly through bridging across communities to build trust and to enhance civil renewal programmes To highlight successful programmes and to provide examples of good practice cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 4

We also wish to draw attention to the particular opportunities presented by the London 2012 Olympics Games and Paralympic Games. In the next six years we need to ensure that the promise of the Games is realised. Cultural diversity and legacy were absolutely critical issues in securing the 2012 Games and we now have an opportunity to both improve community relations across the country and to develop them for the young people of the World. iCoCo and its role The Institute of Community Cohesion was established in 2005 to provide a new approach to race, diversity and multiculturalism, and will focus on building positive and harmonious community relations. iCoCo represents a unique partnership of academic, statutory and non-governmental bodies, which combine the experience and expertise of four Universities - Coventry, Warwick, DeMontfort and Leicester, with practitioners from a range of diverse backgrounds and professions. iCoCo endeavours to: Improve and develop our understanding of community relations, collating and disseminating best practice Provide a capacity to evaluate cohesion programmes and conduct action research Provide a network for all agencies interested in this area, so that developments can be shared and constantly updated Build capacity at all levels and provide development opportunities, ranging from the training of community leaders to postgraduate research-based programmes. Our aim is to become the recognised national and international centre of expertise on community cohesion, providing unrivalled research capacity, academic courses to the highest level, accredited training programmes for public, private and voluntary sectors and support to all agencies involved in the development of community cohesion policy and practice. cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 5

How to use the toolkit

This toolkit, in line with others produced by iCoCo, is a dynamic document that can be used in a number of ways: 1) The toolkit provides a summary of key policy issues which will enable users to gain a useful understanding and links through to further detailed documents and papers that have been produced in this area; 2) The toolkit has a number of tools that can be used to develop practical solutions to use sport to promote and develop good outcomes in terms of community cohesion; 3) The toolkit is also to provide an opportunity for practitioners to share good practice and lessons learnt. cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 6

PART ONE: Policy context and background

Community cohesion and parallel lives
The concept of Community Cohesion was conceived 5 years ago in response to the Bradford, Burnley and Oldham disturbances. It developed partly in response to the parallel lives of different communities, which were identified by the Community Cohesion Review Team and found on a much wider basis in many parts of the country. Community cohesion has now become a national programme with a formal definition (see below) promulgated by central government and the LGA on behalf of local government. It is now a part of many local authority community strategies and is central to the Governments approach to race and community relations. Parallel lives were not simply related to segregation in a residential sense. They described a complete separation of communities in which there was no contact and no relationship between different groups because the separation of housing areas was compounded by separation in schooling, employment, social, cultural, faith and other spheres. The ignorance and lack of understanding about each others communities was seen to create an easy target and opportunity for extremists to stir up race hatred and to demonise particular groups. The importance of the community cohesion agenda has become even more apparent over the last 12 months or so, following the London bombings on July 7th 2005 and small scale riots in a number of towns and cities including Birmingham. The heightened international tension has ensured that race and diversity has moved up the political agenda and it is also apparent that, across the world, various models of multiculturalism are being questioned. Formal definition of community cohesion The formal definition of community cohesion adopted in Guidance issued by the Government and the LGA is that a cohesive community is one where: there is a common vision and a sense of belonging for all communities;

the diversity of peoples different backgrounds and circumstances are appreciated and positively valued;

those from different backgrounds have similar life opportunities and:

strong and positive relationships are being developed between people from different backgrounds in the workplace, in schools and within neighbourhoods. cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 7

It should be noted that the more traditional approaches of tackling discrimination and promoting equal opportunities are still very much part of the agenda and that community cohesion is building upon them, whilst also trying to break down the barriers between communities, encouraging people to come to terms with diversity and difference and promoting an overarching identity and sense of belonging. Community Cohesion programmes are being devised in relation to sport and many other areas there is no single way of bringing communities together and it is important to find ways of bridging divides in all parts of daily life. However, sport has been identified as an area of safe ground and is often where youngsters, in particular, are prepared to meet. Sports like football are a universal language common to all cultures where the discipline, rules and norms are readily understood. Sport also has the power to inspire both teams and individuals and to create a sense of achievement which can be built upon week by week and year by year. Yet, whilst sport can create many opportunities for bringing communities together and establishing the strongest of social bonds it can also be the root of the most destructive of forces. Sport can divide communities, or reinforce existing divisions based on area, social class, ethnicity and faith. In some cases these divisions are almost tribal, supported by mythology, intimidation and even violence. Such is the nature of competition and especially where those on the field of play are simply a reflection of wider social divisions and problems. The reinforcement of divisions are perhaps nowhere more evident than in Northern Ireland where many aspects of daily life are segregated, for example, Catholic and Protestants use separate auctioneers, solicitors and estate agents and around 95 per cent of children are served by separate school systems. Residential areas are highly segregated. Sport is similarly divided - Catholic participation is almost wholly through the Gaelic Athletic Association. The Catholic/Protestant division is also evident to a lesser extent, in England and Scotland and, though not on the same scale, the sectarian divides in the community are reflected in support for particular football clubs. Sport has also divided the many minority ethnic communities from each other and from the majority community. This is attributable to a combination of tradition and heritage, social class and cultural factors and, on occasion, to indirect and direct discrimination. Many efforts have been made however, to rid sport of racism and some of these initiatives have been remarkably successful in both raising ethnic minority representation and reducing overt racism. However, some well meaning attempts to raise ethnic minority participation, such as the Asian participation in football initiative, have also created some dilemmas. These schemes may well have increased the number of Asians playing football and have raised the level of participation, but may also have succeeded in reinforcing separation by creating, for example, an Asian team to play in an all-White league, rather than impacting on the sport as a whole, or providing the basis for interaction and multicultural structures. cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 8

Many of the initiatives undertaken to date have been designed to improve access for underrepresented black and minority ethnic groups and to ensure equality of opportunity. Similar approaches have been developed to tackle the under-representation of women and girls. (A number of such schemes are in part 3 of the toolkit). In these terms, most of the schemes have been an unqualified success. However, The Power of Sport argues that a more holistic approach can also ensure that initiatives also improve community relations and avoid institutionalising separation and division. Practice is, however, lagging behind policy and relatively few sports initiatives have been used to promote community cohesion. In a number of studies and reviews there has been difficulty in identifying mixed sports teams and many established teams, as well as new ones, seem to have reflected community patterns and networks and developed on a single identity basis. IDeA research examined the shortlisted Round 7 Beacon Sport and Culture for Hard to Reach Groups and conducted a search on references to cohesion in each of the applications. Results of this search revealed that of the 13 authorities shortlisted, only 7 made any reference to cohesion and only 3 made it a significant feature of their bid. Leicester City Council, which is a Beacon Council for Community Cohesion, was outstanding with 18 references. The IDeA also looked at applications that were not shortlisted for Beacon Status. Again, a search was conducted on references to cohesion in each of the applications. The results were, ironically, a little better but from the 21 applications, 5 made no reference to cohesion, 11 made very limited reference and 4 made it a significant feature, with again only one being outstanding. Fewer still, appear to use sport as a means of assisting asylum seekers to integrate and as a means of allowing the host community to get to know and respect them, though there are some schemes which include such arrangements (see for example, Sunderland City Council, The Raich Carter Sports Centre in part 3). This is a critical area and the power of sport to break down barriers should again be recognised. There has, however, been relatively little by way of properly funded and evaluated action-based research, at least by the statutory agencies. Fortunately, some has been funded by charitable bodies, the most significant of which is Understanding the Stranger, financed by the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, commissioned and published by the independent Information Centre about Asylum and Refugees in the United Kingdom (ICAR, 2004). The research examined ways to manage the arrival of asylum seekers, with a view to developing practical steps which would prevent tension from developing in local areas. The Report uses contact theory as an approach and concludes, amongst other things, that, one of the most effective ways of encouraging understanding between local people and asylum seekers is for them to meet each other arrangements need to be made for local residents and asylum seekers to meet as neighbours. This need not be through specially convened meetings existing cultural, sporting or community activities can provide good opportunities (ICAR, 2004). cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 9

Other research has highlighted the need to tackle the ignorance of the resident population as a means of reducing hate crime and the necessity of interaction between young people to improve tolerance and reduce conflict. To some extent the modest emphasis on cohesion in sports schemes to date is not very surprising: most departments with a responsibility for sports developments are focused on their own particular targets in respect of participation, performance and access, whilst those policy teams responsible for regeneration, cohesion and community relations tend to focus on more conventional approaches, or on the physical side of regeneration. The Power of Sport seeks to make these connections more apparent. The sector should build the evidence base that demonstrates the benefits of sport and physical activity to social cohesion, community safety
Sport England, The framework for Sport in England: making England an active and successful sporting nation: a vision for 2020

A process of separate development?

The arguments for and against single identity funding are not unique to sport (see for example NACVS Paper on Single Identity Funding on the Institutes website www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk) and are not entirely straightforward. In the short term at least, it has often proved easier to engage with different groups on their own ground (or within their own comfort zones), with people from a similar background. It can also be argued, historically at least, that this has been necessary (see Appendix Black Team, White League). More generally, the need for capacity building within a particular community, so that they can perhaps compete on an equal basis, and especially in respect of new migrant groups, is difficult to argue against. However, once established on that basis, it seems as though it can be even harder to develop common programmes subsequently and the arrangements quickly become institutionalised. Furthermore, the separate development on the playing field appears to make it even more difficult to challenge other areas of sports development and management. For example, the progression into higher level coaching and management structures, and inclusion of minorities in the governance arrangements, has generally failed to develop where it has simply been based on single identity groups. Sports policy in Britain, which traditionally focused upon the dual strands of increasing participation and raising performance levels, has begun to shift towards viewing the potential benefits and impacts of sport in more holistic and cross-cutting ways
Town Planning Review, Vol 76 No 2 2005, pp i-v cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 10

However, a number of new and more challenging approaches and schemes are beginning to emerge (again, see Section 4) and football is again leading the way. For example, the Community Cohesion Focus/Awaaz project in Hounslow, which brought together South Asian and Somalian communities from central Hounslow, with communities from the west of the borough, which are predominantly white. It aimed to break down the lack of social mixing, tolerance and understanding which had been reflected in local schools. Similarly, West Ham United Football Club, in partnership with the London Borough of Tower Hamlets is at the forefront of a pioneering project to improve participation in football, in deprived, inner city, multicultural areas. It is open to all children in the Borough regardless of ethnicity, gender or disability; although targeting young Asian players is a key objective given their past low representation. Targeting of groups, within a wider multicultural perspective, may offer a compromise between single identity funding and cross-cultural provision, though care will obviously need to be taken to ensure that schemes remain genuinely multicultural. The targeting of groups, which have a history of conflict with a view to defusing hostility and tension, have also been undertaken. The Maimonides Foundation, a joint Jewish-Muslim interfaith organisation, which fosters understanding, dialogue, and co-operation between Jews and Muslims, has an active education programme which runs a number of projects and events for young people of Jewish and Muslim faith. They create forums where the two communities can share their commonalities and discuss their differences through dialogue. The Foundation has used both art and football as universal languages to begin to develop fraternal relations between Britains 275,000 Jews and 1.5 million Muslims, bringing together people from those communities, some of whom have never previously met anyone from the other community. One of their most high profile events is the annual Interfaith Football Programme, at which over 120 Jewish and Muslim students between the ages of 912 take part in a football tournament in mixed faith teams. However, schemes in other sports such as cricket and golf, are also beginning to emerge, such as the Saltaire Cricket Club in Bradford, which was founded in 1869 and has reinvented itself as a multicultural club over the last five years or so. Interestingly, their success has been based more on changing the social, rather than the sporting, dimensions of the club, a view reflected in the Hounslow Focus/Awaaz project. (see both schemes in section 4). Bradford has similarly championed multicultural development in other sports like golf, though mixed teams are still difficult to achieve. Multi-sports activities are also able to attract a diverse range of participants, for example the Haringey Warriors Youth Organisation (HWYO) summer sports camp, 2005, which, utilised funding from London & Quadrant Housing Association, Haringey Councils Youth Services and Neighbourhood Management. cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 11

Special initiative or mainstream activity?

A large number of the best practice schemes referred to in Section 4 and perhaps especially the most innovative and challenging appear to have been the product of special initiatives, pilots or pathfinders. On occasion they have had little to do with the statutory agencies and depend upon the voluntary effort and good will of community activists. However, the possible mainstreaming of community cohesion approaches is gradually being seriously considered. For example, the Department of Media, Culture and Sport (DCMS) produced Bringing Communities Together through Sport and Culture in 2004. This started the process with a collection of ideas resulting from a seminar and involving an array of government agencies, which reported that they had managed to help participants in their various programmes to feel differently about people of other cultures and backgrounds and to break down the barriers between them. Much of the present funding on community cohesion is short term and limited to specific areas or activities. Local councils, their partners, sports associations, governing bodies and the sports infrastructure provided by Sport England in particular needs to consider how community cohesion principles can be embedded in all its work. However, just as importantly, LSPs, local authorities, Crime and Disorder Partnerships, Regeneration agencies, RDAs, LEAs and schools, colleges - and universities and many other bodies responsible for the various aspects of societal relations - must also consider how they can use sport to achieve their aims of a safer society in which individuals can engage and reach their potential and in which communities are more at ease with each other. It is to be hoped that the bringing together of the various Government programmes within the new Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG), together with the establishment of the Commission on Integration and Cohesion, will create a stronger sense of purpose and clearer focus within all mainstream services.

Sport and social capital

The concept of social capital is now beginning to play a much bigger role in public policy and as John Williams suggests (see Section 3) sport is a key arena for promoting social relations and community bonding. However, as John Williams also points out sport can be responsible for the some of the more extreme forms of bonding social capital, which creates strong support for one team by inhibiting the bridging to other teams and groups. But social capital is not yet widely understood, nor accepted as being within the competence of local authorities and their partners. The pioneering work of the London Borough of Camden and the IPPR to assess and measure social capital at a local level may however mean that this position changes. (Sticking Together social capital and local government, LB Camden and IPPR, 2006). If social capital the loose associations and networks which enable people to work together and establish neighbourliness and trust becomes a key part of public policy, then sporting links and associations will inevitably be seen as cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 12

more important. From a cohesion perspective, the concept of bridging social capital is pretty much equivalent to cross-cultural contact and is a means by which we can begin to break down the barriers and develop understanding and trust between different communities. As discussed above, the emerging best practice now adopts cross-cultural sports activities. However, associational engagement, which can also be formed by sporting organisations clubs, societies, league structures and governing bodies - is a key part of civil society. The hundreds of sports bodies, which are generally constituted on a voluntary basis, can also draw people together, across boundaries, and facilitate cross-cultural understanding. Social capital is in no way limited to the relationships that develop on the sports field. Varshney's Ethnic Conflict and Civic Life (YUP, 2002) draws upon previous work in Northern Ireland to highlight the beneficial effect of a range of Lions Clubs, Rotary Clubs and integrated sports societies, which have become a bulwark against civic unrest, simply because of the association and trust which had been previously created. In the present context, following a small incident, or a rumour which has begun to fly around communities, unrest can quickly follow, unless community leaders are able to quickly confer, challenge the information and respond by quelling the anxieties. This demands preexisting networks. Sport alone cannot provide them, but should be part of that community tapestry which can do so. Such networks may need to be established and sports associations can provide a ready made vehicle. At a national level, organisations like the Inter-Faith Network have been responsible for promoting cross-cultural and inter-faith dialogue and many local networks have been established over the years. These have been purposely cross-cultural and local and regional sports associations should consider how they measure up. They also need to understand that cross-cultural contact, unfortunately, does not generally arise naturally and often has to be engineered in the first instance to break down barriers and to give people the confidence to move out of their comfort zones.

Sport and culture in the UK

As the Australian sociologist John Hughson (2004: 320-1) points out, this recent drawing together of sport and the arts under the panoply of culture in the UK is connected to attempts to reconcile the principles of access and excellence in policies for the creative industries as an intrinsic part of a New Labour strategy for developing a more democratic agenda for present and future UK cultural policy. It also has much to do with the current (rather overplayed) trend of urban regeneration in the UK and elsewhere to be seen to be substantially, and inexorably, culture-driven (Coleman, 2003). Recent UK competitors for nomination as European Capital of Culture in 2008 (Liverpool was the cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 13

successful city, of course), for example, all included prominence given to successful professional sports clubs as part of their portfolio of supposedly indispensable cultural attributes. Talking specifically of the plans for the cultural regeneration of the city of Liverpool and looking forward to 2008, Coleman (2003: 32) warns, usefully, of what he calls the dangers of an emerging hegemony of aesthetics regarding who and what should be allowed to be seen in these newly branded Merseyside streets of culture. These were once open and democratic public urban spaces, he claims, one available to all members of the community. Now such spaces are increasingly privatised and sanitised and are characterised by what he suggests are officially sponsored and staged cultural events - and thus by a culturally and socially deadening controlled spontaneity. We need not share, entirely, this rather extreme pessimism about the effects on the transformation of public space produced by a cultural regeneration of this narrow range, a kind of regeneration that occurs as a response to intensifying global competition and the socalled city place wars of late-modernity. But we do need to be aware, of course, of some of the potential negative implications of these new dimensions of sporting and cultural policy which are often pursued in the name of greater community cohesion and cultural integration - especially in a neo-liberal era in which categories of acceptable citizenship seem, increasingly, to be defined by the capacity to consume and in which failed consumers seem to be progressively managed out of preferred images and experiences of urban space (Bauman, 1997). It is probably also true that this specific policy focus on the cultural relevance of sport in this context has had the associated effect of driving up unrealistic and largely unfounded perceptions of the increasing capacity of sport, almost alone, to successfully unite the ethnically diverse and resolutely classed members of local urban communities in the UK in a putative and nostalgically cohesive all embracing civic culture. Sport is sometimes portrayed, in fact, as the main, emergent hope for a more egalitarian, a more inclusive, future for an otherwise economically and socially polarised late-modern city (Hughson, 2004). But as John Hughson also points out, relying on sport and culture in this way - as the unifying totem of a cultural package that can, and will, deliver on issues of community cohesion, collective identity, social need and on a range of connected social ills in the city is to mistake the kind of simple political rhetoric that is often effortlessly mobilised in debates such as these, for the real effects of urban difference and for the consequences for marginalized communities of often deep seated, long term and impacted social inequality and poverty. He, convincingly, argues in this regard that: The attendant rhetoric proposes not only that culture will revive the economy, but also that it can reverse the social decline of the underprivileged. Reversing urban social decline and overcoming poverty and related problems is, of course, a reasonable and worthy aim for social planners, but when overcoming social decline is made too dependent on the success of programmes in culture sport and the arts, this tends to ask too much... (Hughson, 2004: 328) cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 14

PART TWO: Profile on football and community cohesion English football and community cohesion: some progress and problems
Let us take one sporting example now, the case of English football. Let us examine it a little more closely in this respect of potentially conflicting national and local agendas. Here, the modernised and generally progressive national Football Associations recent public commitment to pursue, centrally, an effective new equity strategy for the sport is very impressive. It promises to address at least some of the problems of racialised exclusion in the English game of the sort identified in a survey recently undertaken by the Commission for Racial Equality though the Premier League and its member clubs claim their own expertise and successes in these areas (see CRE, 2004). But, successfully devolving this new FA policy down to local County FAs where it is arguably needed most: Where the governance of the grassroots version of the sport is mainly delivered;

Where the processes of modernisation experienced centrally have been much more slowly felt and have been generally more patchy in their effects;

And, where racially divisive forms of exclusion and marginalisation continue to impact against the possibilities of local football becoming a reliable site for community cohesion All this seems a much more contentious issue altogether (see Lusted, 2006). The apparent cultural and organisational dissonance between the policy centre of English football (The FA) and the rather more resistant, independent and geographically and socially outlying policy deliverers of the local governance of the game in England (the County FAs) has, in turn, produced something of a challenge from British Asians who are deeply committed to local football. They claim the FAs new national agenda for change

underplays the structural problems in the game and fails to see that real equity strategies require more power sharing (See NAFF, 2005). Here the claim from the FAs opponents is that making progress on delivering real opportunities and real safeguards for British ethnic minorities in local football - and thus enhancing community cohesion and social inclusion at the local level through sport - is just too much discussed and advertised in the English game at the national level of rhetoric. Despite much goodwill, it is still far too little experienced in some areas at the local, grassroots versions of the sport. Here, paradoxically, a progressive and centralised commitment towards greater equity and thus more community cohesion in sport at The FA one that is heavily pursued via promotional packages in order to advertise and cement these new agendas - may also have stimulated anger and resentment at the local level, where some ethnic minority players and officials still claim that relatively little seems to have changed. cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 15

This is because existing barriers to the effective delivery of such commitments decided at the core, are perceived to remain relatively undisturbed at the grassroots. And because, after more than a decade of agitation for change from British Asians in football, for some of those who operate at some distance from the palatial and undoubtedly cosmopolitan Soho Square corridors of the national FA headquarters, progress on matters of increasing community cohesion in local football in their own neighbourhoods can still, sometimes, seem almost glacially slow to arrive. At the professional football club level in England, meanwhile, the temptation for some smaller and medium-sized provincial football clubs - even in a by now well established, if hardly always consensual, multi-cultural Britain - has seemed to be to continue to mine what have been historically positive and successful long-term community relations with more traditional sectors of the local football publics in England white, largely working class and lower middle class, males (see Bradbury, 2001). This rather narrow approach to community and customer relations in some parts of professional football in England, nevertheless, has the associated tendency to reject, perhaps, the more invidious and divisive effects of the gentrifying, more marketised, types of fan/club relations popularly pursued elsewhere in the sport in recent years. But, at the same time, they also risk marginalising potential community cohesion gains in and around British sports stadia, especially in some racially divided British towns and cities in parts of the north of England, as well as some potentially fruitful sporting and commercial contacts with a new, local BME supporter base including possible female ethnic minority fans and even BME female football players (see Bradbury, 2001). In this sense, British sporting stadia can still, simultaneously, evoke what Bale (1993) has described as topophilic sentiments (a pleasurable sense of place) for the mainly white included fan base, and rather more topophobic responses (a sense of fear or discomfort) for those excluded sporting citizens who are more likely to be drawn from local ethnic minorities and communities of colour. These all remain real difficulties in domestic sport in Britain, problems that have no easy solution. They are ones that require directed local action, but also sensitive handling and the careful dissemination of training and best practice, as many British sports clubs such as these claim to be and often believe themselves to be resolutely colour blind in their approach to access, marketing and local community relations (Bradbury, 2001; Bradbury and Williams, 2006). And it should also be pointed out that even in the face of these tales of incomplete, contingent, local resistances to changes in sporting practices in relation to extending community cohesion, substantial progress has, indeed, been made in specific locales in British football and in other British sports to positively promote inclusion, antiracism and community cohesion in and via sport. cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 16

In a recent review of European-wide initiatives in football to combat racism, for example (van Sterkenburg et al, 2005), it was shown that whilst both Italy and Spain then relied solely on fans to offer opposition to widespread racism in the sport in those countries, the UK was shown to boast a number of national and local initiatives on this score. These include the national Kick it Out strategy established in 1997, and the education and media focused Show Racism the Red Card campaign that worked with an impressive 63 British professional clubs on the production of anti-racism publicity materials and videos in 2003/04 (van Sterkenburg et al, 2005: 39). UEFA, footballs European governing body, meanwhile made a sum of 1.7 million Euros available in 2005 for anti-racism programmes established by its 52 member associations across Europe (uefa.com/uefa 2005). Local, independent initiatives aimed at addressing football racism and increasing community cohesion in England include Football United, Racism Divides (FURD), set up in Sheffield in 1993, and also Foxes Against Racism (FAR) from Leicester, which was established in 1997. The Charlton Against Racism and Exclusion (CARE) project, established in conjunction with Charlton Athletic FC, the police, the local Race Equality Council, Greenwich Council and local regeneration projects, is a much more broadly based initiative, is much better resourced than these independent schemes, and it links the voluntary and statutory sectors directly with the local football club in promoting training and employment opportunities, as well as access to the football club and its facilities, and to sporting provision more widely in the borough of Greenwich. These are in addition to the many funded Pathfinder schemes established around Britain to work at bringing together members of local communities through sport. CARE has shown, especially, just what a broadly based, co-ordinated and adequately funded local campaign can deliver through sport, especially when it is allied to an approach to cohesion and inclusion strategies that run throughout the culture of the local professional sports club, rather than remaining, as is often the case, pigeon-holed in the low status community department of the organisation (Garland and Rowe, 2001: 67). More recently, Charlton Athletic responding, predictably positively, to the important new messages about interdependence and globalisation in sport, has extended its work in these areas to members of poor, black township communities in South Africa (see Williams, 2005). cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 17

PART THREE: Practical tools for understanding sport and community cohesion Good Practice case studies (see our online database)
The IDeA undertook desk research focused on 3 main areas; recent applications to the Round 7 Beacon Scheme Theme Sport and Culture for Hard to Reach Groups, existing local authority contacts who have demonstrated good practice in community cohesion or community engagement, and finally other information sources such as the internet, journals and books. The review revealed a number of initiatives promoting sporting engagement with so called hard to reach groups e.g. BME groups, young people, disabled people etc, but less information was uncovered with regard to promoting sport as a tool for community cohesion. However, some information on interesting projects was obtained, summaries of which are highlighted throughout this section and have been added to schemes identified from other sources. The main reason different ethnic groups dont mix is not because they dont want to but because they have no reason to.
Community Cohesion Review Report

Case studies
London Borough of Tower Hamlets Olympic Summer of Sport A programme of sport sessions inspired by the 2012 Olympic bid and is designed to take advantage of the local enthusiasm and publicity for the Olympics. It targets children and families from deprived areas. Sessions are themed around the 26 Olympic and 12 Paralympic sports encouraging participation by previously under-represented children and young people. The programme also includes a number of targeted sports events including an Asian Sports Festival featuring traditional sports such as Kabbadi and wrestling as well as a Disabled Sports Festival and the recently acclaimed Estate Based Sports Programme aimed at reducing anti -social behaviour amongst young people. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk Burnley Borough Council - Football Development Group This group has been tasked to produce a development plan for football for the Borough. The document is the plan for Burnley. The development plan also links to the Playing Pitch Strategy that has identified the need to develop quality and modern football facilities across the Borough. The development plan also identified the need to have a specific development officer for the sport because football has a new dimension emerging which is centred on the broader social impact that football can have and particularly its capacity for generating a sense of community and empowerment amongst groups who are typically seen as excluded from mainstream society. Therefore a Community Football Development Officer was appointed. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 18

Leicester City Council Leicesters political leadership is effectively engaged on sport and cultural issues and has for many years championed diversity and the needs of hard to reach groups. For example, councillors set up a community cohesion funding stream used this summer for a programme of inter-cultural sporting activities, partly in response to emerging community tensions between Somali and African Caribbean young people. More than 200 young people took part in the Street Sports finale bringing together young people from 5 deprived communities. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk Sunderland City Council The Raich Carter Sports Centre The Raich Carter Sports Centre is a community sports hub which sits in New Deal for Communities (NDC) area with 54m regeneration funding. It is a Sport England Pathfinder Multi Sports Environment and a national model of excellence. The area is home to 9,434 residents in 4,000 households. One tenth of the population are from BME groups, predominantly Bangladeshi, 48% of working age households have no-one in paid employment, 16% of over 16s are long term sick or disabled (national average 5%) and the area has some of the highest incidences of coronary heart disease, lung cancer deaths, teenage pregnancies in the city and region. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk Oldham Unity in the Community Sport Programme Unity in the Community is an imaginative community cohesion initiative across 50 plus primary / secondary schools. It links schools of a variety of backgrounds to allow communities to connect through sport in a safe, fun structured environment and impact on changing attitudes of young people in the borough. Children are then actively encouraged to attend further sporting opportunities such as Active Sport sessions, Greater Manchester Youth Games, Open for Action holiday courses and junior club sessions. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk Saltaire Cricket Club, Bradford At a time when many clubs in the Bradford area have still been unable to sustain a mixed playing and non playing membership, Saltaire Cricket Club has managed to achieve a mix in its teams from the Asian and White communities, from the youngest children at 8 and 9 years old to the senior teams. Other clubs are starting to make inroads and the the propspects are brighter than for a number of years. This has now been sustained at Saltaire for a number of years and there are several different stands to the clubs ability to achieve this. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 19

Nottinghamshire County Council Social Capital Development Sport Action Zone Social Capital Development SAZs Needs Assessment recognises that projects to improve access to sport and leisure are best developed at a local, preferably Neighbourhood level, yet in C2DE former Coalfield Communities there is sometimes and absence of social capital, which hinders groups from accessing grants and support. The 4 NRF areas in the Zone have all recognised the power of sport in developing neighbourhood cohesion. We undertake work with and where necessary join the committees of various organisations to overcome barriers. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk Shrewsbury and Atcham Borough Council In response to the shared priorities of the local strategic partnership and agreed objectives, Shrewsbury and Atcham Borough Council set about its target to deliver a first class sport and recreation facility base within the borough, to be underpinned by a comprehensive, community sport & recreation programme for ALL. Following a needs analysis in 2003 an Open Space Sport and Recreation Strategy was developed. This in turn led to the programme of delivering a set of new and enhanced facilities, together with an appropriate sports development programme. The project coordinator developed close working relationships with the various sporting bodies, local sporting groups users and future users to help determine the exact nature of sports provision. The culmination of the work led to the Council approving the development of a new multi sport sports village in the north of Shrewsbury, meeting a key objective within the Community Strategy (Health & Well Being). For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk Charnwood Borough Council- Sports Links project The Sports-Link Project is a partnership between the Council, Charnwood Arts, Sport England, Leicestershire Constabulary, Charnwood Council for Voluntary Service, Leicestershire Youth Service and Charnwood Racial Equality Council. The partnership arose as a result of effective initiatives across Charnwood through the local community cohesion agenda and the successful work of Connecting Communities, another partnership commissioned under the Home Office Resolving Differences programme for the East Midlands. These relationships have been sustained through the Charnwood Community Cohesion Pathfinder Programme. The SLPO continuously works in partnership with community providers and community members to develop and create projects and opportunities for specific communities. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 20

Charnwood Borough Council The Global All Starts Project The Global All-Stars is a football project, which aims to promote unity and friendship to undertake work around cultural and personal differences and cohesion. The concept of the project is to create a World United football team consisting of participants living in Charnwood from different cultural backgrounds. Young people were chosen from teams at the World Cup Football Camp in 2003 to represent the Global All-Stars Team. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk Darlington Borough Council- Westside project Tackling Anti- social behaviour This pilot project is delivered at a local comprehensive school on a Friday evening in one of Darlingtons Priority wards, deemed a hot spot area for anti social behaviour. The purpose of the project is to provide diversionary leisure activities for young people. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk Darlington Borough Council- Darlington School Sport Partnership As part of the Governments PE and School Sport Strategy, the Darlington SSP was implemented in September of 2002 across approximately half of the schools (including Beaumont Hill Special School) in the town. The SSP programme has five key principles: support for PE in schools, integrated sports development and partnership working, focus on disadvantage and inclusion in schools, working together with families, and a whole school approach. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk London Borough of Southwark- Southwark Community Games Southwark Community Games is a council-led partnership initiative that continues to build on its success. The Southwark Community Games is a year round programme of sports coaching and competition for young people aged seven to 16 years old. There is also sport related vocational training for teachers and young people aged sixteen years and older. It takes place across the eight community council areas in schools, after school clubs, estate and community settings. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 21

Preston City Council- disability sports development Preston Panthers was Lancashires first disabled multi-sports club for young people. Since its establishment in 1998 it has expanded and developed and now has a membership base of 65 young people who attend weekly sessions at West View Leisure Centre and an annual residential course in outdoor pursuit activities in the Lake District. A second Disability Sports Club has also been established in partnership with Preston Primary Care Trust specifically for those with co-ordination difficulties. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk The Maimonides Foundation, London The Maimonides Foundation is a joint Jewish-Muslim interfaith organisation, which fosters understanding, dialogue, and co-operation between Jews and Muslims through cultural, academic and educational programmes based on mutual respect and trust. It has an active education programme which runs a number of projects and events for young people of Jewish and Muslim faith. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk Tottenham Hotspur Community: Coaching Programme in Partnership with Haringey Neighbourhood Management During February half-term 2006, Tottenham Hotspur Community (THC) provided opportunities for over 750 young people aged six to 18 years to participate in a structured coaching programme in a safe and friendly environment. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk West Ham United Football Club: Partnership with the London Borough of Tower Hamlets A pioneering project to improve participation in football, in deprived, inner city, multi cultural areas. The coaching programmes are open to all children in the borough aged 7-11 years old, regardless of ethnicity, gender or disability; though targeting young Asian players is a key objective given the lack of opportunities that have historically been available them. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 22

Tameside Sport Development Tameside Sports Development has responsibility for the development of a network of sports opportunities across the Borough. The main aspects of development work are directly linked to Tamesides Community Plan, Tamesides Cultural Strategy and Government led recommendations and initiatives with Sport Development seeing its role as a constantly changing mixture of direct provision and facilitation. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk Haringey Warriors Youth Organisation Summer Sports camp and end of summer tournament The HWYO summer sports camp and end of summer tournament 2005 took place between July 25th and August 26th 2005. For the first time, the camp was brought to Priory Park. The sports camp offered the children and young people an exciting, fun, new experience that they would otherwise not have had during their summer holidays. HWYO puts emphasis on providing professional, top quality coaching and youth mentoring to children and young people. Under the expert guidance of our coaching team the children and young people have been able to create new friendships and engage with young people from different cultures. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk Hounslow Community Cohesion Focus/Awaaz Football Team This project is a good example of how one can use sport to bring young people together. Hounslow suffers from an unfortunate polarisation of young people within the borough, central Hounslow having large South Asian and Somalian communities, whilst the west of the borough, areas like Feltham, are predominantly white. This also seems to be reflected in the schools young people go to, leading to a lack of social mixing and therefore a lack of tolerance and understanding. This was also reflected in the football teams, Awaaz and Focus. Starting with both teams going to tournaments together in the same mini bus but playing in their own teams, there is now one football team. For information on this project see www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 23

Practitioners network The Practitioners' Network is a group of cohesion practitioners who exchange ideas, discuss issues, seek solutions to problems and find out about successful initiatives operating throughout the UK. If you would like to contribute to making effective changes in the field of community cohesion, why not register now at www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk Good practice database There are numerous examples of community cohesion projects and schemes throughout the UK. The iCoCo good practice database provides a facility for practitioners to record their achievements and to learn from the experiences of others. This is a dynamic resource, which will continuously be revised and updated. If you have been involved in community cohesion work, why not submit your project? Much can be achieved through the sharing of experiences; your successes should be talked about and your insights are valuable to other cohesion practitioners. Register your scheme at www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk cohesion@coventry.ac.uk www.cohesioninstitute.org.uk 24