Sport club consultants as street-level bureaucrats in sport policy processes: conceptualising micro-level interaction styles and their macro-level consequences

The focus of this paper is sport club consultants, an under-researched role that uniquely situated at the interface policy systems and clubs. Incumbents role—the label which varies between countries—conduct club-directed developmental work to align clubs with centrally issued policies programmes. Conceptualising consultants as a sport-specific street-level bureaucrat, paper’s purpose is, first, analyse consultants’ interaction style vis-à-vis and, second, demonstrate broader unintended transformative effects may follow from rather micro practice. We propose institutionally shaped be operationalised along four dimensions (e.g. case prioritisation principle, shaping context, interactor positioning, communicative strategy). substantive empirical content these vary in question. Nonetheless, we show system-level fragmentation, professionalisation, centralisation are potential consequences through attempt reconcile tensions distilled clubs’ readiness, willingness, ability change.