Like waves, culture crises roll in and out of our sporting shores. Rugby and cricket have been in the headlines recently. A string of reviews have investigated Olympic and Paralympic sports including cycling, archery, bobsleigh, para-swimming, judo and gymnastics. The problem with this regularity of cultural emergencies is that it’s fast becoming the norm, part of what we expect in high-performance sport, rather than a warning sign that something is going badly wrong in these environments and that the fixes to date are not working.
Normalising these cultures reinforces the narrative that underpins them: sport is tough and athletes need to be prepared to do whatever it takes, no questions asked. Carrying on like this would be wilful blindness. Rather we should be asking what is going wrong in high-performance sport? What could we do differently to chart a better, healthier path for elite sport? And is this a peculiarly British phenomenon, or are there lessons to learn from abroad?
In Canada, athletes are currently banding together across hockey, soccer, boxing, bobsleigh, rugby, gymnastics and rowing to denounce toxic cultures of abuse and discrimination and drive change. Pascale St-Onge, the minister for sport, acknowledged there was a “safe sport crisis” in the country and pledged government action. St-Onge meets monthly with AthletesCAN, a body representing Canadian athletes to discuss systemic change. The voice of athletes is at last being listened to at the highest level.
Changes are happening on both sides of the Atlantic. Greater mental health support is offered, though in Canada it lasts beyond sporting retirement. The Canadian government recently set up the Office of the Sport Integrity Commissioner and UK Sport piloted an independent investigation service, Sport Integrity. The scale of the crises has proven that sports are unable to scrutinise and course-correct themselves, as Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson highlighted in her 2017 Duty of Care review, which called for a sporting ombudsman. But questions as to whether there is sufficient independence in such structures abound in both countries where trust in the sport system is at an all-time low.
Both countries are trying to respond but risk reacting superficially, neglecting the deeper cultural issues that lead to athlete abuse, coach burnout and damaging experiences all round. Setting up better complaints procedures or welfare policies won’t work without changing the way sport is actually experienced and led. For example, more wellbeing advisers are useful but alone do not address the root causes of the problem. As one mental health expert said: “An hour with a wellbeing adviser almost makes it worse when you then go back into the unchanged performance environment that is causing extreme stress the rest of the time.”
Change is required to the ethos and values underpinning these systems. UK Sport’s “no compromise” approach and funding for medals policy played a role in enabling damaging cultures. Understanding and rectifying that is proving difficult. Canada’s equivalent organisation called Own the Podium – a name that crudely exposes the shallowness of its approach – is struggling to set out a credible vision for the future.
Jennifer Walinga, a Canadian rowing world champion and professor of culture at Royal Roads University decries the focus on “too much prevention, not enough positive vision. As much as there is a need for a better response to poor cultures and abusive behaviours, [there is a need for] something to fight for, not just fight against.”
Looking in a different direction, Australia has been working through its spate of high-profile cultural troubles for some time. The ball-tampering scandal in cricket hit the Australian public hard, alongside public disclosures of mental health struggles and depression from sports stars such as Olympic swimmers Ian Thorpe and Cate Campbell.
Australia is reimagining its approach to sport in preparation for Brisbane hosting the Olympics in 2032. Last year, legendary Olympic swimmer Kieren Perkins took over as CEO of the Australian Sports Commission which will oversee both high-performance and participation sport (the two remain firmly split in the UK). Perkins articulated the bigger challenges for sport beyond winning medals, citing the “participation cliff”, access issues and the experience that young people have in sport that can put them off for life. “If we just want to win, and we’re happy just putting people into the meat grinder and seeing how many kids survive to get gold medals … fine, I can buy gold medals, that’s not hard,” he said. “But I think we can do better than that.”
Under a broader and imaginative approach to developing the next generation of coaches at the Australian Institute of Sport, coaches learn collaboratively across sports, dive deep into what values-based environments look like and consider the broader responsibility of coaches to develop people, not just athletes. Coaching development and support is going to be a defining area for cultural change and competitive advantage over the next period.
Another area for cultural innovation is being explored closer to home. A pilot project, Powered by Purpose, run by UK Sport and delivered by the True Athlete Project (disclaimer: I am a member of their advisory board and supported the programme) saw a group of Olympic and Paralympic athletes supported by a range of experts in their aims to make a difference beyond the field of play. Each wanted to find a way to use their platform and position as athletes to contribute towards positive social change across diverse fields including environmental sustainability, increasing inclusion and better sports opportunities for those with disabilities.
There should be no surprise that the weekend after the final presentations, several athletes delivered personal-best performances in their latest competitions. Beyond that, they each attested to the inspiration and confidence this had given them in deepening their identity of what it means to be an athlete. It’s an area increasingly understood as crucial to positive mental health and comes from a radically different starting point – that athletes are citizens, rather than short-term commodities, and have a value beyond sport.
New structures, policies and roles in any country will be worth little unless underpinned by a new ethos, vision and values. Are we ambitious enough to pursue a compelling vision of high-performance sport with longer-term benefits, or are we just going to wait and see which sport rolls up next needing a cultural review?
Cath Bishop is an Olympic rowing medalist, leadership and culture coach, and author of The Long Win.
