ABSTRACT
Notwithstanding any reluctance among sport and tourism agencies to work together, developing policy to support the diverse nature of sports tourism, evidenced by the discussions of participants in the previous three chapters, is no simple task. The heterogeneous nature of sports tourism, based on the interaction of activity, people and place, makes the task of policy development in this area a complicated one. That the development of such policy takes place against a general backdrop of indifference from many of the policy agencies that might reasonably be expected to be involved only serves to make the task more complicated. A number of factors can be initially identified that contribute to such indifference. In many countries around the world the agencies and structures that exist for developing sport and tourism respectively have been established and have developed entirely separately. This separate development is often compounded by a significantly different ‘culture’ or ‘ethos’ in the two sectors. There is often a tradition of public sector support, subsidy and/or intervention in the sports sector (the exception, perhaps, being the USA, where the US Olympic Committee, although granted a role via legislation, receives no public sector funding), while the tourist sector is largely seen as a private sector concern, and agencies are often limited to a marketing or business support role. These factors are further complicated by the different levels at which responsibility for policy development lies. Organizations may exist at national, regional and/or local level, and in countries such as the USA or Australia, which have federal systems of government, the significant role of state governments also needs to be considered. The respective responsibilities of these agencies can mean that in some instances liaison would need to take place not only across sectors, but also between levels. In England, for example, the business support role of the English Tourism Council often means that the Regional Tourist Boards are the more appropriate bodies for the nationally focused Sport England to liaise with. The relative scarcity of such liaison is a testament to the range of problems that exist.
