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A “gathering of enthusiastic expense account tourists”?

A study of assignments to the Sport Committee of the German Bundestag

Ein „Stammtisch jubelstarker Spesenurlauber“?

Eine Studie zu den Berufungen in den Sportausschuss des Deutschen Bundestages

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Abstract

The paper addresses the question whether the cooperative relationship between organized sport and state actors has left an impact on the legislative organization of sport policy-making. The idea of whether the Sport Committee of the Bundestag can be categorized as a constituency committee staffed mainly with lobbyists from the sport associations and backbenchers is examined. Empirical results for the hypotheses are mixed. Committee assignments and career trajectories show some features supporting the idea that membership in the Sport Committee is mainly interesting for legislators with a strong sport background. However, committee members have strong party ties suggesting that the committee is also of relevance for the political parties and is under party control. The Sport Committee member’s ties with the sport bodies indicate patterns of co-optation between sport and legislature.

Zusammenfassung

Dieser Beitrag behandelt die Frage, ob das partnerschaftliche Verhältnis zwischen organisiertem Sport und Staat seine Spuren in der parlamentarischen Organisation der Sportpolitik hinterlassen hat. Es wird überprüft, ob der Sportausschuss des Deutschen Bundestages als Klientelausschuss kategorisiert werden kann, der hauptsächlich mit Lobbyisten aus den Sportverbänden und Hinterbänklern besetzt ist. Die empirischen Ergebnisse für diese Hypothesen fallen gemischt aus. Ausschussberufungen und Karrieremuster unterstützen die Annahme, dass die Mitgliedschaft im Sportausschuss vor allem für Parlamentarier mit einem starken Sporthintergrund attraktiv ist. Allerdings besitzen die Ausschussmitglieder auch starke Parteianbindungen, was vermuten lässt, dass der Ausschuss für die politischen Parteien relevant ist und von ihnen kontrolliert wird. Die Verbindungen der Ausschussmitglieder zu den Sportverbänden weisen auf Kooptationsmuster zwischen Sportverbänden und Bundestag hin.

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Notes

  1. To these members belong former decathlon trainer Friedrich (‘Friedel’) Wilhelm Schirmer (SPD), former GDR Olympic gold medal winner Dr. Ruth Fuchs (Linke), former GDR cycling idol Gustav-Adolf (‘Täve’) Schur (Linke), top football referee Bernd Heynemann (CDU), and former high bar world champion and Olympic bronze medal winner Eberhard Gienger (CDU). Also Walter Link (CDU) has been included due to his bronze medal at the European Senior Track and Field Championships in Helsinki 1988.

  2. These members include the following: Agnes Hürland-Büning, Peter Rauen, Friedrich Wilhelm (‘Friedel’) Schirmer, Karl-Heinz Spilker, and Wieland Sorge.

  3. According to email communication of the author with Thomas Gschwend on July 12, 2011, the dataset entails only a minor share of Sport Committee members.

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Acknowledgment

The author is indebted to Hanna Bäck for inspiration. Moreover, he wants to thank Marc Debus for granting access to the “Ideological Cohesion of Western European Political Parties” dataset (Bäck et al., 2010). The author is further grateful for indispensible assistance in data retrieval provided by Daniel Schönert and Alexander Fuchs. Finally, the paper has substantially benefitted from the critical remarks and advice of two anonymous reviewers

Conflict of interest

The corresponding author states the following: this is an original contribution and that there no conflicts of interest.

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  1. Institute for Sport and Exercise Sciences, University of Münster, Horstmarer Landweg 62b, 48149, Münster, Deutschland

    H.E. Meier

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Meier, H. A “gathering of enthusiastic expense account tourists”?. Sportwiss 41, 300–314 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12662-011-0210-z

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