INTERNATIONAL OLYMPIC ACADEMY 7th JOINT - IOA

The complexity and general aggravation of this resource situation
in modern societies will be discussed in this paper, leading to the
conviction that the management efficiency standards of such elite
sport systems have to be improved. Due to the defined scope of work
such elite sport systems are facing, which is also going to be outlined
in this paper, the management concept of benchmarking seems to be
an adequate tool to achieve this.
The PhD research project “Benchmarking Elite Sport Systems”
follows this strategic approach whereas this paper summarizes parts of
the literature review of this thesis.
2. The National Sport System
When talking about elite sport systems and their organisational
elements (which are assumed to be able to influence the likelihood to
produce international successful athletes), it is important to become
aware of the structure of the general national sport environment such
systems are interdependently linked with. Furthermore, it is important
to discuss the international variety of organisational forms of sport
policy systems in general and elite sport systems in specific as well as
the complex stakeholder structure of such systems which can be partly
held responsible for this variety. On the other hand, as the different
stakeholders provide - respectively restrict - access to the mentioned
resources, talking about this stakeholder system is also necessary in
order to improve the understanding of the described resource problem.
Based on the general foundation provided in this chapter it is then
possible to narrow the focus and illustrate which concrete tasks and
services an elite sport system is meant to offer.
2.1 Sport Development Continuum
One commonness for all existing models structuring a respective
national sport environment concerning the different performance
levels sport can be carried out on, is the conviction that international
sport success is in the long run only possible, if the respective elite
sport sector is founded on an adequate mass and sport participation
system (Baka 2002, Sotiriadou 2002):
“[...] Increases in participation are necessary to ensure
continued success at the elite level.“ (Baumann 2003a)
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