HOW CAN WE CALL TRANSPORT A UTILITY?

First railways, then buses and taxis and, for a time, road freight – there has for many years been a tendency to treat transport as a utility, and nowhere more so than in the provision of roads. This article calls for the return of all forms of inland surface transport to the market.     

The migration of gymnastics coaches from the Former Soviet Union to New Zealand: an actor–network theory perspective

This article uses actor–network theory (ANT) to examine factors that influenced highly skilled gymnastics coaches from the gymnastics stronghold of the Former Soviet Union to migrate to the geographically and culturally distant nation of New Zealand. Our research diverges from the emphasis on the professional sports labour market that has dominated sports migration research and extends upon the network-orientated approaches that have recently been utilised in sport. The article is informed by the stories of 10 migrant gymnastics coaches obtained through qualitative interviews. We demonstrate how the ANT approach helps reveal how multiple micro- and macro-factors assembled together to motivate and facilitate the coaches’ migration. While economic factors can be identified, we draw attention to a unique facet that has received little previous attention in the sports migration literature: the non-human. We show how the coaches’ migration was facilitated by non-humans such as a disease, Skype, leotards and work visas and that these non-humans played a role in enabling or disrupting migration.     

Surface Transport Distribution Channels in New Zealand

Abstract

This paper complements recent research on distribution in the airline industry by examining distribution channels for a range of surface transport businesses (coaches, rental cars, campervans, rail and inter-island ferries) in New Zealand. The study takes a national perspective, adopts a supply-side approach and is based on the analysis of information from in-depth interviews with selected providers. Particular emphasis is given to establishing the nature of the channels used and to the factors that contribute to differences and similarities in channel structures from one form of transport or product to another. Three broad classes of channels are identified: direct; conventional travel intermediaries; and local intermediaries. While carriers use multiple channels, broader patterns do emerge related to particular forms of travel and market segments.     

陕西省体育运动学校教练员队伍现状调查与分析

本文采用文献综述法、问卷调查法,对陕西省体育运动学校621名教练员进行调查,结果表明:教练员年龄主要集中在25～35和36～45两个年龄段,大专和本科学历占95.65%。在训练方面,教练员执教年限较低,缺乏训练经验。在科研方面科研能力和科研意识不强,教练员培训次数少。     

Changing of the guards: New coaches in Austria’s premier football league

Professional team sports provide an ideal real world experiment to explore the effect of top executive replacement due to the availability of excellent performance data. This paper investigates how replacing the coach affects the performance of football teams. Analyzing almost 2,000 matches of the Austrian premier football league by ordinal (probit) regression techniques we find that a new coach tends to enhance team performance in home matches but to weaken it in away matches. However, neither of these effects turns out to be statistically significant. Nevertheless, the much discussed coach effect—ousting an underperforming coach in order to improve team performance at least temporarily—may make sense despite the costs involved by providing stronger ex-ante incentives for effort.

浅谈新时期基层体育教练员责任心

随着改革开放的深入发展,社会对教练员提出了更高的要求,教练员的责任心尤为重要,本文对其进行了详细探讨。