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The origins and evolution of professional football clubs from a business, management, and organizational history perspective

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Venue: Birkbeck Clore Management Centre

No booking required

Register for this event on BAM website. 

This event will take place in-person only and registration for this event will close on Thursday 8th June. 

Professional football provides fertile ground for historians interested in exploring continuity and change. It has undergone considerable change and evolution in terms of its identification as an industry – historically football identified as a representative competition between locales, and in many countries profit or even turnover were not considered significant in the purpose of clubs. The entry of broadcasting and the opportunities for related entrepreneurship and licensing in the context of the game have created the opportunity for much of the change that the game has undergone, with a considerable increase the problem of “appropriability” (Buchanan, 1965; Demsetz, 1970; Coase, 1988), in which club owners have struggled to capture the benefits of these innovations, although they have often pushed to exploit them. Many of the benefits have flowed to players, who have seen increased status through the “economics of superstars” (Rosen, 1981) where highly talented played have seen their bargaining powers increase.

We invite papers looking at club football from a management and business history perspective, especially those drawing on archival or oral history research.  Papers should seek to contribute to a developing stream of research including Dizin et al (2004), Walters and Hamil (2013), Gillett and Tennent (2017) and Fernández-de-Sevilla (2021). Secondly, following Gillett and Tennent (2020) we aim to broaden the realm of business and management history by providing opportunities to look at theoretical and empirical themes related to the professional football industry such as project-based enterprise, hybridity, or the role of not-for-profit organisations in business.

Learn more about Dr. Richard Tacon's social capital research at the Birkbeck Sport Business Centre. Dr. Tacon investigates the concept of social capital in sport, focusing on how people develop and maintain relationships through voluntary club involvement.

Call for papers deadline:
April 30th – short abstracts (c. 300 words) only needed.

Please send your proposals to alex.gillett@york.ac.uk and kevin.tennent@york.ac.uk.

Benefits of attendance:
Receive critical feedback on and review of in-progress academic work
Network with academics and practitioners in the field with the potential to encourage impact collaboration
Understand the current state of academic work on management and business in the football industry.

Provider Information
BAM Management and Business History Special Interest Group

Who Should Attend?
Academics with an interest in the business, management or organisation of football, and/or its history, as well as practitioners with an interest in taking a historical perspective to present challenges within football.

The event speaks to sections A1, A2, A3 and C1, C2 and C3, as detailed in the BAM Framework.

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Facilitators
Professor Geoff Walters, Birkbeck, University of London

  • Sean Hamil, Birkbeck, University of London
  • Dr Kevin Tennent, University of York
  • Dr Alex Gillett, University of York

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Contact
Please contact the BAM Office at eventsofficer@bam.ac.uk with any general queries.  

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Event Fee 
BAM Members: £10

BAM Student Members : Free (10 places available)

Non -BAM Members : £20

For further information the benefits of becoming a BAM Member, and to sign up, please visit BAM Membership

Registrations close on the 8th June 2023 at 23:59 UK time.

Please note, if we do not receive enough registrations 2 weeks ahead of the event, we reserve the right to cancel the event.

 

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