Sport policy and evaluation strategies of representation, deliberation and reflexivity – ‘solutions’ to the ‘problem’ of sport (and) participation?

Sport and participation in sport has become an important welfare policy and is seen to contribute positively to society and the individual. Simultaneously there has also been an increased interest in turning sport and sport policy to a relevant object of study and evaluation. This study draws on the concept of governmentality to examine one such evaluative activity, the new Swedish sport policy evaluation system that emerged in 2010. The purpose is to elucidate the forms of knowledge and methods for generating knowledge about sport participation and the (non)sport participant. The analysis demonstrate three strategies of evaluation and governing; strategies of representation, deliberation and reflexivity. The argument being proposed in this article is that these three strategies draw on different yet overlapping forms of knowledge and methods of generating knowledge about sport participation and thereby also produce different (non)sport participant subject positions.