Jonathon’s research examines politics, policy implementation and governance in sport, with a particular focus on British tennis. His PhD takes an organisational perspective, exploring how and why governing and policy arrangements shape collective efforts to increase participation among underrepresented population groups.
The research is oriented by the Lawn Tennis Association’s (LTA) Tennis Opened Up strategy and understands its ambition to make tennis more accessible, welcoming and enjoyable as a collective action problem. Achieving this ambition depends upon cooperation between national, regional and local organisations with different responsibilities, resources, capacities and incentives. Jonathon’s research therefore examines how and why power, decision-making and responsibility are distributed across this complex system, the emergence of cooperation and competition between organisations and the extent to which governing and policy conditions enable or constrain collective efforts to widen participation.
The project draws on theories of collective action, and polycentricity as its principal theoretical lens. Although polycentricity has begun to receive greater attention within sport research, existing studies have focused predominantly on elite and international sport and have often relied upon secondary data. Jonathon’s research extends this work into community sport through an abductive comparative case study of three English County and Island Association areas. It combines semi-structured interviews with national, regional, county and local actors, documentary analysis and patchwork ethnography.
Jonathon came to this area of research through his long-standing involvement in tennis as a player, coach, volunteer, policymaker and organisational leader. He is currently an LTA Independent Councillor and undertakes consultancy work with organisations across the sport. These experiences have given him first-hand insight into the opportunities and challenges involved in translating national policy ambitions into meaningful and sustainable change within local communities. His research critically and reflexively draws upon this embedded position while maintaining clear boundaries between his professional and academic roles.
Before beginning his PhD, Jonathon completed an MA in Research Methods (Political Science) at Durham University, achieving a Distinction. His dissertation critically examined how the LTA implements community sport policy in practice. He previously graduated from King’s College London with First-Class Honours in Philosophy, Politics and Economics, where his undergraduate dissertation explored the use of evidence within LTA sport-for-development programmes.
Jonathon’s wider research interests include sport politics and public policy, policy implementation, the governance and changing role of national governing bodies, collective action, polycentricity, and the political economy of institutions and decision-making.
