Andrew Hamilton | 11 October 2016
LINK

After a tense trade period and few weeks of slow AFL news, I dug this article from the internet and it's worth a read.

Some of the bits I like:

- ... Relationships between players, between players and coach, those of the club with supporters, with board, with media, with community organisations, with the local community, to the state and national audience were not primarily economic. They were best described in terms of friendship, altruism, imaginative ownership, encouragement, pride and motivation.

- ... 'No dickheads' policy, more positively expressed in the concern for the full human development of players.

- ... the competitiveness of individuals, businesses and corporations need to be tempered and subordinated to the development of character. This is important for shaping good human beings.


Enjoy ....

The best writers on sport show that it is a metaphor for life. Perhaps that is why the triumph of the Western Bulldogs in the AFL Grand Final has been so ruthlessly milked for larger significance that it should now be put out to graze.

But I would like to exploit it once more because it illustrates the weakness of the liberal politics I discussed last week. To recap, the assumption of liberal politics is that the government should give priority to economic growth through a free competitive market. It identifies the national good with economic growth and effectively defines personal worth by the individual's level of participation in the economy.

It assumes also that all will benefit from the economic growth that unfettered competition between individuals yields.

The joy of the Western Bulldogs victory lay in its challenge to these assumptions. In the first place it was only possible because the clubs had realised that unfettered competition did not benefit all clubs. It increased the resources and success of wealthy clubs while threatening to leave poor clubs resourceless and unsuccessful.

The Western Bulldogs, a relatively poor club, recognised that its own success had been possible only because the competition between clubs was moderated by caps that limited the money that could be spent on buying players and on infrastructure, and by a distribution of revenue that gave financial and other support to poorer clubs, most notably to those in the rugby badlands.

The wealthier clubs, though with some grumbling, accepted this restriction on competition because they realised that in the longer term their own prosperity depended on ensuring the prosperity of all clubs, and especially the weakest.

They recognised that a competition in which most clubs were uncompetitive, their supporter base apathetic, and their games unattractive to watch, would lessen public interest in the game. This would affect the media interest and income on which their own prosperity relied. Unrestricted competition would undermine their own prosperity.



In the Western Bulldogs' premiership, too, economic factors were consistently set within a broader pattern. The club recognised the importance of many sets of relationships, all of which were important in the building of the club.

"In the search for success football clubs accept a responsibility to place individual competitiveness in a broader context. It leads them to encourage a player to miss a game at some cost to the team for personal or family reasons."
Those that aimed at profit, although crucial, were means to that end, not a goal in themselves. Relationships between players, between players and coach, those of the club with supporters, with board, with media, with community organisations, with the local community, to the state and national audience were not primarily economic. They were best described in terms of friendship, altruism, imaginative ownership, encouragement, pride and motivation.

Individual competitiveness, of course, is central in playing football. To be described as a fierce competitor is high praise. And premierships are famously not won unless the winning team's players are fiercest of all. But individual competitiveness must be tempered by altruism. The individual needs to cooperate with others to achieve a shared prize that transcends individual glory. Two of the notable features of the Grand Final were that players who missed out on the team responded so generously, and that the coach presented his own premiership medal to his injured captain.

For lasting success football teams need to build a culture in which competitiveness is further tempered. It is enshrined in the 'No dickheads' policy, more positively expressed in the concern for the full human development of players. It leads teams, for example, to encourage a player to miss games at some cost to the team for family or personal reasons. In the search for success football clubs accept a responsibility to place individual competitiveness in a broader context. It leads them to encourage a player to miss a game at some cost to the team for personal or family reasons.

They might also expect their players to visit hospitals and disadvantaged children, to behave responsibly in their recreation, and to develop leadership skills through which they will later contribute to the community. Teams look beyond competitiveness for personal or for corporate success to the presence of character — the quality that enables people to see what matters most deeply and to pursue it — and they encourage its development. On this ultimately depends both the sporting success and the economic prosperity of the team.

This example suggests that in order to build a prosperous nation the economy needs to be set within the varied broader relationships of human beings towards one another and to the world. Furthermore, even in the economy, the most critical relationship are not always those that are competitive. If the national good is to be furthered, the economy will need to be regulated to ensure the good of all, particularly the most vulnerable. This is particularly true in the relationships that are involved in globalisation.

Finally, the competitiveness of individuals, businesses and corporations need to be tempered and subordinated to the development of character. This is important for shaping good human beings. It is also the necessary condition for a healthy and sustainable economy. Just as it is necessary in a successful football club.