ABSTRACT
Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is developing to a considerable extent across business, sporting and academic agendas. Football is the most represented sport in the scholarly activity of CSR. The current scholarly work on CSR has provided an account of the substantial challenges linked to the integration of CSR in professional football. As CSR developed, football sport organisations have altered their organisational structures, strategies and processes. This chapter focuses on delineating the different types of organisation structures for managing CSR – or modes of implementation – within professional football. This chapter draws on Husted’s (2003) work that identifies three approaches that impact upon the way in which organisations manage CSR. First, organisations outsource CSR through charitable contributions. Second, organisations internalise CSR through in-house projects. Third, organisations enter into a collaborative or partnership model. This chapter examines these approaches for managing CSR by using mini cases from different types of football organisations across the globe. In doing so, we demonstrate the strategic and managerial implications that each structural form entails.
