Identifying and Prioritize the Multiple Roles of Government in the Process of Sports Industry Privatization

Purpose: The purpose of this research was to identify and prioritize the multiple roles of the government in the process of privatization of sports. Methods:The current research is of mixed type (qualitative and quantitative) and in terms of practical purpose and data collection method, it was field. The data collection tool in the qualitative part of the research was a semi-structured interview, and in the quantitative part, a researcher-made questionnaire (taken from the qualitative results, Reliability α=0.794 ). The research sample was selected from experts in sports management, economics, politics, management and people familiar with privatization issues in a targeted way(N=220). Friedman's test was used to rank the roles of the government in the privatization of sports. All statistical analyzes were performed by Excel and SPSS 23. Results: In general, 74 components, 18 dimensions and 5 variables were identified. Among the five identified roles, the role of drafting regulations with an average of 3.38 in the first priority, the political role with an average of 3.17 in the second priority, the managerial-executive role with an average of 3.05 in the third priority, the economic role with an average of 2.76 in the fourth priority and the cultural role ranked fifth with an average of 2.63. Conclusion: According to the results, it is suggested that the government take into account the multiple roles identified and the priority level of each of them by creating a specialized department for the privatization of sports within the structure of the Ministry of Sports.