Edinburgh Napier University

  The paper traces the People's Republic of China's (PRC) efforts to modernize its public sector through economic reforms, and explores the effects of these on the country's sport structures. More specifically the research reported here investigates the nature of the sport management reforms and how these were linked to efforts to attract the Olympic games. The research draws on the conceptual framework of new managerialism, organizational analyses of Chinese organizations and culture specific accounts of organizational realities in the PRC. The data collected from interviews, observations and other documents was qualitatively analysed and the findings give evidence of modernization of sport structures over the last twenty years as well as some persistent outdated practices and management inexperience. The discussion on the development of the sport industry also reveals how the economic reforms helped the PRC' s Olympic bids. With the preparation for the forthcoming 2008 Beijing Olympics well under way, the pressure is on for further accelerated modernization.