Interesting read to contrast how the GAA is often framed here. I see a lot of focus on all the bad individuals involved, often saying it’s like a cult, with no mention of the many selfless members who contribute a world of good to our society. Well worth a read for any non-nationals that are curious about the organisation
When the Na Fianna club in Dublin commissioned Whitebarn Consulting to come up with figures around social value, they found that for every euro invested, the social return was multiplied by 15. Overall, Na Fianna was estimated to be worth €50m to society.
Professor Shibli feels the GAA’s unique amateur/volunteer-led ethos is always more likely to produce much higher outcomes. “The thing I would say about Na Fianna report is that the return on investment multiple was a lot higher than we conventionally see,” he said.
“The UK model has a return on investment of 4:1, a lot of the Irish studies are showing between 12:1 and 19:1.
“That’s not to say that they are over-inflated. It’s to say that there is clearly something unique about Irish sport and particularly Gaelic games. It is a professionalised sport in a way that it is run and administered but an amateur sport in the way that it is played and administered locally.
I’ll let ya know how I feel about it tomorrow when I see how long a suspended sentence Kyle Hayes gets.
I was never a GAA head, didn’t like playing it in school because we had one of those teachers that would beat his personal interests into the students.
But over the past few decades seeing how active the GAA are in communities and how dedicated they are to the social aspects of GAA it really is a national treasure. I wish we could extend that passion into other parts of society.
I spent my teenage years decrying the waste of talent & funding the GAA sucked up instead of getting bodies and money into internationally relevant sports.
I left Ireland to attend uni, travelled the world for work and eventually came home. In my time I have found literally nothing which builds community the same way GAA does. Say what you want about the organisation itself, but we all owe the people on the ground a massive debt of thanks for their contributions of their time and effort to the benefit this country.
Except if you are a woman of course.
This is the full text of the 2019 edition of the report.
It’s interesting that almost all of that value created is attributed to the players themselves, and even for them it’s two things: improved health and ‘friendships’. Practically no value measured for local communities, GAA volunteers, supporters or other stakeholders.
Does anyone have access to this more recent report?
Bit of a chicken egg quality to the arguments here. The GAA gets disproportionate funding and has disproportionate influence. Proving causation is harder.
It’s great cos if I bate the bollox off some lad in a drug and drink fuelled rage, but I have to play county or travel to the US, that’s all grand.
My bainisteoir will just tell the judge, a chara, sure he’s a good lad and needs to travel and all dat.
People in this sub won’t like this
Thatcher said “There’s no such thing as society.” I always thought that she confused or forgot the importance of both concrete and mesh.
Living in both the UK and Ireland, I can say from experience that advocates of stand-alone individuals living in communities without any community sport/ culture/ etc binding agent are all concrete, no mesh.
Most on here will cry reading this as GAA gets a bad rap from your typical Irish Reddit poster, it’s an important part of our culture that a lot of people want to get rid of. People used to blame the GAA for the reason we had shit football teams when the reality is that the FAI was badly run and corrupt, they used England and granny rulers to paper over the cracks of their dog-shit development programs for years, not to mention the constant ignorance of the league. There’s room for it all.
It’s just a pity about the GAA the organisation
The GAA is beautiful. Take away the GAA from Irish life and you’ll find even more young lads will move to Australia as there would be fuck all left.
I know fellas who come back from travels just in time for championship. An amateur sport! Incredible commitment and speaks to the community factor that we in Ireland have developed.
My father was chairman and brought in more for the club than he did wages. Unbelievable commitment and it is something that sets us apart from the rest of the globe
I think there is no question that the clubs all round the country contribute massively to their communities.
The big problem is and always has been participation.
I am from Kilkenny and there were two sports as I grew up Hurling and Soccer. And if you weren’t good enough or weren’t a parish name you didn’t get a game.
Where I’m from you had to be exceptional to get a game as it was such a big club.
So that left lots of young lads never getting a run but who never missed a training session.
As they got older they drifted away because they weren’t really part of the “team” as they didn’t get any game time and the gap between them and those who played every week for bigger. If you are not playing you are not participating.
Before anyone asks how to include everyone, I don’t have the answer.
There is an ad on the TV now about #stopthedrop trying to address the drop in participation in sport as kids move from primary to secondary school.
One of the biggest issues is that is the age (12+ )that it really gets competitive. And no coach is going to risk the ire of the chairman for losing to the neighbouring parish because they wanted to give everyone a run.
As a focal point to the parish the GAA is hard to beat but it has a long way to go to keep all the youngsters participating
16 comments
Interesting read to contrast how the GAA is often framed here. I see a lot of focus on all the bad individuals involved, often saying it’s like a cult, with no mention of the many selfless members who contribute a world of good to our society. Well worth a read for any non-nationals that are curious about the organisation
When the Na Fianna club in Dublin commissioned Whitebarn Consulting to come up with figures around social value, they found that for every euro invested, the social return was multiplied by 15. Overall, Na Fianna was estimated to be worth €50m to society.
Professor Shibli feels the GAA’s unique amateur/volunteer-led ethos is always more likely to produce much higher outcomes. “The thing I would say about Na Fianna report is that the return on investment multiple was a lot higher than we conventionally see,” he said.
“The UK model has a return on investment of 4:1, a lot of the Irish studies are showing between 12:1 and 19:1.
“That’s not to say that they are over-inflated. It’s to say that there is clearly something unique about Irish sport and particularly Gaelic games. It is a professionalised sport in a way that it is run and administered but an amateur sport in the way that it is played and administered locally.
I’ll let ya know how I feel about it tomorrow when I see how long a suspended sentence Kyle Hayes gets.
I was never a GAA head, didn’t like playing it in school because we had one of those teachers that would beat his personal interests into the students.
But over the past few decades seeing how active the GAA are in communities and how dedicated they are to the social aspects of GAA it really is a national treasure. I wish we could extend that passion into other parts of society.
I spent my teenage years decrying the waste of talent & funding the GAA sucked up instead of getting bodies and money into internationally relevant sports.
I left Ireland to attend uni, travelled the world for work and eventually came home. In my time I have found literally nothing which builds community the same way GAA does. Say what you want about the organisation itself, but we all owe the people on the ground a massive debt of thanks for their contributions of their time and effort to the benefit this country.
Except if you are a woman of course.
This is the full text of the 2019 edition of the report.
It’s interesting that almost all of that value created is attributed to the players themselves, and even for them it’s two things: improved health and ‘friendships’. Practically no value measured for local communities, GAA volunteers, supporters or other stakeholders.
[https://socialvalueuk.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/012325_Na_Fianna_Report_Main_Final.pdf](https://socialvalueuk.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/012325_Na_Fianna_Report_Main_Final.pdf)
Does anyone have access to this more recent report?
Bit of a chicken egg quality to the arguments here. The GAA gets disproportionate funding and has disproportionate influence. Proving causation is harder.
It’s great cos if I bate the bollox off some lad in a drug and drink fuelled rage, but I have to play county or travel to the US, that’s all grand.
My bainisteoir will just tell the judge, a chara, sure he’s a good lad and needs to travel and all dat.
People in this sub won’t like this
Thatcher said “There’s no such thing as society.” I always thought that she confused or forgot the importance of both concrete and mesh.
Living in both the UK and Ireland, I can say from experience that advocates of stand-alone individuals living in communities without any community sport/ culture/ etc binding agent are all concrete, no mesh.
Most on here will cry reading this as GAA gets a bad rap from your typical Irish Reddit poster, it’s an important part of our culture that a lot of people want to get rid of. People used to blame the GAA for the reason we had shit football teams when the reality is that the FAI was badly run and corrupt, they used England and granny rulers to paper over the cracks of their dog-shit development programs for years, not to mention the constant ignorance of the league. There’s room for it all.
It’s just a pity about the GAA the organisation
The GAA is beautiful. Take away the GAA from Irish life and you’ll find even more young lads will move to Australia as there would be fuck all left.
I know fellas who come back from travels just in time for championship. An amateur sport! Incredible commitment and speaks to the community factor that we in Ireland have developed.
My father was chairman and brought in more for the club than he did wages. Unbelievable commitment and it is something that sets us apart from the rest of the globe
I think there is no question that the clubs all round the country contribute massively to their communities.
The big problem is and always has been participation.
I am from Kilkenny and there were two sports as I grew up Hurling and Soccer. And if you weren’t good enough or weren’t a parish name you didn’t get a game.
Where I’m from you had to be exceptional to get a game as it was such a big club.
So that left lots of young lads never getting a run but who never missed a training session.
As they got older they drifted away because they weren’t really part of the “team” as they didn’t get any game time and the gap between them and those who played every week for bigger. If you are not playing you are not participating.
Before anyone asks how to include everyone, I don’t have the answer.
There is an ad on the TV now about #stopthedrop trying to address the drop in participation in sport as kids move from primary to secondary school.
One of the biggest issues is that is the age (12+ )that it really gets competitive. And no coach is going to risk the ire of the chairman for losing to the neighbouring parish because they wanted to give everyone a run.
As a focal point to the parish the GAA is hard to beat but it has a long way to go to keep all the youngsters participating