2019 Volume 17 Pages A9-A36
The purpose of this research was to clarify the importance of the complementary relation-ship between the Japan Sports Association (JASA) and an Information Network Support NPO (NPO) for creation of a public sphere based on the main arguments of Albert Melucci in his theory of new social movements and Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe in their theory of radical democracy. For this, the JASA (a private sporting organization that plays a central role in the field of Japanese sports) and the NPO (an external organization that has supported the development of community sports clubs [CSCs]) were regarded as civil society organizations that are independent of the public and private sectors, in order to comprehend the complementary relationship between the 2 in real terms.
Data on the actual practices of the JASA and the NPO between 1997 and 2007 were analyzed, and the complementary relationship between the 2 organizations was then discussed based on the concepts of mobilization and symbolic movement. Mobilization is a social space in which individuals redefine their social roles in a self-recursive manner through acceptance of information resources related to the values and ideals that society requires. Symbolic movement is a generic term for social movements whereby individuals' voluntary discourse act and associations act are transformed into civil society-based public intention.
As a result, it was clarified that the JASA has been facilitating mobilization that can temporarily remove individuals from public bureaucracy and customs and direct them towards parties related to CSCs through announcements of investigation and research results and lifelong sports vision and recommendations. On the other hand, it was revealed that the NPO has been playing a symbolic role, leading to normative discourse act and associations act that are initiated by various individuals who are interested in CSCs, namely the private sector, through interactive information exchange that leverages the information and telecommunications infrastructure. Although the business methods of these 2 civil society organizations seem to be confrontational when viewed from the perspective of a complementary relationship, it was suggested that creative confrontation between mobilization and symbolic movement is a requirement for creation of a public sphere. Furthermore, the complementary relationship between mobilization and symbolic movement that attempts to aggregate and share various sources of information related to CSCs, showed some degree of ambiguity, and accordingly may be transformed into public intention in the form of collective/political action.
