Stakeholder relationships in the festival and event planning process

In 2013 the most important sport-for-all-festival in Denmark, the Landsstævne dating back to 1863 successfully took place in the city of Esbjerg. The relationship of the stakeholders managing the festival was the subject of a study of the difference in aims, strategies and power in the last four months before the festival. The stakeholders organized in the festival secretariat consisted of the DGI, who’s the festival owner, the regional DGI stakeholder the DGI South West, one representative from the municipality of Esbjerg and a number of local associations. Differences in expectations, interests and aims as to the instrumental outcome of the festival were analyzed from an organizational power perspective. Victor Pestoff’s theory about the power relation between the state and the third sector as a co-producer of democracy is used in the analysis of the study. The study was a qualitative study consisting of nine qualitative interviews with stakeholders, a document study as well as participant observation during the festival. The findings pointed to the importance of the collaboration, as all the stakeholders despite their differences in interest, aims and organizational role in their strategic use of the planning process were able to strengthen their specific interests in order to create a positive social impact. Whereas the DGI redesigned their festival call in order to rebrand the festival as a young festival, the city of Esbjerg used the festival to rebrand the city as a family-friendly workplace while simultaneously strengthening the networks between the civic society and the city. Some of the local sports associations took advantage of the festival’s need for volunteers to recruit and strengthen the ties with potential, “sleeping” volunteers before and during the festival. In doing so, they came out of the festival with strengthened networks, while others saw the festival as an opportunity to train their collaborative skills of managing an event. The outcome of the collaboration during the planning process was a successful rebranding of the festival and the city strengthening both the civic stakeholders and the municipal stakeholders and leaving the community of Esbjerg with improved event management skills.