Richard Tacon
Richard is currently undertaking a PhD at Birkbeck in which he is evaluating the impact of voluntary sports clubs on social capital. He previously completed an MSc in Sport Management and the Business of Football at Birkbeck in 2004, prior to which he had received a BA Hons in Classics at the University of Cambridge. In 2005, Richard joined the Football Governance Research Centre as a Research Officer, where he was involved with the annual State of the Game publications in 2005 and 2006. He also authored a paper for the journal Managing Leisure, entitled ‘Football and Social Inclusion: Evaluating Social Policy’, and co-authored a review of the social and economic benefits of sport for the Economic and Social Research Council.
In 2006, Richard became Research and Evidence Officer at the Central Council of Physical Recreation, the umbrella organisation for the national governing bodies of sport in the UK, where he worked until 2008. Here, he commissioned a survey of voluntary sports clubs in 2007 and authored a substantial policy-related literature review of the impact of sport on the UK Government’s priorities. He also provided the secretariat for the Sports Volunteer Research Network. Richard’s main research areas are the social impacts of sport and evaluation within sport.