ABSTRACT
This chapter examines Sustainable Development Goal 17 (SDG 17) which has a unique status as being the “key to realizing” aspirations across all of the other 16 SDGs. Thus, the overall aspiration for SDG 17 is to “strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development.” SDG 17 also includes a particularly wide set of 19 specific targets, and so the chapter specifically considers those targets related to policy, partnerships, resources, and monitoring and evaluation that have previously been recognized as specifically relevant to sport. Through discussion of these targets, the chapter links to three overarching features of SDG 17, namely: the centrality of national-level policy and action toward implementation, the key role accorded to national governments in doing so, and the importance of developing partnerships across different public, private and civil society organizations. Taking these three features, the chapter moves to consider a theoretical conceptualization of six varying types of relationship between state and non-state actors that may be potentially implemented in enabling sport to contribute to various SDGs. Finally, the chapter broadly reviews the existing context in sport to develop appreciation of the progress required toward implementation approaches envisioned in SDG 17.
