Determining the Problem of Order in the Australian Football League

This paper examines the means available to management to establish order within organizations. Three variables, bureaucracy, industrial democracy, and corporate culture, are examined in relation to Australia's largest professional sporting organization, the Australian Football League. The paper traces how the organization of sport in Australia emanated from a pure form of democracy that in the early 1980s impeded the Australian Football League's progress toward a professional competition. Establishing order within the league is complicated by the trichotomy formed between the league, the clubs, and the players.