Sport and the fight against HIV/AIDS in Zambia: A ‘partnership approach’? Iain Lindsey Edge Hill University, UK Davies Banda York St John University, UK Abstract Sport is being increasingly recognized for the contribution it can make to the Millennium Development Goals and, in particular, the response to the HIV/AIDS pandemic. In both sport-for-development and HIV/AIDS sectors, partnerships are advocated as an effective approach to achieving policy goals. This exploratory study examined the nature of partnerships involving non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that use sport as a tool for HIV/AIDS prevention in Zambia. Sensitized by development literature, the study utilized an inductive, qualitative research approach primarily centred on interviews with key stakeholders from a variety of governmental and non- governmental agencies both based in Zambia and supporting sport-for-development programmes from overseas. A large number of different partnerships were identified by interviewees that varied significantly in terms of their purpose and form.Within the Zambian sport-for-development sector, organizational fragmentation and competition for resources provided by overseas agencies inhibited the development of partnerships aimed at policy co-ordination across the whole sector. Productive bilateral partnerships existed between sport-for-development NGOs and between these organizations and health-based NGOs. However, the sport-development sector lacked integration into more strategic partnerships that addressed HIV/AIDS policy issues. Incremental progress is identified as the key to future improvements in partnerships involving sport-for- development NGOs. Further research that examines how partnerships influence the delivery of programmes within specific communities would also enhance understanding of the contribution of sport to development efforts. Keywords HIV/AIDS, NGOs, partnership, sport-for-development Article Corresponding author: Iain Lindsey, Edge Hill University, St Helens Road, Ormskirk L39 4QP, UK Email: lindseyi@edgehill.ac.uk International Review for the Sociology of Sport 46(1) 90–107 © The Author(s) 2010 Reprints and permission: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav DOI: 10.1177/1012690210376020 http://irs.sagepub.com