Chen, Jiaqi (2025) The impact of Sport-Event Portfolio on Urban Sustainable Development: An Empirical Study of Shenzhen, China. PhD thesis, Victoria University.

Abstract

Globally, cities increasingly leverage event portfolios for strategic development and placemaking. Event portfolio theory (EPT) frames these portfolios as a macro-level governance architecture that orchestrates synergies and learning across events and calendar cycles. Such portfolios are strategic collections of sport, cultural or commercial events that generate economic, social and cultural benefits. Yet scholarship has struggled to integrate policy and planning logics with resident-centred psychosocial mechanisms. This leaves two gaps: first, limited policy-aligned evaluation that links goals and instruments to delivery and outcomes; secondly, the absence of an integrated resident-centred mechanism that connects event quality, experience, identity and quality of life to attitudes and intentions. The thesis therefore adopted a two-level macro–micro architecture that integrates an EPT-based macro environment with resident mechanisms informed by the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) and Social Exchange Theory (SET). To address these gaps, the thesis developed and tested a two-level, macro–micro conceptual framework—policy-attuned and resident-centred—that coupled this macro EPT scaffold with a micro TPB–SET mechanism. A parallel mixed-methods design was employed, using Shenzhen’s citywide National Fitness events as an in-depth case of a complex sport-event portfolio. The study was situated within an EPT-specified macro environment; EPT provided a non-estimated conceptual backdrop, while TPB and SET specified the resident-level mechanism tested quantitatively. The qualitative stage involved document analysis to map policy to delivery. The quantitative stage administered a citywide survey to estimate the structural model, with comparisons across gender and generation groups. Qualitative synthesis identified seven governance themes that articulate policy objectives, measures, impacts and underlying planning logic. Quantitatively, all fifteen main-effect hypotheses were supported, and heterogeneity by gender and generation was selective rather than pervasive. Key findings showed that perceived event quality and green self-identity acted as upstream drivers; quality of life played a central role by translating perceived event quality into supportive attitudes and, in turn, behavioural intention. The quality of life → support → intention pathway was particularly strong. At the intention stage, support had a larger effect on behavioural intention than affective attachment. Green self-identity also showed a direct link to intention alongside its indirect effects through perceived quality and attitudes. Multi-group analysis indicated that between-group differences were concentrated in the upstream relations from perceived event quality to event image, event experience and quality of life, whereas downstream links from event support and affective attachment to behavioural intention were broadly invariant. Theoretically, the study advances a nested perspective in which TPB and SET model resident-level processes within an EPT-specified macro environment, clarifying how green self-identity, quality of life and related constructs shape sustainable behavioural intentions. It also validates a framework tailored to event-portfolio governance, linking policy and planning logic—goals, instruments and delivery—to a resident-centred psychosocial chain. Practically, it provides transferable tools for managers, including a policy–mechanism alignment, a policy-to-delivery map and a streamlined monitoring and evaluation cycle, offering a reproducible approach to assess and enhance public value, resident engagement and sustainable outcomes across diverse urban contexts.

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