This thesis is focused on benchmarking municipal sport policy. Physical activity is used by the Dutch government as a policy tool to create a healthy society. The Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport stimulate people to adopt active life styles in order to combat the prosperity diseases: overweight, diabetes and depression. In benchmarking municipal sport policy there are the following complexities. Firstly complexities related to the governance of municipal sport policy, there are many actors involved with contradictory interests. In addition municipal sport policy is focussed within municipal boundaries and evolves on previously pursued policies. Secondly complexities related to benchmarking. Benchmarking is from origin a method developed for the industrial industry and now is also applied in the public sector, but the applicability of the method is contested. Moreover benchmarking is not straightforward and is dependent on its design, data reliability and the way of processing data.

An essential actor in sport policy are the municipalities: they conduct sport policy in order to heave healthy citizens and focus their policy to a large extent on sport facilities. Currently municipalities lack insight in whether the output of the sport policy (namely the quantity, type, and location of sport facilities) leads to the desired effects (namely healthy citizens), which we define as a lack of insight in the effectiveness of the sport policy. This insight is crucial for municipalities, since it can be used in the policy evaluation to assess the performance of their policy.

A method that has been proven useful for measuring and comparing of performance is benchmarking. Benchmarking is the research in which the output between organisations can be compared. However, there is a lack of literature describing how sport policy by municipalities can be compared, whereas comparison with other municipalities can provide additional insights and stimulate learning. In this study a benchmarking method for municipal sport policy aspects is developed and conducted.

The benchmarking method is designed based on a benchmarking literature review. Based on the review it was established that the design of the benchmarking method consists of phases, process steps and criteria. Subsequently with the literature review a benchmarking model is designed consisting of phases, steps, and criteria directed at assessing the performance of municipal sport policy. In the benchmarking criteria common elements are: the usage of indicators, transparency in performance measurement method and self-assessment of performance. In the benchmarking models common process steps are: set objectives, define indicators, select benchmark groups, collecting data, preparing data, analyzing data, determining significant different findings and reporting findings.

With the designed benchmarking model the benchmark is conducted, resulting in the following findings. The benchmarking results found no significant correlation between the dimensions, the output and the outcome of municipal sport policy. This study found that for benchmarking both the benchmarking design as the benchmarking process are crucial. Currently literature focuses on the design of the benchmarking method. This study found that the benchmarking process confronts challenges mainly related to data analytics.