How to Calm the Storm and Recover Reputation? A fsQCA Analysis of Public Relations Effectiveness in Sports Organizations

Abstract

In recent years, the growing frequency of negative events in global sports has made crisis communication a critical issue for maintaining the credibility of sports organizations. Drawing on the Situational Crisis Communication Theory (SCCT) and employing fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA), this study investigates 25 international sports crises to explore the multidimensional mechanisms influencing the effectiveness of sports public relations. Public relations effectiveness is conceptualized across two dimensions: reputation recovery and attention containment. And six key conditions are identified: crisis type, crisis severity, and prior reputation as crisis situational factors, and crisis response strategies, response speed, and information transparency as crisis communication factors. The findings reveal a multi-path structure: high reputation recovery is achieved through either the Attribution buffer Type or Transparency Repair Type mechanisms, while high attention containment emerges through the Strategy-Transparency Closure Type and Low-Severity Auto-Decay Type mechanisms. Among these, information transparency consistently serves as a core driver, whereas high prior reputation may trigger reputation backfire and sustained public scrutiny in high-responsibility and low-transparency contexts. This study offers a configurational perspective on crisis communication grounded in SCCT and provides empirical and practical insights for public relations in sports organizations.