Wayne Aquila noticed something troubling in the spaces where elite athletes train and compete: organizations spoke passionately about care and well-being while athletes spoke of bullying, abuse, and worse. For his Master of Commerce thesis at Victoria University of Wellington, the graduate researcher decided to investigate this disconnect using a tool most sports managers don't expect—critical theory.
His investigation came at a moment when the cost of elite sport had become impossible to ignore. As athletes increasingly shared stories of toxic environments, Aquila questioned how such harm could persist within systems explicitly designed to protect athletes. "These aren't just isolated cases, these are systemic issues, rooted in power, structure and management practice," he says. The death of Olympic cyclist Olivia Podmore in 2021 crystallized the urgency of his central question: What does critical theory reveal about how power operates in high-performance sport, and what effect does it have on athlete well-being?
Using Marxist theory and Michel Foucault's work on power, Aquila conducted a critical discourse analysis of well-being-related documents from high-performance sport organizations across New Zealand. Rather than accepting the language on the surface, he dug beneath it to examine how well-being was actually being defined, measured, and controlled. What he found was striking: athlete well-being was being treated as a commodity—something to be optimized not for the athletes themselves, but to achieve performance outcomes like funding success, medals, and national pride.
The structure reinforced a hierarchy of control from the top down, even though well-being is deeply personal and experienced differently by each individual. "Control over well-being was commonly exercised from the top down, even though well-being is experienced differently by individuals—it's subjective," Aquila explains. These systemic pressures, he argues, "reinforce a 'win at all costs' culture."
The problem spans far beyond a single sport or organization. Women's rugby, gymnastics, canoeing, kayaking, and cycling all show similar patterns. What emerges is a picture of widespread structural harm dressed up in the language of care—what Aquila's thesis title captures perfectly: "Reproducing Harm While Narrating Care."
His work matters because it names something many have felt but few have systematically documented: that good intentions and careful language can mask systems that prioritize medals and funding over human flourishing. It also matters because Aquila sees a different path forward. Having received a Wellington Doctoral Scholarship, he is now pursuing a Ph.D. to deepen his exploration of ethics, power, and well-being in organizational systems.
"My studies have shown me there's another side to management," he reflects. "It's not just this dusty old-fashioned system where managers are there to control or influence employee behavior. Exploring critical theories has shown me a different purpose for management, where people can be prioritized at the same time as organizational goals."
That vision—where elite sport can genuinely honor both excellence and human welfare—remains a work in progress. But with researchers like Aquila asking hard questions and proposing better frameworks, the conversation has shifted. The question is no longer whether these problems exist. It's what we'll do about them.