Author:

Keywords:

poverty, sports participation, sports policy, social inclusion

Abstract:

Poverty deeply affects one’s life. Experiencing poverty entails much more than a shortage of money. The lack of resources often marks how people feel. Poverty also implies that social participation is hampered. Participation in customary activities becomes hard or impossible. Therefore, poverty is considered as a type of social exclusion. In addition, poverty tends to affect multiple dimensions of one’s life, such as health, education, employment, housing, recreation, etc. In this doctoral thesis, we focus on sports. So far, the field of sports has received little attention in poverty research, but also vice versa, poverty is rather absent in the sports literature. During the last decades, we have witnessed what is called the ‘sportification’ of society. Sports has gained importance in our society. Sports is widely practiced, a development to which the central concern for health and healthy life styles has contributed. For example, in Flanders, which is the context of this study, 63 percent of the population (aged 15-86) currently participates in sports. Sports receives also considerable public policy attention, and large public investments are made, both in elite sports as well as in mass sports. With regard to the latter, the policy goal is ‘Sport for All’, providing the opportunity to all citizens to practice sports, regardless of age, gender, or other background characteristics. ‘Sport for All’ implies the recognition of sports participation as a social right, even though often, reality is still different. Sports is currently also advocated as a valuable means to accomplish broader societal goals, amongst which social inclusion, which is another important rationale underlying mass sports policies, especially towards socially disadvantaged groups. In this doctoral thesis, we investigate the sports participation and sports opportunities for people living in poverty from a sociological perspective, and explore the ability and willingness of the sports sector to facilitate the participation of this social group. The research focuses on four main questions: 1) Does living in poverty have an impact on sports participation, and if so, to what extent? 2) Has the impact of socio-economic background on sports participation changed (diminished/increased) over time? 3) What are the experiences of people living in poverty with regard to sports? 4) To what extent are actors in the field of sports provision, more specifically sports clubs and local sports authorities, able and willing to improve sports opportunities and facilitate participation of people living in poverty? What are determining factors? Ultimately, it is our aim to gain a better understanding of current problems with regard to poverty and sports, and to explore how we can move towards an inclusive sports policy and practice. We rely both on quantitative and qualitative research methods. Data stem from large scale surveys (among potential participants, local sports authorities and sports clubs) as well as from semi-structured interviews and focus groups. The findings indicate that poverty severely affects sports participation. This holds for youth as well as for adults. This study shows that children and adolescents living in poor households are 44 percent less likely to participate in club-organised sports as compared to non-poor youth (controlling for other factors). Also for adults, poverty causes a large participation gap with regard to club-organised sports. With regard to other types of sports participation, i.e. in informal or semi-formal contexts (practicing sports in a health and fitness centre, in sports activities organised by local sports authorities or with friends for example), results depend on the measure of poverty used. When taking income poverty as a measure, there is no evidence of an effect on sports participation in informal or semi-formal settings. Subjective poverty, based on one’s own assessment of the financial situation, is negatively associated with all types of participation, regardless of the setting. Moreover, the results point towards a raise of social inequality in terms of sports participation. The findings allow for a better understanding of the dynamics of non-participation and show how the choice not to participate is often a matter of choosing the lesser of two evils, trying to avoid worse, as participating in sports could imply having to deal with adverse consequences. Feelings of inferiority and the shame of poverty are key in understanding mechanisms behind non-participation, even though this does not hold for all people in poverty. The study shows how people in poverty need a ‘safe’ sporting environment, financially, physically and/or socially. More generally, the results demonstrate that, on the one hand, sports can indeed contribute to social inclusion, as sports was found to be a way to broaden one’s social world, meet new people and interact with others. On the other hand, however, sports is also still a domain of social exclusion, as there is a large social gradient to participation, and people in poverty are most likely to (feel forced to) withdraw from social sports settings. People in poverty are regarded as a target group for local sports policy. In other words, in most municipalities, policy initiatives are being taken to remediate the unequal situation in terms of sports participation, aiming at facilitating participation for people in poverty. However, people are considered as a difficult group by local sports managers. It is hard for local sports managers to know how to reach people in poverty and to know where to find them. Also motivating people is difficult. Local sports managers generally feel they lack the knowledge and expertise to deal with people in poverty. It is therefore essential to work with partners, such as the Public Centre for Social Welfare. However, this cooperation is often challenging as well, and it is not an institutionalised form of cooperation yet. Overall, there is a large diversity among municipalities in terms of local social sports policy. Yet, in a considerable part of the municipalities, the content of the local policies is limited to providing discounts. More generally, initiatives are taken to facilitate the inclusion of people in poverty, but in many cases, these initiatives seem to address only part of the problem. Often, the underlying assumptions are based on a limited, oversimplified understanding of the dynamics of poverty and social exclusion. In addition, the sports provision, and the way it is organised, tends to be considered as a ‘given’, with little consideration of alternative possibilities, which reflects a narrow interpretation of the idea of participation. Virtually all nonprofit sports clubs have an ‘open access’ policy, in the sense that almost all clubs agreed that everybody is welcome at their club, regardless of social, cultural or ethnic background. However, this does not mean that participation is facilitated nor that exclusionary mechanisms are dealt with. The strongest determinant of making inclusionary efforts is the presence of underprivileged people in the club. There is a clear parallel with the results for local sports authorities here, in the sense that in both cases there is a strong interdependence between awareness of poverty (and related needs) and actions in this regard. Overall, aiming at social inclusion in sports in a broad sense implies aiming at a sports sector in which each individual can find his/her place, in accordance with individual needs. Accomplishing this objective requires a willingness for critical reflection on a well-informed basis and, where and when it proves necessary, a willingness for change. The insights resulting from this doctoral study provide guidance in this regard.