When Sports and Politics Collide

When Sports and Politics Collide

Introduction

This essay intends to discuss the argument that sport and politics are inextricably linked. To do so, the following will look at sport in a social context and briefly examine the ideologies behind the current policy makers’ agenda toward sport in the UK. It will then offer an alternative view of sports policy under Capitalism and the argument that Government policy on sports promotion is a cynical attempt at social engineering to maintain a healthy workforce. The essay will then look at South Africa’s historical Apartheid policies and how these impacted not only nationally, but globally on both sportsmen and sport

It is important to remember when discussing sport, that sport and sporting activities take place within a social context. Sport does not exist in a vacuum but rather there are social and cultural mores (Coakley, Pike 2009), generally expressed through Government policy that impact on individuals and groups and the activities they choose to participate in. Arguably then, the type of society and how it is governed i.e., through social policy, will impact and model the motivations and behaviours of those individuals and groups living within that society. (Defra, 2010) If it is accepted then that any social policy is intended to make a given ‘society a “better society”’ (Titmuss, 1977) then it is useful to examine the political ideologies that underpin those policy decisions, particularly in relation to sport.

In the developed western world we live in, essentially democratic Capitalist societies, where sport and sporting culture are promoted as ‘a good thing’ (Nicholson, et al, 2011). In Britain the current UK right of centre coalition Government promote the culture of sport through its various Social and Health policies i.e, The Health and Social Care Act (2012) and The Public Health Act (2010). This promotion