Jay Coakley

Youth Sports: What Counts as "Positive Development?"

There is a widespread belief that sport participation inevitably contributes to youth development because sport’s assumed essential goodness and purity is passed on to those who partake in it. Promoted and perpetuated by sport evangelists and kindred spirits, this belief inspires the strategy of using sports to create among young people the attributes needed to achieve personal success. This neoliberal approach to development is perpetuated by anecdotes and unsystematic observations that uncritically support the evangelistic promise that sport participation produces positive development among young people. Although a few scholars in the sociology of sport have studied sport participation and identified conditions under which particular outcomes are likely to occur, there remains a need for critical research and theory that identifies the processes through which sport participation is or is not linked with subsequent forms of civic engagement and efforts to produce progressive change transcending the lives of particular individuals. Strategies for doing this are identified.

The Good Father: Parental Expectations and Youth Sports

Abstract Family life and expectations for parents have changed dramatically over the past two generations. In the United States these changes have been fuelled by a combination of factors, including a conservative emphasis on traditional family values and fathers as heads of households, a neo‐liberal emphasis on individualism and the need for fathers to take responsibility for the development of their children, a liberal feminist emphasis on gender equity in family life, and progressive ideas about the meaning of gender and sexuality. As a result of these factors mothers and fathers today are held responsible for the whereabouts and actions of their children 24 hours a day, seven days a week. This standard, never before used in any society as a baseline measure for good parenting, serves as a foundation for linking the character and achievements of children to the moral worth of parents. Because sports are activities in which a child’s success is visible and objectively measurable, and because fathers are more likely than mothers to have or claim expertise in sports, the development of athletic skills among children is often monitored by fathers who act as coaches, managers, agents, mentors, and advocates for their child athletes. Therefore, the involvement of fathers in youth sports is grounded in complex cultural changes and it has implications for families and father–child relationships. These implications are discussed in light of new expectations that connect the moral worth of parents to the success of their children.

Leaving Competitive Sport: Retirement or Rebirth?

This paper reviews existing information on retirement from sport and offers an interpretation of the retirement process that will both challenge widespread assumptions held by sport sociologists and provide hypotheses for future research. The dynamics of the retirement process are discussed for athletes in top-level interscholastic and amateur sports as well as in professional sports. Existing data suggest that retirement for athletes in each of these contexts is not an inevitable source of stress, identity crises, or adjustment problems. It is argued that the dynamics of the sport retirement process are grounded in the social structural context in which retirement takes place. Factors such as gender, race, age, socioeconomic status, and social and emotional support networks shape the manner in which one makes the transition out of sport. Therefore, retirement from sport sometimes may be the scene of stress and trauma but, by itself, it often is not the major cause of those problems.

Assessing the sociology of sport: On cultural sensibilities and the great sport myth

On the 50th anniversary of the ISSA and IRSS, Jay Coakley, a foundational scholar in the development of the sociology of sport, reflects on the lasting power of the Great Sport Myth (GSM) to shape cultural understandings of sport. Situated in an unshakable belief about the inherent purity and goodness of sport, it is argued that the GSM has shaped uncountable decisions to embrace and sponsor sports despite their costs and what they may preclude in the way of other private and public choices. In assessing the challenges of the field, the author points to the influence of the GSM in masking and enabling personal power that has enabled ruling elites to appropriate public money for private gain. In looking ahead to future sociology of sport inquiry, scholars are encouraged to recognize how the GSM continues to undermine critical discussions and research on the culture and organization of sports and engage that understanding in more effective tactics for disseminating research that can facilitate social change and activism.

Sociology of Sport in the United States

This paper updates and extends previous analyses of the sociology of sport in the United States. It provides a chronology of major events in the history of the field as well as a description of the social context in which the field emerged and grew. Then a review of data from both sociology and physical education leads to the conclusion that the sociology of sport in the United States continues to lack full legitimacy and a critical mass of members in both disciplines. In fact, there are reasons to conclude that the continued numerical growth of those calling themeselves sport sociologists has peaked and will not change significantly in the immediate future. Finally, a content summary of papers published in the first 14 issues of the Sociology of Sport Journal reveals the priorities given to research topics and research methodologies among those Americans doing some of the more significant work in the field.

The “Logic” of Specialization

JOPERD • Volume 81 No. 8 • October 2010 I t was not too long ago that the best athlete was the one who played multiple sports and had all-around skills. Lettering in three sports was an admired feat in high schools, and the decathlete who could sprint, jump, run, and endure was the epitome of athletic achievement. But definitions of athletic excellence have changed over the past two generations. An all-around athlete today is often pressured to specialize in one sport, or even in one position. Not to do so might elicit accusations of lacking motivation or having a fear of commitment and success. Youth programs that encourage year-round specialization in a single sport have become so quickly and thoroughly normalized in United States culture that their historical novelty is often overlooked. How did we get here? Why are we scrambling to find research on the developmental consequences of specialization and its usefulness in producing elite athletes? Although I am concerned about the consequences of specialization among young people today, I also want to know how and why we have reached this point. Most people know that positive child development requires diverse experiences across a range of situations, so how has year-round specialization in a single sport become common for so many children without evoking serious objections from parents and educators? And how has it become the norm in certain sports and even mandated by some coaches who no doubt know that the overall development of young people would be better served if they participated in multiple physical activities and sports? After studying youth sports over four decades, I believe that sport specialization has emerged in connection with two changes in the larger society: (1) the privatization and commercialization of youth sports, and (2) the development of unique ideas about parenting, especially the definition of what constitutes a good parent (Coakley, 2009).

Sport mega-events: can legacies and development be equitable and sustainable?

Sport mega-events (SMEs) involve struggles to determine the definition of legacy and the outcome priorities that guide legacy planning, funding, and implementation processes. History shows that legacies reflect the interests of capital, and legacy benefits are enjoyed primarily , if not exclusively, by powerful business interests, a few political leaders, and organizations that govern high performance sports. This paper addresses challenges faced by cities and countries that host SMEs, and shows that fair and equitable legacies and developmental outcomes are achieved only when the voices and interests of the general population are taken into account and given priority during the process of planning, funding and implementation. It also explains how full representation in the process of defining and achieving legacies and developmental outcomes may be undermined by populist beliefs about the power of sport.

Federal government funding and sport: the case of Brazil, 2004–2009

In 2009, Brazil won the right to host the 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games. International media coverage of the bid process revealed the involvement of the then Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in the project application. To further understand the governments involvement in Brazilian Olympic sport, we undertook an analysis of federal investment in sport between 2004 and 2009. We reviewed both quantitative and qualitative data showing Brazils public investment in Olympic sport by analysing official information available through the federal government. Noting that sports, especially Olympic sports, were the recipient of federal funds, we critique the rationale underlying the governments interest in providing financial support to this elite sport. Our analysis shows that federal funding for sports goes disproportionately to elite training and support for mega-events, despite constitutional guidelines to the contrary.

Media coverage of sports and violent behavior: An elusive connection

The general relationship between the media and violence has proven to be exceptionally elusive in spite of decades of research. Furthermore, there have been no attempts to link media coverage of sports to the lifestyles of their audiences. Exposure to the media does not occur in a social, cultural or political vacuum, and the responses to such exposure, including coverage of sports violence, vary according to individual circumstances.

Mega sporting events and public funding of sport in Brazil (2004–2011)

Brazilian law states that it is the duty of the State to promote sport as a right of each citizen, noting the allocation of public funds for the priority promotion of educational sports and – in specific cases – of elite sports. In view of this legislation, the objectives of this study were to investigate the amount of funds planned and executed by the Brazilian federal government on sport between 2004 and 2011, and to verify how these funds were distributed into the three sport dimensions recognised by the Brazilian law: educational, participation and elite sport. The research was quantitative, descriptive and exploratory. The data were collected from the ‘Siga Brazil’ portal and analysed using the Microsoft Office Excel (2007) and Statistical Package for Social Sciences (version 22) programmes. We found that the development of major sporting events in Brazil has significantly influenced the amount and distribution of budgetary resources in sports and leisure in the country. Although in the budget planning process the government had indicated the promotion of participation sports as a priority, elite sport and hosting Pan 2007 were taken as priorities in the budget execution process. The data show inconsistencies between the priorities established by the Brazilian Constitution and the priorities established by the governors. They also show incoherence between what was predicted in the planning process and what was actually executed. These inconsistencies have interfered with the democratisation of access to sport and leisure practices for Brazilian citizens.