Social stratification in sport and sport policy in the European Union

Sport for All? Insight into stratification and compensation mechanisms of sporting activity in the 27 European Union member states

“…This means that in 2005, 4 out of 10 Europeans were still not exposed to sporting activity, even by the broad definition of sporting activity used in the Eurobarometer survey. Moreover, our bivariate results are entirely consistent with previous studies (Collins & Kay, 2003;Lamprecht & Stamm, 1995;Hartmann-Tews, 2006;Scheerder & Van Tuyckom, 2007) and show that sporting activity in the EU-27 (2005) is geographically as well as socially stratified. This implies that particular subgroups of nonsportive citizens can be distinguished-South and East Europeans on the one hand, and women, elderly, individuals with a lower educational level and rural citizens on the other hand.…”

“…With respect to sporting activity, however, we notice striking differences between the European member states. This is congruent with results from previous studies into European sport participation (Hartmann-Tews, 2006;Scheerder & Van Tuyckom, 2007). In general, sporting activity declines when moving from north to south in Europe.…”

“…Crum summarised this trend as the "sportization of society" (1991, p. 15). However, previous research has shown that recreational sporting activity in Europe is both geographically and socially stratified (Hartmann-Tews, 2006;Scheerder & Van Tuyckom, 2007). First, it was found that the sport participation behaviour of Europeans is geographically stratified or differentiated.…”

Sport participation of the elderly—the role of gender, age, and social class

“…The main stock of surveys produces cross-sectional data, i.e., information on activities of different age groups at a certain point of time. A comparison of these surveys of the past decades can identify changes in the level of participation over a period of time and social trends in the development of the populations sport participation [7,11,28,46].…”

“…These difficulties are well known in the academic literature on empirical methods in general and of comparative analysis in particular. Against this methodological background, a comparison of surveys on sports participation of elderly people is a challenge that becomes even bigger in an internationally comparative perspective [28]. Against this background the review focuses on studies in Germany and on studies on sport activity of the elderly, thus going beyond general physical activity, which includes daily life routines like gardening, household work, or transport activities.…”