Introduction Sports and Physical Activity: Key Elements of Personal, Community, Social and Economic Life

This issue is different from the others. Departing from our usual editorial policy, the theme of this issue was not determined in advance nor was there any specific call for papers or requests for contributions from leading researchers in the field. The guest editors did not need to chose a particular orientation or outline the most pertinent leisure issues in different communities and societies. In a sense, this theme emerged naturally as a result of numerous articles submitted spontaneously by researchers. The articles presented in this issue reflect the interests of researchers in this area of leisure studies. Moreover, they clearly indicate the differences in orientation between Leisure and Society and other journals specifically devoted to sports and physical activity. The importance of physical and sports activities in the life of the individual or even in families, communities and social groups as well as different cultures cannot be denied. In all these areas, physical and sports activities constitute behaviours and practices to which are attached values and specific significance peculiar to the players involved. The activities are motivated by current goals but are also the result of the history and specific traits of each group. They also respond to both personal and cultural needs and have an impact on the environment, the economy, management, culture and politics and affect psychological, educational, medical and professional aspects of the individual. With regard to mass culture and resulting quasi-universal phenomena, attention focuses on Olympic games and world championships linked to sports disciplines. Professional sports, especially in developed countries, constitute a widespread phenomenon; they involve paid athletes who compete for the benefit of spectators and fans for whom they serve as models or idols. Besides these spectator and entertainment sports, there are also participation or recreation sports practised by amateurs for different reasons such as pleasure, excitement, development, self actualization, socialization and social belonging, personal health and well-being or even self-esteem and prestige. Besides sports involving games and competition, there are other important phenomena which also involve physical activity. Among them are physical training, outdoor or adventure physical activity. These different practices entail very different behaviours, goals and values and also require interventions, organisations, facilities, infra-structures as well as policies and economic decisions which vary from one situation to situation and which are not always in sync with each other or with other aspects of social and community life. Leisure sciences address all of these issues, and the areas of physical and sports activity are no exception. This broad category of activities is the most popular of free-time activities, whether they entail active participation, learning and training, competition or recreation or even performance or entertainment. The articles submitted to us reflect this diversity of approaches and issues, but since they come from a rather limited number of countries and cultures they do not necessarily reflect the universality of the phenomenon. However, the studies and reflections presented here can be adapted to show fully how sports and physical activity blend in with lifestyles prevalent in the four corners of the globe. In this respect, this issue could serve as a starting point for several comparative studies on physical leisure activities and sports. The first sub-theme deals with sports development policies. First of all, Dulac and Henry compare and examine urban sports development policies adopted from 1960 to the end of the 90s in Grenoble, France and Sheffield, England. In both cases, despite differing political, institutional and structural contexts, policies favoured the market rather than social interests. Next, Corneloup et al. focus on nature leisure sports and the social, economic and tourist activity they generate. They …