Title : Amateur sports clubs and the politics of sustainability: A critical sociological perspective from Portugal
Abstract:
Amateur sports clubs are increasingly invoked in public discourse as local allies in the promotion of environmental sustainability and active urban mobility. However, critical sociological and anthropological analysis reveals a deep disconnect between these narratives and the lived realities of grassroots sports organisations. This paper explores how state funding models — particularly those based on the number of federated athletes — shape the institutional priorities of amateur clubs in Portugal, often subordinating ecological concerns to logics of survival, competition, and visibility.
Drawing on qualitative fieldwork and grounded ethnographic observation, the study argues that the widespread celebration of clubs as sustainable agents overlooks their structural constraints, including precarious infrastructures, limited human resources, and a lack of environmental training. Rather than viewing sustainability as an inherent function of sport, this paper frames it as a socially and politically contingent possibility — one that is frequently compromised by performance-based funding criteria and instrumental governance models.
By analysing these tensions through a socio-anthropological lens, the paper calls for a reframing of environmental policy in sport that takes into account grassroots institutional fragility, social inequality, and the symbolic economies that shape local sporting life. The findings contribute to broader debates on urban sustainability, public policy, and the need for context-sensitive approaches to environmental innovation in the sport sector.
KeyWords: Amateur Sports; Sustainability; Funding; Governance; Ethnography; Urban Policy
