Sport, Physical Activity and Public Health

This edited collection includes articles which examine the complex relationships between sport, physical activity and public health. It reflects a current expansion in academic, policy and practice interest in sport and physical activity for public health. Our contributors discuss issues connected to the politics and policy of sport, physical activity and public health by focusing on a range of theoretical themes including evidence and knowledge production, national policies and the political promotion of sport and physical activity for health, sports mega-events and public health, social diversity in community sport for health programming, education and training in physical education and fitness sectors, and critical perspectives on partnership working in sport and public health. Overall, the chapters reflect debate about the motivations of national and local government intervention in policy making on public health that includes the role of sport and / or physical activity, and explores the discussions about the impact that such policy decisions have on people and their communities. This book was originally published as a special issue of the International Journal of Sport Policy and Politics.

Louise Mansfield, PhD, is Senior Lecturer in Sport, Health and Social Sciences at Brunel University London, UK. Her research focuses on the relationship between sport, physical activity and public health. She is interested in partnership and community approaches to female involvement in physical activity and issues of health, wellbeing, inequality and diversity. She has led research projects for both sport and public health organisations. She sits on the editorial boards for Leisure Studies, Qualitative Research in Sport, Exercise and Health and the International Review for the Sociology of Sport.

Joe Piggin, PhD, is a Senior Lecturer at Loughborough University’s School of Sport, Exercise and Health Sciences in the UK. Joe’s research covers the areas of sport policy translation into marketing and programmes, health promotion at mega sports events, and physical activity policy.