During the beginning of the 20th century, the Swedish School Sports Association was started with the goal of developing sports for students in Swedish schools. The association arose as part of the sports movement in Sweden and is a committee of the National Sports Confederation. During the first half of the 20th century, the Swedish Sports Association functioned like any other sports association, but with students as the focus group. In connection with their 50th anniversary, 1966, the Swedish School Sports Association invited students to their association's board. This became a turning point for the Swedish School Sports Association and what kind of association they have become in today. In modern times, the Swedish School Sports Association is an organization that works to teach young people to lead and take responsibility through democratic leadership, an organization for young people, led by young people.In this essay, the aim is to examine how the Swedish School Sports Association's development into a association led by students and young people began and developed. To analyze this development, this essay uses a qualitative text analysis as its method to analyze the Swedish School Sports Association's own archive material in the form of the member magazine Final, Activity Reports and campaign protocols between the years 1966–1981. Robert Putnam's theory of social capital which defines how an organization's social capital can be valued through "civic virtue" is used to value and develop a functioning democracy within a group. Putnam's theory will be used to visualize how this development of the Swedish School Sports Association has changed the organization's social capital with a focus on the students' integration. The essay asks three questions that aim to answer how students are engaged and involved in the organization of the Swedish School Sports Association and how this has developed democratic values within the association. With the aim of investigating students involvment within the organization, these questions will shape the structure of the inquiry and focus the reading of the archival material.The essay comes to the conclusion of how the development of the Swedish School Sports Association has gone over 15 years, from an organization with a low social capital where the students were only participants in the physical activities, to an organization with high social capital where the students are involved in everything from the physical activities to participation on the board. The survey also shows how unique this development has been during the latter half of the 20th century when placed in a larger societal and international perspective. A unique development for Swedish sports where the Swedish School Sports Association is one of the earliest to let students participate and lead. At the same time as it is an opposite development from American sports that is developing.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:sh-54257 |
| Date | January 2024 |
| Creators | Möller, Ludvig |
| Publisher | Södertörns högskola, Lärarutbildningen |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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