Sport practice for people with disabilities in France: a history strewn with pitfalls

Résumé 0

The 2024 Paris Olympic and Paralympic Games focus on the inclusion of all audiences in sport and include people with disabilities. The Paralympic Games are also the subject of a special attention with strong hopes for medals from the French team. This desire is part of a long time process during which the reception structures allowing the practice of sports for people with disabilities have gradually been built.While in 1924, one hundred years before the Paris 2024 OPGs, the first silent games took place in this same city (Ruffié, Ferez (dir.), 2013), the institutional development of different groups in favor of sports practice for people with disabilities during the 20th century testifies to the political and cultural challenges in terms of disability within French society.The first International Games of Stoke Mandeville in 1948, spurred on by the neurosurgeon L. Guttmann, were a fundamental milestone in understanding this structuring in France, which thinks the practice of sports for people with disabilities through a re-educational prism. In the 1960s, the sporting turning point was officially recorded within the Sports Association of the Disabled of France (ASMF). Various conflicts lead in 1977 to the creation of the French Handisport Federation (FFH) for the physical or sensory handicap, while the French Federation of adapted sport (FFSA) for the mental handicap replaced the FFESPHM in 1983.This historic development is now leading to a plurality of modes of practice for PWDs who can choose to join a specific club affiliated with the FFSH or the FFSA or (in) an ordinary club. We conducted a survey of ordinary clubs combining a quantitative and qualitative approach. A questionnaire intended for sports clubs (n = 1042) and another intended for license holders with disabilities (n = 1752) supplemented by semi-structured interviews carried out with people with disabilities (n = 64). The results show that inclusion is effective and progressive within clubs, but that there are still cultural and structural obstacles to overcome in order to move from an integrative model to an inclusive model. In addition, the interviews show that their commitment to practice is still a difficult undertaking depending on the nature of the handicap, accessibility, family and social environment, material and / or sensory assistance, the amount of time available... configuring very heterogeneous practice ways.