Sports Clubs, Social Capital and Social Regeneration: ‘ill-defined interventions with hard to follow outcomes’?

Recent political and policy concerns with social inclusion, civic renewal and ‘joined up’ government have placed debates about social capital at the centre of a number of areas of social policy. In this context increasing demands are being made of sport to contribute to this broader social regeneration agenda. This essay explores the nature of sport's presumed contribution, in particular the contribution of sports clubs to the development of types of capital, especially social capital. It concludes that it is not clear what contribution sports clubs can play in this agenda, that the new policy agenda carries dangers of undermining the nature and strengths of the voluntary sector in sport and that more research is required to explore the processes of social capital formation in sports clubs.