Sport and Social Change in the Japanese Rural Community

Abstract

Sport sociologists in Japan are now facing the great task of rethinking their sociological methodologies. There are several reasons for this.

1) The leisure policy of the Japanese government, which had been strongly connected to economical development, has been greatly changed. (The "Resort Act" which aims to promote leisure activities by making rural areas open to resort development.)

2) Sport sociologists in Japan have tended not to pay attention to the drastic social changes in which have occurred in rural areas.

3) New theoretical developments in American and European schools of sociology have arisen and they provide the means for Japanese scholors to approach these devlopments. Focusing on the works of Bourdieu and Mandles would surely aid Japanese sport sociologists to break through the current deadlock in dealing with Japan's new sociological environment.