The manager, the doctor and the technician: political recognition and institutionalization of sport for the physically disabled in France (1968–1973)

Abstract

It was in 1969, six years after the creation of the first sports federation for the physically disabled in France, that regular ties with the Ministry of Youth and Sports began to develop. The aim of this article is to question how these ties affected the development of the movement towards the model of ‘classic’ sports federations. Between 1968 and 1973, data from the Ministry of Youth and Sports kept in the National Archives, along with information published in the federal press (crossed with accounts from persons with prominent roles d in disabled sports at the time), reveals a reorganization of the internal relations between managers (who are physically disabled people) and doctors (who generally come from the field of re-education). These new circumstances entailed their collaboration with another federal agent, who consequently became centrally important: the sports technician.

Notes

1. The allocation of a delegation of power to sports federations is part of the ruling of 28 August 1945. (Terret 2007).

2. Brevet d’État (National Certificate).

3. President Berthe’s widow and President Volait; three General Secretaries (Huguette Tanguy, Georges Morin et Claude Sugny) and a treasurer (Pierre Cochard); one of the first technical counsellors allocated by the MJS (Christian Paillard); two athletes who represented France at the Paralympics in the 1960s and 1970s before taking up administration functions (André Hennaert and Alain Siclis).

4. Two members of the bureau (Gérard Masson et André Auberger); three volunteers of the ASPHL (Maguy Pelletier, Pierre Bayard et Jean Molin); the president of the Rhodanienne [Rhone region] Association for the Physically Disabled (Dr Réty); a volunteer swimming technical counsellor (Pierre Randaxe); a photographer/documentary maker (Jean-Claude Parayre). The two main protagonists of the following part of the story, Marcel Avronsart and Yves Nayme, could unfortunately not be interviewed due to their early deaths.

5. SS, n° 22, 1969, 2.

6. Note written by Christian Gaudefroy and dated 5 February 1970 (AN F44bis 6074), addressed to M. Augustin (Cabinet member of the State Secretary to the Prime Minister in charge of Youth and Sports).

7. SS, n° 25, 1970, 8.

8. SS, n° 25, 1970, 11.

9. SS, n° 29, 1972, 12.

10. Note from the bureau S.2 to the bureau S.3 of the Head Office of Physical and Sports Education dated 3 March 1972 (AN, F44bis 6074).

11. AN, F44bis 6074.

12. Doctors are called upon to recruit members and benefit from the special installations within re-education centres, but also to weigh on the decisions of international sports organizations for disabled sports and of the national public authorities (role of sports in functional re-education and social readapting).

13. SS, n° 13, 1967, 2.

14. SS, n° 14, 1967, 16.

15. Dr Michaut, for instance, is head of the ‘amputee’ national commission.

16. AN, F44bis 6073.

17. Dr Maury, president of the medical committee, declared: ‘Certain performances are remarkable and constitute an exploit, but it must be realized that in sports education we take a calculated risk, and none of these performances overstep the limits of what can be asked of this type of patient’ (1st JMNESHP, 1972, 90). [AN, F44bis 6073].

18. ‘Those who must benefit the most from this sport are the paraplegics, who need to muscle their upper limbs and develop their balance and dexterity in the wheelchair’ (medical committee, 11 October 1971, 2).

19. Medical Committee, 11 October 1972, 2. [AN, F44bis 6073].

20. 1st JMNESHP, 1972, 5. [AN, F44bis 6073].

21. 1st JMNESHP, 1972, 13. [AN, F44bis 6073].

22. 1st JMNESHP, 1972, 53. [AN, F44bis 6073].

23. 1st JMNESHP, 1972, 24. [AN, F44bis 6073].

24. 1st JMNESHP, 1972, 24. [AN, F44bis 6073].

25. Pr Grossiord, 1st JMNESHP, 1972, 9. [AN, F44bis 6073].

26. Medical Committee, 11 October 1971, 4. [AN, F44bis 6073].

27. Dr Piera, 1st JMNESHP, 1972, 42. [AN, F44bis 6073].

28. Class A, for instance, encompasses ‘complete spinal injuries, sensory and motor, up to D11’.

29. For example, a number 2 classification is relative to ‘muscular contractions which are sufficient to produce a movement without weight conflict and that reaches to the full extent of the passive movement’ (2nd JMNESHP, 1973, 14). [AN, F44bis 6073].

30. 2nd JMNESHP, 1973, 13. [AN, F44bis 6073].

31. 1st JMNESHP, 1972, 41. [AN, F44bis 6073].

32. Pr Grossiord, 1st JMNESHP, 1972, 9. [AN, F44bis 6073].

33. 2nd JMNESHP, 1973, 69. [AN, F44bis 6073].

34. AN, F44bis 6074.

35. AN, F44bis 6074 (for both letters of June 8 and 14, 1972, as well as for the note of 28 November 1972).

36. AN, F44bis 6074.

37. ‘Physically Disabled’ is written with capital letters in the text.

38. Article 3 requires that ‘the candidates provide a certificate attesting to the fact the he/she attended first aid lessons without enduring certain tests on account of physical disability’, an aspect that president Avronsart questioned in his letter to the State Secretary on 13 February 1973.

39. With a ‘technical test’ (coefficient 2), ‘an educational test’ (coefficient 2) and an ‘athletics preparation test including a demonstration’ (coefficient 1).

40. On the ‘medical and technical aspects (and possibly tactical aspects) of the selected sports discipline’ (coefficient 3).

41. On the ‘organization, regulation, administration of the selected sports discipline’ (coefficient 2).

42. A ‘technical demonstration’ (coefficient 2), an ‘educational test (and possibly tactical)’ (coefficient 2), a ‘practical test relating to training difficulties’ (coefficient 2), a ‘physical preparation test’ (coefficient 2) and an ‘interview with the jury concerning the candidate's activities as an Educator or as a Player (in the case of the candidate's being physically disabled)’ (coefficient 1).

43. The 3rd degree comprises ‘a technical test including a presentation followed by a demonstration relating to executive training’ (coefficient 3), an ‘educational test including the organizing and presentation of an executive improvement session’ (coefficient 2) and an ‘interview with the jury concerning the candidate’s activities as an Educator or as a Player (in the case of the candidate's being physically disabled)’ (coefficient 1).

44. For the 1st degree, one has to be the holder of ‘a federal 1st degree or to prove two years’ experience on a national, regional, departmental or local level within the federation’; for the 2nd degree, of ‘a federal 2nd degree or to prove four years of active experience, in one of the disciplines of disabled sports, on a national level, and within the FFSHP’; for the 3rd degree, of a ‘federal 3rd degree or to prove six years of active experience, in one of the disciplines of disabled sports, on a national level and within the FFSHP.

45. See Pierre (2009), ‘Des brevets d’État d’éducateur sportif aux diplômes professionnels de 1963 à nos jours’. If the 989 EPS circular of 5 April 1957, created a body of national sports counsellors, it was not until the circular of 10 June 1966, signed by Crespin, that the function of national technical manager (DTN) was defined (AN, F44bis 10521). Before Crespin, a certain number of positions were already allocated, such as Robert Robin’s to the French Federation of Athletics in 1961 (Amar 1987), but it was he that generalized them after 1966 (Le Noé 2014).