Can Sports Drive Racial Justice? What the Evidence Says
Note: This article is cross-posted from our sister site: This Week in Public Health.
On a warm summer night in 2020, a local health department staffer scrolls through her phone after a long shift. The headlines aren’t about COVID case counts or vaccination clinics. They’re about athletes—kneeling, striking, refusing to play. In between emergency briefings and burnout, she wonders: Does any of this actually change anything?
That question sits at the heart of a sweeping new review by sociologist Douglas Hartmann, who examines a decade of research on sports, race, and social movements. His conclusion is both hopeful and sobering: sport can move culture—but culture alone does not move systems.
For public health, where narrative change often precedes policy change, this distinction matters.
The Problem: We Overestimate Symbolic Change
For decades, sociologists argued that sport mostly reproduces inequality. It profits from racial hierarchies, masks exploitation behind “meritocracy,” and sells a comforting myth of colorblindness.
Then came the 2010s.
Athletes—from high school teams to global superstars—began openly challenging racism, policing, and injustice. Colin Kaepernick’s decision to kneel during the national anthem ignited a movement that spread across leagues, countries, and causes. To many observers, it felt like a turning point.
But was it?
Hartmann’s review of dozens of studies asks a tougher question: What kind of change does sports activism actually produce?
The Evidence: Sport Changes Meaning More Than Structure
Sports activism does three things very well:
- Grabs attention
- Frames public debate
- Forces conversations that might not happen otherwise
In social movement terms, sport excels at agenda setting. It puts issues like systemic racism, police violence, and white supremacy into living rooms that would never attend a protest or read an academic paper.
But when researchers looked for lasting institutional change—new policies, reduced inequality, durable reforms—the results were mixed, fragile, or even reversed by backlash.
Key Insight: Sport is a powerful stage, not a governing body.
Hartmann describes sport as a “dramaturgical platform”—a public theater where social struggles are performed before massive, emotionally invested audiences. These performances shape how people understand injustice, but they rarely deliver justice on their own.
Contrast Framing: What We Assumed vs. What We Learned
We assumed: Athlete activism would persuade opponents and build broad consensus.
The evidence shows: It mostly reinforces existing beliefs. Supporters become more committed. Opponents become angrier. Polarization deepens.
This matters for public health, where polarized responses already complicate work on vaccines, climate adaptation, gun violence, and racial equity.
Why This Still Matters for Public Health
If sports activism doesn’t reliably change policy, why should health professionals care?
Because culture is upstream of policy. Public health successes—from tobacco control to HIV stigma reduction—did not begin with legislation. They began with norm shifts, language changes, and new moral frames. Sport contributes precisely at this level.
Athletes helped normalize terms like systemic racism and structural inequality for millions of people who would never encounter them through public health messaging annurev-soc-090324-025141.
That cultural work is necessary—but not sufficient.
What This Means in Practice
For Local Health Departments
- Treat sports activism as a signal amplifier, not a solution.
- Pair moments of public attention with concrete policy proposals and data.
- Be ready for backlash and plan communications accordingly.
For Community-Based Organizations
- Collaborate with athlete advocates, but anchor campaigns in non-sport institutions (schools, housing, public safety).
- Use sports moments to recruit, educate, and mobilize—not just to message.
For Policymakers
- Symbolic gestures without structural follow-through invite cynicism.
- Tie public statements to funding, enforcement, and accountability mechanisms.
For Researchers & Evaluators
- Measure cultural and discursive change explicitly, not just policy outcomes.
- Track backlash as an outcome, not a side effect.
Barriers and Constraints
Hartmann’s review highlights several limits that public health leaders should recognize:
- Backlash risk: Successful visibility can trigger political retaliation that harms institutions and communities.
- Co-optation: Corporations and leagues often adopt activist language while avoiding real reform (“woke capitalism”).
- Fragmentation: Decentralized activism is powerful symbolically but weak structurally.
- Interest convergence: Reforms stick only when they align with elite incentives.
These dynamics mirror challenges public health faces when equity language outpaces budget authority.
What’s Next: From Stage to System
The evidence points to a clear lesson: sports activism works best when it connects to broader movements and institutions. For public health, that means:
- Aligning cultural moments with policy windows
- Embedding narrative change within organizational strategy
- Treating visibility as a resource that must be converted into infrastructure
Sport can open the door. Public health must walk through it.
Conversation Starters
- How could your agency better convert moments of cultural attention into policy action?
- What safeguards do you need to anticipate backlash when equity becomes visible?
- Does this challenge your assumptions about how social change happens?
Final Takeaway
Sports don’t change the world by themselves. They change how the world talks about change.
For public health, that distinction is not a disappointment—it’s a roadmap.
