ROMANIA: Private Sport Sector at the Crossroads of Past Socialism and Present Capitalism

This project moves on the virgin ground. The issue is important as it not only reflects the architecture of one sector, but it also touches other issues: the structural opportunities of access to sport; the nature, and the consumers of sport establishments and services; the distribution of sport products; and the commercialisation and commodification of sport. In this article I attempt to sketch out the socio-political background and the structure of private sport sector along with the examples of the historical development via case studies.

The evolution of the current private sport sector can be seen to have followed four major patterns in Romania: (1) the acquiring/privatisation of the entities in state ownership; (2) the entering of the global operators to the market by direct foreign investment; (3) the spreading of the companies that are created with local capital; and (4) the formation of specific, “personal undertakings”, following unique paths. These are outlined along case studies such as the privatisation of the FC Steaua football team; the case of Master Adventure, a small business providing extreme sport services; and the tennis player Simona Halep phenomenon. It will be argued that the structure of the sector is defined by three factors: the monopoly and political control of the socialist state over the sector before 1989, conjointly with its ideological appropriation; the acute underdevelopment of the community sport sector, or its quasi absence; and the neoliberal economic turn after 2000.