Missing Links: Towards a Theory of Social Economic Agency for Sports Attendance

In this chapter I address the need for debate regarding the standard economic agent presupposed or used in sports attendance demand theory and research. I first set out a participant observation ethnographic account of ‘a day at the football’. This provides a contrast in order to ask the question, ‘is it reasonable to think that the person who attended a sports event of the kind described becomes some version of the standard economic agent at the point of purchase of the ticket that secures attendance?’ I then discuss in detail the issues that this raises regarding a social agent and suggest that sports economics is one side of a more basic divide in its approach to economics. Finally, I explore some possible concepts and resources for ‘the other side of the divide’.