Abstract
The French Association of the Paralyzed (FAP), which was created in 1933, is both an administrator for social and health establishments and services and a representative organization of “disabled people”. Fluctuating between a “self-organization” and an “organization for others” (Laville & Sainsaulieu, 2013), the FPA is attempting to develop a “participatory model” (Ebersold, 2002) by involving its members and users in individual and collective decisions.In this context, the National Directorate of FPA decided to recruit a PhD student to carry out research specifically concerning the question of physical and sports activities. However, since sports demand is infrequent among members and users, it is difficult to consider the organization of physical activities from a co-construction perspective. The central issue is then to better understand the position which is either given or taken by the members and users of the FPA in the decision-making process in terms of physical and sport activities.Through a participant observation at the headquarters of the association, plus monographic studies of 10 FPA’s units, 49 in-depth interviews (23 employees or volunteers, and 26 members or users) and a documentary research, we adopted a comprehensive approach. Its aim was to grasp the beliefs and social representations of these actors, as well as their interactions.Finally, sport participation in the association seems to expose the difficulties for the employees or volunteers and for the members and users to move from the “model of care” to the “model of empowerment” (Oliver, 1990 ; Morris, 1997, 2001).