The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on sports-based youth development: the case of the rugby association ‘Rebonds!’

ABSTRACT The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on organisations that work with economically disadvantaged youth such as Rebonds! [Pick yourself up!], an association that provides educational rugby programmes to underprivileged young people in Toulouse, France. During the pandemic, this association experienced social change in the form of a double movement. First, its actors sought to preserve the fundamentals of the socialisation process that structures their work, which encourages young people to open up to the world and engage their bodies, while also introducing a new range of socialisation activities to address precarity and social inequality in healthcare. Second, because it was able to adapt its programmes to environmental constraints and remain strongly connected to all its partners, the association came to be perceived as a strong, stable, and seasoned community resource. At the same time, Rebonds! was able, during this period, to strengthen its legitimacy and the recognition it received from public institutions.