Sport and Physical Education in Communist Factories: from the Soviet Union to Romania

Abstract

After 1948, Romania followed the Soviet canon regarding the physical culture: before any sport performance, sport was designed to improve the general health and labour capabilities of the working people. Physical education was both a propaganda element of the new communist regime and also a slowly growing reality in the Romanian factories. As the economical framework and the overall well-being of the society improved, the physical education propaganda slowed down its pace, while sport infrastructure and its practice in factories were the seed not only for the “massification" of sport, but also for true performance in sport. In this article we explain the Soviet implications towards Romanian sport in general; we focus on recreating the framework around practicing of sport in factories with clear examples, statistics and a focus between the contrast of propaganda and the reality from factories.