ABSTRACT
The second half of the twentieth century in France was a period during which sports training was structured around new institutions: The National Institute of Sport in Paris (INS) and a network of Regional Sport Centres. After WWII and the political voluntarism of the ‘Vichy Moment’, INS executives who were interested in the organization of sport abroad initiated a ‘Method of Sports Education’. It was disseminated mainly in educational circles with the aim of rebuilding the bodily health of youth and the transformation of French sports training to coaching remained difficult. An eclectic solution was found in the face of scientific scepticism about foreign contributions. The first professional titles for sports educators were established in the 1960s, while a rationalization of coaching spread through the spirit of a new ‘Doctrine of Sport’. A French-style training doctrine appeared finally in the 1970s, gradually structured in a very pragmatic manner that marked a new cultural context for sports training in the country. In an effort to find a particular path in the search for effectiveness, it existed as a blend of autonomy under the control of sports federations and the administrative weight of the Ministry of Sport authorities, a halfway point between the most centralized models and Anglo-Saxon liberal autonomy.
