The underrepresentation of women's sport in sports economics literature

This paper addresses two questions: Is women's sport underrepresented in sports economics research? If so, why?First, it is demonstrated that the investigation of women's sport is severely underrepresented in academic discourse on sports economics. This is revealed by a cursory examination of specialist journals, selected handbooks, and textbooks in the subfield of sports economics.Second, the paper speculates on several (potentially rival) explanations for this underrepresentation. These explanations include: the gender imbalance in the economics profession; the alienating masculine representation of sport in society; the androcentric limits of the theoretic and methodological nostrums of the dominant paradigm in economics; and a profane economic incentive structure of the subfield of sports economics itself. These explanations are briefly assessed in turn. It is argued that although none of the explanations are implausible, it is -ironically" a crude economic/materialist explanation of the subfield of sport economics itself lies at the base of the current near invisibility of women's sport in the academic literature.The paper concludes with some brief comments on how these reflections are relevant to women's sport both inside and outside the academy.