Field of (American) Dreams: Sports and Belief in Meritocracy

• In Event: Popular Culture: Communicating and Shaping Political Attitudes

Abstract

American inequality has reached levels not seen since before the great depression. Yet public support for redistribution has not changed in response to this rising inequality. In this paper I examine how watching sports reinforces American attitudes about meritocracy. Using two surveys I demonstrate that greater sports watching is associated with higher belief that hard work and talent are more responsible for success, that economic advancement is possible, that competition is a force for good, and that redistributive policies are undesirable. I supplement these findings with a survey experiment conducted during the 2021 NBA finals to show that priming sports can reinforce positive attitudes towards the role of competition in society and activate beliefs among sports fans that America is more meritocratic. These findings illustrate the importance of studying how media that has traditionally been thought of as non-political can nevertheless promote narratives which shape political attitudes.

Author

• Alexander Tolkin, University of Pennsylvania