Tackling Football Hooliganism - Research Paper Example

 Tackling Football Hooliganism: A Quantitative Study of Public Order, Policing and Crowd Psychology Even though hooliganism is prevailing in most of the sports competitions, football hooliganism seems to be widespread one. Hooliganism refers to the unruly and destructive behaviours by a partisan crowd when certain sports competitions occur. In most of the hooliganism cases, the partisan crowd engage in actions such as brawling, vandalism and intimidation when their supporting club wins or loses matches. The unruly behavior may occur either during or after the matches. English football fans are infamous for hooliganism. They create problems not only in UK, but also in other parts of the world where their supporting club participate in football matches. In some cases, football hooliganism may start from the stadia and spread outside the stadia. Riot and communal violence may take place as a result of that. This paper analyses the public order, policing and crowd psychology with respect to football hooliganism. Public order, policing and crowd psychology with respect to football hooliganism Despite its widespread acceptance the concept of football hooliganism is considered by some researchers as largely a mass media construction. It is problematic as a scientific and technical construct primarily because it is used to describe such a vast array of different forms of activity, ranging from individual drunkenness to spontaneous rioting involving hundreds of supporters (Stott et al., 2008, p.117). Patriotism and nationalism are the major reasons behind football hooliganism. When two teams from different countries or different clubs fight each other in the stadium, players cultivate the spirit of nationalism and pride into the veins of the spectators. Instead of treating the match as a sports activity, some partisan crowd may take it as a real fight between two nations or clubs. The actions, gestures, body languages of the players generate too much spirit in the minds of the spectators. Football players after scoring goals show some symbols of victory or triumph towards the crowd nowadays. These gestures and body languages often lift the spirit of the spectators. Instead of treating a football match as a sport, spectators may treat it as a war. Such spirits force them to fight against the supporters of the opposite nation or club in the pavilion. Hooligans were believed to play vital roles in distraction, protection and reputation for many non-hooligan fans and even when fans did express disapproval of ‘hooligan’ activity, this was often for practical rather than moral reasons. Furthermore, fans who express positive attitudes to hooliganism – or ‘hooligans’ – have to be acknowledged and understood if the problem of football crowd disorder is to be controlled (Rookwood & Pearson, 2012, p.149). In certain cases, hooligans may force even non-hooligan fans to engage in violent activities. It should be noted that the harassment, joking and bullying by the opposite fans may cross all the limits in certain occasions so that even non-hooligans may fight with the hooligans. The thirst for domination is inherited in all human beings. However, social orders and customs prevent them from showing this dominance publicly. While watching football matches, these inherited traits may often come out in the form of violence. According to Scott et al (2008), “the Elaborated Social Identity Model of crowd behaviour (ESIM) proposes that crowd members’ social identity is embedded within intergroup relations that are defined in terms of legitimacy and power”(Stott et al., 2008, p.119). Imagine a football match between Germany and UK. It is widely accepted that Germany’s superiority complex resulted in two world wars. In other words, Germans do believe that their race is superior to all other races and it is their right to rule the world. On the other hand, Britain was the ruler of the world once. They had colonies in all parts of the world in the past. It was often said that sun never sets in British Empire. Under such circumstances, a football match between Germany and Britain may often cross all the limits of a sports match. The partisan crowd may support their team using all strategies and may fight with the opposite fans because of the superiority complex in the veins of Germans and British people. “While the ESIM accepts that crowd members’ social identity is a meaningful reflection of intergroup relations, it also emphasises that acting collectively on the basis of that social identity can in turn change the intergroup context” (Stott et al., 2008, p.119). Many people have the belief that football hooliganism can be prevented with the help of adequate police force in the stadium. However, the above belief seems to be wrong which is evident from the data collected by Stott et al from the Euro 2004 matches. In their opinion, “low profile policing works because it manages crowd events in such a manner that avoids the forms of intergroup interaction, collective psychology and intragroup relations that the literature on crowd psychology proposes are necessary for widespread escalation and rioting to occur (Stott et al, 2008, p.134-135). While watching the presence of large number of police in uniform, the football crazy hooligans may deliberately try to create problems. In many cases, police actions could trigger hooliganism in football grounds. Crowd do not like to get their activities restricted in football grounds. They wanted to enjoy the match as much as possible. While police enforces certain restrictions upon their activities, they may perceive those actions differently. According to the Elaborated Social Identity Model of Crowd Behaviour and Procedural Justice Theory, “the perceived legitimacy among fans of the way they were policed affected the internal dynamics, patterns of collective action and overall levels of ‘compliance’ among the fan group” (Stott et al., 2012, p.381). The psychology of football hooliganism involves lot of complex parameters. There are four sets of metamotivational states: telic-paratelic (goal seeking behaviour and its opposite), conformity-negativism, mastery-sympathy, and autic-alloic (concern with oneself against concern for others). However, it is also postulated that one does not flip between the two states within a pair randomly. Reversal theory attempts to cover the idea of personality by indicating that some individuals have a tendency to spend more time in one metamotivational state than another; hence, these people can be categorised as paratelic dominant, conformist dominant etc. To be relaxed is to be in the telic state with low arousal and a high hedonic tone. It is the combination of these metamotivational states and the feelings they create that are essential, in explaining and understanding the motivation behind football hooligans and their behaviour (Kerr, 1994) While watching football matches, crowd or fans go through different emotional states. These emotions often associated with the individual characteristics. In other words, some people may experience over joy when their team scores goals or win matches while some others may not show much joy or sorrow when their teams win or loss matches. Fans who are deeply involved in the matches may react differently than fans who moderately involve in the matches. Conclusions Football hooliganism is wide spread all over the world. However, in Europe it seems to be crossing all limits. The partisan crowd often engage in violent activities when their team wins or loses matches because of over enthusiasm and deep interest in the matches. Football crazy crowd often perceive matches as wars rather than sports. Their inherited traits may often come out in the form of violent activities while their team wins or losses. Some studies have shown that excessive policing may cause more problems in football grounds. References Kerr, J.H. (1994). Understanding Soccer Hooliganism. Retrieved from http://www.reading.ac.uk/RevSoc/archive/volume10/number2/10-2v.htm Rookwood, J. & Pearson, G. (2012). The hooligan: Positive fan attitudes to football ‘hooliganism’. International Review for the Sociology of Sport Jun2012, Vol. 47 Issue 2, p149 Stott, C., Adang, O., Livingston, A. & Schreiber, M. (2008). Tackling Football Hooliganism A Quantitative Study of Public Order, Policing and Crowd Psychology. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law. 2008, Vol. 14, No. 2, 115–141. DOI: 10.1037/a0013419 Stott, C. Hoggett, J & Pearson, G. (2012) Keeping the Peace’. British Journal of Criminology. Mar2012, Vol. 52 Issue 2, p381-399. 19p. Abstract: This paper explores the relevance of the Elaborated Social Identity Read More