Master thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (MSc)
open access
The world of football is constantly changing and is now a global industry with employers, employees, investors, and consumers, and the football shirt can be seen as the commodity par excellence of...Show moreThe world of football is constantly changing and is now a global industry with employers, employees, investors, and consumers, and the football shirt can be seen as the commodity par excellence of this industry. However, both in professional and amateur football, the football shirt and other elements of football material culture, acquire meanings and value that exceed the consumeristic and capitalistic dynamics. Through Photo and Video Elicitation Interviews and Oral and Life History Interviews, the participants of this research project, who are six members of the Liberi Nantes amateur football club based in Rome, Italy, demonstrate how the club’ shirt is more than just a football shirt as it is something that reinforces their sense of belonging towards each other and towards the team, how this shirt becomes a lens through which it is possible to think about broader issues and questions such as migration flows and the movement of people, how elements of football material culture become the glue that connects the world of amateur football to the one of professional football, and how amateurs’ perspectives and opinions become interesting prompts for further discussions and reflections about the recent economic and financial changes in this sport and about a possible switch towards a non-Eurocentric football.Show less
Mega sporting events (MSEs) like the Olympic Games and FIFA World Cup are seen by many as pathways for promoting human rights. While MSEs seek to promote ideals like peace and equality, there have...Show moreMega sporting events (MSEs) like the Olympic Games and FIFA World Cup are seen by many as pathways for promoting human rights. While MSEs seek to promote ideals like peace and equality, there have been numerous occasions where hosts of these events undermine the same values the MSEs strive to foster. This can be seen with the most recent edition of the FIFA World Cup in Qatar with the host accused of undermining human rights controversies related to migrant labor, women’s rights, and LGBTQ rights in the country. Given the phenomenon of state’s reacting differently to norm contestation, the central research question this project assesses is: How did democratic states respond to human rights norm contestations at the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar? Building on literature from the schools of human rights, protests, and state responses to norm contestation, this study uses democracy level as an independent variable see its effects on state behavior at the 2022 World Cup. Using a most-similar systems design, a QCA is conducted on Croatia and The Netherlands. This study provides mixed support for realist thought that finds that the closer a state is to being a full democracy, the more likely it is to respond to a norm contesting MSE host.Show less
Since the initial commercialization of the men’s Chinese professional football league, Chinese actors have started investing increasingly more resources in the foreign football sphere. Players,...Show moreSince the initial commercialization of the men’s Chinese professional football league, Chinese actors have started investing increasingly more resources in the foreign football sphere. Players, coaches, trainers and even clubs from all over the world have all been the subject of Chinese investment over the last few decades. Although spending has increased exponentially, the level of both the Chinese professional competition as well as the men’s national team have not improved at the same rate. This study uses existing literature from both academic sources as well as marketing and news reports on the subject to better understand the reasons to why investing in globalized resources has increased while also providing possible explanations to why the level of competitiveness has not been influenced as much. The study suggests that through the frameworks of soft power and state corporatism we can understand the levels of spending as larger state-driven strategy to both stimulate the football industry as well as to improve China’s soft power through international competitions. This study also suggests that based on the current academic and professional discourse surrounding Chinese competitive football, the reason for professional Chinese clubs’ relative low level of performance is due to a lack of incentive for the clubs to invest in future talent development. Although this study’s conclusions remain to be theories based on the interpretations of other academic researchers and experts, it still confirms that there is still much urgency for further research on this subjectShow less
By analysing incidents in Italian football stadiums since 2000, this thesis explores whether the approach of the Italian authorities to combat racism has been effective over the past two decades....Show moreBy analysing incidents in Italian football stadiums since 2000, this thesis explores whether the approach of the Italian authorities to combat racism has been effective over the past two decades. Furthermore, the research identifies what form of racism is most common in Italian football and which supporter groups have been involved in most of the racist incidents in the 21th century. The goal of this study is to determine if the Italian Football Federation and the Italian authorities have dealt with racism in Italian football between 2000 and 2018 effectively.Show less
What ontological changes does commercialization make to the relation of the crowd and the game played on the field? In chapter 1, I will use Johan Huizinga's ideas on sport and play from Homo...Show moreWhat ontological changes does commercialization make to the relation of the crowd and the game played on the field? In chapter 1, I will use Johan Huizinga's ideas on sport and play from Homo Ludens to prove that before we can speak of any changes brought about by commercialization, this relation must be accounted for nondualistically. In chapter 2, I will use Gadamer’s non-dualistic ontology of play and spectator that he develops in Truth and Method to prove that the spectator opens a possibility for play to transform into art, where, when the transformation is fully realized, the relation between play and spectator becomes one of “aesthetic non-differentiation”. I will also show that the proof of such a transformation having taken place in the case of football, hinges on a “perception of a meaningful whole” on the part of the spectator. In chapter 3, I will prove the existence of such a perception, by looking at the language of 'justice' surrounding football and I will prove also that these utterances point to a blockage in the transformation. In chapter 4, I will find the source of this blockage in commodification of football and its transformation into a spectacle.Show less
There has always been a correlation between football and violence. However, incidents at football matches lost its spontaneity in the UK during the 1960s, when groups of young supporters started to...Show moreThere has always been a correlation between football and violence. However, incidents at football matches lost its spontaneity in the UK during the 1960s, when groups of young supporters started to organize themselves in groups, giving life to football hooliganism. The advent of European football competitions and the interaction between British supporters and the ones from rest of Europe provoked the spread of football hooliganism. This thesis proposes an analysis of the development of this social phenomenon in four countries: the UK, the Netherlands, Italy, and Spain. In particular, this research will focus on the role that political ideologies have played within hooligans’ groups and will assess the motives for the major presence of politics within the stadiums of countries such as Italy and Spain, and its absence in the UK and the Netherlands.Show less
A research into the role newspapers play in introducing football into the Dutch identity during the golden age of Dutch football, the 1970’s, in which Ajax won the Europa Cup I in ’71, ’72 and ’73...Show moreA research into the role newspapers play in introducing football into the Dutch identity during the golden age of Dutch football, the 1970’s, in which Ajax won the Europa Cup I in ’71, ’72 and ’73 and the Dutch national team came second in the World Cup 1974. Specifically the change in reporting on Ajax between 1965 and 1974 and the Dutch national team between 1970 and 1974, where the football these teams played became branded as typically Dutch: the Dutch School (Hollandse School) an total football (totaalvoetbal). This type of football symbolised the Dutch identity, as several typical Dutch qualities where ‘recognised’ within this football, and after the success, varying non-football related products were promoted with references to these playing styles, implicating they had become part of the Dutch national identity. Another point of view, among several others, was the togetherness Dutch footballing success brought the nation. Newspapers wrote extensively about all provinces being united by Dutch football as well as all kinds of people and professions, ranging from anarchists to the prime minister, being united by the ‘Brilliant Orange’.Show less
