Social Factors Influencing Sport and Violence: On the "Problem" of Football Hooliganism in Germany

In: International review for the sociology of sport: irss ; a quarterly edited on behalf of the International Sociology of Sport Association (ISSA), Band 31, Heft 1, S. 49-66

Abstract

On the basis of the discussion of the everyday lives, violent behavior of hooligans is interpreted as young people's cries for help to society to provide meaning and a future, as survival strategies, a way of getting by in a society which provides scarcely any scope for self-affirmation. Young people's bizarre or violent behavior is a pointer to underlying inequalities, forms of coercion and exaggerated discipline, and its 'positive function' as information must be decodes, taken seriously and, where possible, translated into action by (local) authorities, before these is a rush to treat this behavior exclusively as law-and-order problem. Repressive as well as socio-pedagogical measures do not solve the problem of Hooligans if they aren't imbedded into structural measures improving the everyday lives of young people effectively. Thus Hooligan behavior can be interpreted as "normal" and Hooligans as the "avantgarde" of a new type of identity. As long there are no real changes at the structural level, the possibilities for reducing violence are limited. Hooliganism seem to be the risk of modernization, commercialization and professionalization of sport and society.