European football fans’ resistance and protest in the face of legal restrictions: Towards a typology and continued research agenda

Abstract

Scholars have established that European football represents an important domain for protest and resistance. While European football has undergone significant political, economic and social transformations, football supporters have adopted various tools of resistance when faced with these processes. Legal restrictions and security measures imposed on football supporters represent highly contested areas of football. Although existing case studies affirm this, few attempts have been made to organize the various types of fans’ resistance and protest into explorative typologies. Therefore, this article advances a typology of supporters’ resistance tactics and strategies in the face of enhanced regulative mechanisms. Specifically, we unpack fanzines/e-zines/social media, symbols and banners, direct protest and boycott, fan congresses and conferences and linkages with wider movements as resistance tools employed by European supporters. As argued, this typology remains significant as it not solely reveals the breadth and width of fans’ resistance but illustrates the repertoires of strategies adopted by actors contesting what is, ultimately, an effort to control them. Relatedly, this article contributes with a continued research agenda relating to processes of juridification and securitization in football and, broadly, fans’ resistant agency.