Football: Society, communities and the beautiful game – Eastminster: a global politics & policy blog

Qatar 2022: the world’s most autocratic World Cup venue?

November 18, 2022November 18, 2022 by Pierre Bocquillon

Pierre Bocquillon

Football fans face a moral quandary. Do they avidly follow the World Cup? Or boycott and stay away? The FIFA World Cup is one of the most anticipated sporting events in the world. But it is also being held in a country where serious concerns have been raised about human…

Pep Guardiola and the long tradition of mixing football with politics

May 8, 2018July 3, 2018 by Admin

Admin

As manager of Manchester City, this season Pep Guardiola has won the Premier League and the Carabao Cup. By wearing a yellow ribbon on his chest, he has also been charged and fined £20,000 by the English Football Association (FA) for “wearing a political message”. Guardiola insists the ribbon does…

Footballers are role models when it comes to being good at football. Everything else is just noise.

April 6, 2016April 6, 2016 by Editor

Editor

Young people aren't likely to emulate how professional footballers behave- except when it comes to their skills on the pitch, argues Michael Skey. The use of the term role model in relation to professional footballers has increased quite noticeably over the past 15 years, with five mentions in 2000 and…

The lack of commitment from…players is frustrating: Football, Community and Time

March 14, 2016 by Editor

Editor

Recent debates around community have tended to focus on questions of place, that is the shift from the local to the trans-national, virtual or global. As Michael Skey argues, this emphasis sometimes overlooks the extent to which any form of community requires on-going effort and commitment and therefore neglects the…

Are elite football community programmes part of the ‘new philanthropy’

December 21, 2015February 22, 2016 by Editor

Editor

Are elite football community programmes part of the 'new philanthropy' asks Dr. Michael Skey. Recently, academics and others have began to note the emergence of new forms of philanthropy, often involving ‘entrepreneurs’ who made their fortunes working in finance, IT and the media. [caption id="attachment_2088" align="alignright" width="300"] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/67/Charity_football_match_Legia_-_Den_Haag_3.JPG/1024px-Charity_football_match_Legia_-_Den_Haag_3.JPG[/caption]According to the…

The more things change…..

December 21, 2015January 11, 2016 by Editor

Editor

'After supporting the team through the good times and bad times, we are told to mind our own affairs' 'Surely we supporters are entitled to some say in the government of the game we support, and surely it's not asking too much that those in authority should answer their critics'.…

The place of football in the community

December 15, 2015January 11, 2016 by Editor

Editor

Michael Skey raises some interesting questions around the place of the sport in local, national and global communities The recent obituaries for Brian Lomax, the man who drove the movement to involve football fans in the running of 'their' clubs through supporters' trusts, once again raised some interesting questions around…

The Lost Soul of the Beautiful Game?

December 8, 2015December 8, 2015 by Editor

Editor

I’ve just finished reading Lee Price’s book ‘Turning my back on the Premier League‘. In it, Price, a long-term Manchester United fan, recounts his experience of following the English League 2 side Dagenham & Redbridge after becoming disillusioned with the hyperbole and spiraling budgets of the Premier League. It’s a…