Anthony King

Abstract and engaged critique in sociology: onfootball hooliganism

ABSTRACT

This note is a response to a critical review of some of my own work publishedrecently in the British Journal of Sociology but it does not reply to the speci� c criti-cisms made in that article. Rather it addresses the question of what constitutesappropriate critique in sociology by developing a distinction between abstractand engaged criticism.

KEYWORDS: football; hooliganism

In an article published recently in the British Journal of Sociology, Tom Smith(Smith 2000) used the � rst chapter of my book, The End of the Terraces (King1998a) to frame some detailed criticisms of another piece of mine, ‘ThePostmodernity of Football Hooliganism’ (King 1997b) published in thesame journal a few years ago. My responses to Smith’s speci� c criticisms ofmy article are not of general interest and readers of Smith’s piece must, forthe most part, decide for themselves whether his interpretation of my orig-inal piece is credible. However, since Smith’s article is heavily shaped by hisreaction to that � rst chapter of my book, where I mounted an ill-conceivedand sometimes inaccurate critique of the contemporary state of the soci-ology of football, his article raises an important issue; the question of whatconstitutes a valid critical position in sociology. Given the recklessness ofthe chapter, Tom Smith’s hostility to the rest of my work is perhaps under-standable but that initial alienation should not have led him to dismiss it allas conservative or reactionary (Smith 2000: 447). Smith is not the only oneon whom the chapter has had this effect. Perhaps understandably, RichardGiulianotti has similarly pre-judged my work, cryptically referring to me asa ‘young, conservative’ sociologist who produces ‘work that is unworthy ofcitation’ (1999: 170).1 At a very different level, another individual ofunknown and uninferrable identity who seems to have been likewiseangered attempted to undermine my relations with an important research

British Journal of Sociology Vol. No. 52 Issue No. 4 (December 2001) pp. 000–000© 2001 London School of Economics and Political Science ISSN 0007-1315 print/1468-4446 onlinePublished by Routledge Journals, Taylor & Francis Ltd on behalf of the LSEDOI: 10.1080/00071310120084544

contact, a fanzine editor, by bringing to the latter’s attention certain puta-tively pejorative comments on the activities of his peer group which thisindividual wrongly thought I had made in an earlier article (King 1997a).Given the reception of my work following that chapter, it is necessary toexpose the weaknesses of what I wrote in 1998.

The � rst chapter of my book fails and has alienated others because it isan example of abstract criticism. The speci� c claims which I made againstthe writings of various individuals in the � eld – Richard Haynes, SteveRedhead, John Williams, Gary Armstrong and Richard Giulianotti – werederived from a reading of their work from which I had taken certain pas-sages out of context in order to mount a ‘logical’ critique of them. Aspectsof that critique might have been sustainable, but it is easy to extrapolatefrom small sections of text to a position which, while logically coherent,may be misleading because it has detached itself from the wider context ofthese works that gives meaning and validity to these violently amputatedfragments. The chapter in question is a prime example of abstract critiquetaking no account of the social production of these pieces of work and con-veniently selecting phrases which could be interpreted negatively.

Tom Smith points, with justice, to a passage which highlights the abstractcritical position adopted by me in that chapter: ‘The critical standardwhich these sociologists have then been able to apply to the contemporarytransformation of football is determined by the reactionary views of a largebut limited constituency of football’s fandom’ (King 1998a: 13). I havecarried out � eldwork over a number of years largely with male fans andknow many of them personally. Any reading of my empirical analysis ofthese fans – for example, my most recent contribution published in theBritish Journal of Sociology (King 2000) – shows that I do not think they are‘reactionary’, although some individuals in the group may sometimesadopt reactionary positions. Rather, my analysis of masculine fans hasattempted to adopt an ‘engaged’ critical position, where some of theirstrategies to resist the commercialization of football can be understoodcritically from a sympathetic perspective which highlights the social originsof these views and their political importance. Thus, I have argued thatwhen masculine fans at Manchester United claim that they are the tra-ditional bedrock of the club’s support and that, when football loses favourwith the new fans, it will be in serious jeopardy having alienated them as itsbedrock, they are, in fact, inventing a tradition for themselves (King 1998a:162–6). I maintain that this argument is not an empirically sustainable wayof looking at either the future or the history of football fandom, but I alsoemphasize that this ‘invention of tradition’ is crucial to the creation of thisnewly self-conscious and politically active group of masculine fans. Theinvented tradition may not be factually accurate in its depiction of the pastor the future, but it embodies new common memories and understandingsand is thus critical to the coherence of this group. Consequently, the useof the term ‘invented tradition’ or ‘imagined community’ to describe thesefans in the 1990s should not be interpreted as claiming that they are a

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specious social group whose political claims can therefore be dismissed.2

Rather, the notion of invented tradition highlights the actual process bywhich this group has come into being. Despite its appeals to a working-classtradition, this group’s formation is not primarily determined by objectiveand prior social facts such a class location but rather the group arises outof the frequent interaction of quite socially diverse individuals at footballgames. Following these interactions in which these individuals come torecognize each other and form relations with each other, appeals tonotions of ‘tradition’, ‘the working class’ and ‘Manchester’ become the keyways in which a common identity between them is established and thegroup comes into being. The putatively long-standing traditions to whichfans appeal, in fact, refers to the practices of those individuals who are cur-rently present in this group (whatever their social origins and history ofsupport) and the appeal to tradition serves to highlight their shared con-temporary experiences and understandings. The group is genuine but, associologists, we can recognize the valid social role which an invented tra-dition plays without having to accept that tradition as historically accurate.All social groups arise and sustain themselves in this way and, consequently,this newly self-conscious group of masculine fans is as real as any othersocial group. In the ‘abstract’ criticisms of the � rst chapter of my book, the‘engaged’ criticism of my broader empirical work, in which the socialcontext is highlighted and ambiguities are emphasized, is � attened toreductive ex cathedra decrees. Ironically, not only does this abstract criti-cism, misrepresent the work of others by ignoring wider realities and theprocess of social production but, as the passage highlighted by Tom Smithreveals, it also misrepresents my own attempts to be an engaged critic.

When a sociologist successfully adopts a position of ‘engaged’ criticism,that does not mean all errors have thereby been eliminated. Even whenanalysis is thoroughly embedded within the social and historic context ofthe research, errors of interpretation can be made. The differencebetween abstract and engaged criticism is not therefore that the latter isalways correct where the former is always wrong. Rather the key differencebetween the two stances lies in an attitude to evidence and interpretation.While abstract criticism is certain of its � ndings because they are derivedfrom a linear logic, engaged criticism offers provisional interpretationsgrounded in a dialectical reconsideration of new evidence and views. Theinterpretations produced by engaged critique are not mere fancies, to beeasily dismissed. On the contrary, since they arise out of deep knowledgeof the social context and make readings in the light of this context, they arelikely to be more rigorous and therefore more durable. However, engage-ment with a particular social � eld ensures that engaged critics are aware oftheir own social position and their views remain open to revision. Thus, myown work on football fans attempts to make a sustainable interpretation ofcontemporary football culture while recognizing its own limitations and itis concerned about its political effects on the fans who are discussed.Abstract criticism ignores its own social production and its relationship

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with those it submits to logical critique. It is often unaware of its effects,merely passing judgment on distant objects. It is wrong because it is socertain that it is right.

Ironically, Tom Smith’s article runs the risk of falling into a similar errorof abstract criticism. By ignoring my empirical work with football fans,Smith is able to imply that I have a reactionary political attitude to football(Smith 2000: 447,460) and to claim that I have ‘a negative attitude towardsthese [masculine] supporters’ (Smith 2000: 448) because I myself belongto the group I de� ne as ‘new consumer fans’ (Smith 2000: 447). Beyondthe misleading adjective in the � rst chapter of my book, Smith presents noevidence to support these claims, though various positions which I havenever adopted are imputed to me by him (e.g. Smith 2000: 445, 448, 453,454, 455–6, 458–9).3 A typical misinterpretation occurs when, apparently‘for the sake of brevity’, Smith turns my neutral phrase, ‘masculine vision’,into the deliberately pejorative and tendentious ‘aggressive chauvinism’(Smith 2000: 449) for which term I am then berated by him, although Ihave, in fact, never used that phrase nor adopted the stance implied by it.Smith descends into abstract critique because his reading of the articlewrongly assumes that since I cite the works of Theweleit (1987) and Mosse(1985), the purpose of the piece is to demonstrate the fascism of masculinefans. In fact, my intention was to outline the broad contours of the kind ofmasculinity hegemonic in modernity in order to highlight the post-1960semergence of a new ‘postmodern’ masculinity through the empiricalexample of hooliganism. Smith’s abstract critique eventually reaches itsclimax in the conclusion of his article, when Smith notes that I haveemployed some of Heidegger’s writings in a discussion of Baudrillard’slater work (King 1998b). Smith then notes that Heidegger was a well-known Nazi-sympathizer and concludes: ‘King does not mention this issue– despite its importance – therefore it is reasonable to assume that heshares one of those stances which seeks to downplay the signi� cance of thisconnection’ (Smith 2000: 459–460). The exact import of this sentence(and the wider paragraph) is obscure but it seems to imply that my failureto discuss Heidegger’s Nazism demonstrates self-evidently dubious politicalmotives on my behalf which invalidate my research on masculine fans. Thisis an example of how abstract critique re� ects only the prejudices of thecritics and says nothing of those whom they attack.

C. L. R. James prefaced his famous work on Caribbean cricket with thisecho of Kipling: ‘What do they know of cricket who only cricket know?’( James 1963).4 European football has undergone profound transform-ations since the 1990s, establishing itself as a genuinely transnational ritualat the heart of the New Europe. In the light of this, James’ and Kipling’sphrase may be appositely altered as an aphorism for British sociology at theMillennium; ‘What do they know of Europe, who nothing of Europeanfootball know’. Given European football’s manifest signi� cance as a totalsocial fact, comprising economic, social, political and cultural elements, itis becoming ever more important that sociologists recognize the centrality

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of football – and sport more generally – to Europe’s future. The sociologyof football, hitherto often dismissed as a minor sub-discipline, can make aserious contribution to research at both the empirical and theoreticallevels. That contribution is likely to be most effective if individuals whowork together in this �eld observed mutually supportive standards of thehighest ethical and intellectual quality. The culture of confrontationwhich, as Tom Smith correctly notes, has characterized this � eld for over adecade (Smith 2000: 444), needs to be replaced by a more constructive, co-operative approach. A parallel development may be taking place withinfootball itself, where struggles for status between the hooligan groups havebecome less important than the activities of politically progressive bodieslike the Independent Supporters’ Associations, many of which are organ-ized or supported by former hooligans. I certainly hope that my exampleof abstract criticism in the � rst chapter of The End of the Terraces was an aca-demic re� ection of the crisis of English football in the 1980s, with which itwas partly concerned. Like that crisis in football, the current crisis in thesociology of football necessitates a transformation in style, content andstandards. In the light of this, Lord Justice Taylor’s famous words about theneed for a renewal of English football in the 1990s might well be appliedto areas beyond those he intended: ‘What is required is the vision andimagination to achieve a new ethos in football’ (Taylor 1990: 12). The newethos in the sociology of football should be characterized by engaged, notabstract, critique.

(Date accepted: March 2001) Anthony KingDepartment of Sociology

University of Exeter.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am extremely grateful to Keith Hart for his comments on an earlier draftof this note.

NOTES

Abstract and engaged critique in sociology: on football hooliganism 711

1. Given that Richard Giulianotti doesnot cite any of my work, it is clear that he isreferring to me here.

2. In his recent work on Millwall fans,Garry Robson has mounted what seems tobe a veiled critique of my work framing hisanalysis of these fans against notions of‘invented traditions’ and ‘imagined com-munities’ which I employed but withoutexplicitly citing my work (e.g. Robson2000: ix, 7). Interestingly, despite its

avowed attempt to identify an essentialistand objective core to Millwall’s supportingculture which is not ‘invented’ (Robson2000: 26, 41, 46, 47, 57, 76), one of themost striking � ndings of his work is thatthe authentic local, working class cultureto which the fans frequently appeal doesnot re� ect the now diverse geographicaland social locations of its members (e.g.Robson 2000: 132, 148, 151). The studysupports rather than undermines my

arguments about the significance ofinvented traditions to the creation andrecreation of these fan groups.

3. Although Smith fails to understandthe concept of an imaginary connection(Smith 2000: 455–6), I accept the error ofreferencing to which Smith points (2000:455) and his broad argument (2000:454–8) that more evidence is required toprove the link which violent fans some-times make in their imaginations betweenthe excitement of sex and violence, thoughit should be noted that such evidence isavailable (e.g Williams et al. 1990: xlii;Dunning 1999: 147).

4. Kipling’s original referred to‘England’ rather than ‘cricket’.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Dunning. E. 1999 Sport Matters, London:Routledge.Giulianotti, R. 1999 Football: A Sociology ofthe Global Game, Cambridge Polity.James, C. L. R. 1963 Beyond a Boundary,Hutchinson: LondonKing, A. 1997a ‘The Lads: masculinity andthe new consumption of football’ Sociology31(2): 329–46.

—— 1997b ‘The Postmodernity of Foot-ball Hooliganism’, British Journal of Soci-ology 48(4): 576–46.—— 1998a The End of the Terraces. London:Leicester University Press.—— 1998b ‘A Critique of Baudrillard’sHyperreality: towards a sociology of post-modernism’, Philosophy and Social Criticism24(6): 47–66.—— 2000 ‘Football and Post-NationalIdentity in the New Europe’, British Journalof Sociology 51(3): 419–42.Mosse, G. 1985 Nationalism and Sexuality.Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin.Robson, G. 2000 No One Likes Us, We Don’tCare: The Myth and Reality of MillwallFandom, Oxford: Berg.Smith, T. 2000 ‘Bataille’s Boys: Postmoder-nity, Fascists and Football Fans’, BritishJournal of Sociology 51(3): 443–60.Taylor, Lord Justice P. 1990 The Hillsbor-ough Stadium Disaster, 15 April 1989: FinalReport. London HMSO.Theweleit, K. 1987 Male Fantasies, Vol I:Women, Floods, Bodies, History, Cambridge:Polity.Williams, J., Dunning. E. and Murphy, P.1990 Hooligans Abroad. London: Rout-ledge.

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