Surveying Football Fans: Cosmopolitans and Communitarians
摘要
In this chapter, the heterogeneity across football fans is quantitatively investigated to find common patterns across fans regarding their attitudes and behaviour. Based on latent class analysis, different types of football fans are identified who differ significantly regarding their attitudes related to national belonging. They are distinguished as cosmopolitan fans, who attribute little relevance to nationality aspects in football and communitarians, who consider such belonging as relevant. The chapter also analyses which influencing factors matter for these attitudes. Unlike previous work suggests, fandom intensity is not the most relevant factor. Cosmopolitan attitudes are triggered mostly by the degree of internationalisation of a league, positive attitudes towards European unification and especially the degree of Europeanisation of a club’s squad.