Football and Social Identity: The Case of Hungary in the Twentieth Century

Radical right populist politics in Hungary: Reinventing the Magyars through sport

“…Another example of the football-politics connection is the celebratory government voices that were present when, after a 30-year gap in international football achievements, the Hungarian national team qualified for the 2016 European Championship (Molnar and Doczi, in press). Such explicit attempts to associate the successes of Hungary's footballing representatives with the nation's political leadership, thus, continues a long-established pattern from political leaders who wish to gain political capital from sport (Allison, 2000;Bairner, 2001Bairner, , 2015Hadas, 2000;Hoberman, 1984;Houlihan, 1994).…”

“…Switching attention from the international to the domestic level of political operation, sport’s mass appeal within a given nation also presents an opportunity for politicians to bolster their electoral support. In the European context, the primary vehicle for domestic political appropriation is football, with the pre-existence of strong fan cultures and identities for football clubs offering scope for political actors to align their political beliefs with those influential fan groups (Hadas, 2000; Kassimeris, 2011b; Scalia, 2009; Thangaraj et al, 2018). For example, Scalia’s (2009) analysis of the interconnection between football and politics in Italy contends that football clubs have been used by contemporary Italian politicians as a ‘branch of their patronage machine’ (2009: 48), which for some clubs has led to an alignment with extreme right-wing political causes.…”

‘Glocal’ processes in peripheral football countries: a figurational sociological comparison of Finland and Hungary

“…"The communist regime tried to deprive the teams of their earlier semantic contents, material bases, and often, of their fans". 107 The political system used football "to symbolize their cultural and societal equality or superiority to Western cultures" 108 and utilized it as a tool for legitimacy. However, at the same time it worked as a form of national resistance against the ruling system as well, for instance at Hungarian-Soviet matches, 109 and following the football World Cup final which concluded with a defeat against West Germany in 1954, which resulted in a disturbance by disappointed fans.…”

Football and national power: a theoretical framework applied to China and Argentina

“…While it is true that a number of scholars have ventured into the sociological study of football -especially since the construction of national representations and identities (HADAS, 2000;MARSCHIK, 2001;BRAD-LEY, 2002;KARUSH, 2003;DARBY, 2013) -there are relatively few studies that come from International Relations (EISENBERG, 2006b), that is, from an optic considering States, international organizations and multinational corporations as fundamental players in this global sport. It is argued here that football is a phenomenon that merits further examination from International Relations (IR), not only because of its growing importance in world affairs but also because it is an activity that paradoxically fosters globalization, regionalism and nationalism simultaneously.…”