Using Your Head: Racism and the World Cup

Those of you who follow sports are most likely already familiar with the story: in the final game of this year’s World Cup, French footballer Zinedine Zidane delivered a staggering headbutt to Italian player Marco Materazzi following a brief spat of conversation between the two on the field. Zinedine was red-carded, and without their star player France lost to Italy. Naturally, people began to wonder – what did Materazzi say to Zidane? What was the incendiary comment that led the Frenchman to sacrifice his team’s star player at the very end of the most important match in soccer?

Speculation following the match fixated on the potentially racist nature of Materazzi’s comment. Zidane, born and raised in France, comes from an Algerian parentage – Kabyle, to be exact. But Zidane himself has said recently that while Materazzi had insulted his mother and sister, the Italian’s comments were in fact not of a racist nature. So why leap to the assumption that the comment had been racist? Racism is never very far from the topic of football in Europe. The FIFA (International Federation of Football Association) website expresses a clear concern for how racism manifests itself in the game throughout Europe; Sepp Blatter (the head of FIFA) has even said in the past that if crowds of fans continue to disturb players by chanting racist taunts from the sidelines, games could be called off.

While race and ethnicity has often become a contested subject in sports, both in the US and Europe, there may be something telling in how each conflict reflects a particular context – a specific web of privilege, power, cultural hegemony and politico-economic reality. The racial tension that manifests itself in European football today may embody the larger picture of racism in Europe. And I suggest that this particular manifestation, on the football field, may be worth studying. Why? I’m not entirely sure we, as social scientists, have thoroughly explored the concept of racism in Europe. As an American who researches Muslim legal mobilization in France, I’ve often used the term “racism” in describing certain activities of the far-right; but should I export my American understanding of racism to France? There’s a certain danger here, one that I’ve tried to be sensitive of, but do not have the tools to speak of accurately yet. So I have been asking myself:

1) Does racism come in different varieties? In other words, do different understandings of race and race relations vary from one national context to the next? It may all be the same monster in the end, but does it present itself differently?

2) What kind of analytical purchase would an understanding of racism that is more particular to, say, France, or Germany, give me in answering other questions about social movements? Or in doing comparative work in general? Does it matter that racism looks different, or is understood differently, in different parts of the world?

3) How would I seek to classify or understand “ideal types” of racism, or is that even the approach I would want to use? Might studying one specific area where racism manifests itself – like around football – help me to gain a richer understanding of racism within a particular context?

What are your thoughts on this subject? We’re so careful as scholars to specify the differences between, say, the “political left” in Italy and the US; between “secularism” in France and the US; might “racism” require a more thorough contextualization? Has this already been done, and/or there references out there to help us in doing this or starting such a project?