Racism In Football: Why are We Still Talking About It?
On the night of 8th December 2020, the football world faced with an another racism act on the pitch. During the UEFA Champions League match between Paris Saint-Germain and Istanbul Basaksehir, the fourth official of the game, Sebastian Coltescu, racially abused Istanbul Basaksehir’s coach, Pierre Webo, resulting the players and staffs of both team walking off and leaving the match to be completed 2 days later, with an entirely new set of officials. This incident isn’t the first racial attack in football industry and definitely it won’t be the last. But in a society where cultural and racial awareness is peaking why are we still talking about racism in football industry? This blog will explore how racism in football industry, specifically in England, can still exist and how do the football elites of the country act in order to tackle racism in the industry?
(Original publish date: December 2020)
Racism is an on-going issue within the sports industry especially in European football. Since the foundation of the Football Association (FA) in 1863, the British football industry and its assorted stakeholders associated with a pattern of whiteness. Likewise, in Italy, the ultras; organized, extremist and politically active supporter groups, are associated with racism and fascism. While the stakeholders of the industry widely echoes with such ideas, it is extremely arduous to combat with racism. Also this white nature of the sport made difficult for Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) people to involve in competitions around Europe.
Lack of Representation
Even though the football industry portrayed as a post-racial, meritocratic and egalitarian space where race no longer matters and where racial inequalities are a thing of the past, the under-representation of BAME people, especially in leadership positions, is still a problem of the industry. Until 1980s, there were only a handful of black footballers such as Arthur Wharton, who is the first black professional football player, and Charlie Williams of the 1950s since football was mostly seen as white working-class men sport and the existence of these players didn’t threaten the racial dominance of white people. However as British-born black players increasingly started to take part in football in early 1980s, most of the white supporters showed their frustration by making monkey noises and throwing bananas to the pitch.
In the 21st century, the number black players significantly increased but the racial abuse by fans still continues. Two of the most recent incidents in Premier League happened in 2018–19 season with one week apart. A Tottenham fan threw a banana to Arsenal player Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang while he celebrates his goal and the following week, Manchester City player Raheem Sterling directly abused by a Chelsea fan during the match. While the diversity increased on the pitch, the lack of representation still continues off the pitch. As of 2020 there are only 6 BAME managers in all of the 92 professional football clubs in England. Also a study by the FA suggests that only 5% of people in leaderships role in England are from BAME background.
Social Media and Racism
With the increased number of online platforms such as fan forums and Twitter, supporters found new mediums to express their opinions. These new platforms allowed racist thoughts to come off the pitch and to flourish online. One of the problems with social media is that the fans can protect their anonymity while expressing their views. Cleland suggests that the opportunity of staying anonymous increased the number of hate speeches across the social platforms. A newly commissioned research by the Professional Footballers’ Association Charity (PFA Charity) and Kick It Out supports Cleland’s opinion. One of the three observations of the study suggests that the targeted abuse of footballers on social media has become normalised. The findings of the study shows that %43 of players who were included in the research experienced targeted and explicitly racist abuse on Twitter. While many of the players exposed to racial abuse on social media platforms, most of them avoid to speak up about it. The authors suggest that players view reporting abuse as a distraction from their main goal, playing football. The aforementioned research also concludes that speaking up for racial abuse creates negative repercussions for players. However, the silence of the players only encourages the racial abuses and players who are reluctant to speak out indirectly tolerate racism.
Tackling Racism
When we look at the preceding statistics and examples, it is crystal clear that racism is still alive in football. So what do the football elites such as the FA and Kick It Out Organisation do to prevent racism? In 1991, Football (Offences) Act 1991 (1991:19) announced by the government which is described as ‘An Act to make further provision with respect to disorderly conduct by persons attending football matches; and for connected purposes.’. In October 2020, the FA introduced a new agenda which supported by over 40 clubs across England to overcome the lack of representation of BEMA people in the industry. According to ‘the Football Leadership Diversity Code’, the 15% of the new hire in senior leadership and team operations roles will be BEMA and 25% of the new hires for coaching jobs will be BEMA. Furthermore, Kick It Out tries to detect racial insults on social media by using AI and reports them to authorities as well as organising grassroots events to educate young people on racism. Also, many of the Premier League clubs started to take action for racial abuses happen in the stadiums. For instance, the aforementioned Chelsea fan was banned from attending home games for life. Furthermore, some incidents were handled by the court. The above mentioned Tottenham fan was handed a four-year football ban and fined £500 by the court. However it’s clear that the current solutions can’t tackle racism at the moment.
The racism in football is far away from being finished. It’s systematic and needs different solutions which should include effective collaboration between institutions, organisations, clubs and governments. If the public’s state-of-mind won’t change, we will still talk about racism in the upcoming years.
