The Contestation of Identities and Communities in German Football

Abstract

Germany’s top football division, the Bundesliga, is often praised for reasonable ticket prices, the preservation of a passionate fan culture and the high quality of its football stadiums. The Bundesliga clubs are frequently commended for being more inclusive than the equivalent leagues in other European countries and for allowing a notable degree of participatory democracy of local fan communities. However, what these reports tend to ignore is that these qualities are not the result of the benevolence of football clubs and their directors but the out- come of many struggles between different stakeholders, in particularly grass-roots supporters and the football authorities. At the heart of these conflicts are, as this chapter intends to show, usually ownership and identity issues that are interconnected and largely interdependent.