This book explores various social, cultural, political and economic issues through the lenses of various sport mega-events in the twenty-first century, including the Olympic Games, and the World Cup and European Championships in football. In a time where sport mega-events are closely followed by controversies, legacy discourses and questions of their governance, the chapters within this book showcase why sport mega-events continue to ignite important questions for scholars, commentators, fans and sport and political authorities. By covering various topics emerging around sport mega-events such as physical activity, legacies, rhetoric, media coverage, environmental impacts, diplomacy and spectators' experiences, this book breaks new ground as it considers a range of longstanding and emerging socio-political issues relating broadly to the staging of spectacular sport mega-events in the present-day. This is a fascinating reading for students and researchers situated in sociology, sport management, event management, political science, sport studies, sport business, urban studies and leisure studies. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of Sport in Society.

This book examines the political significance of sport and its importance for nation-state building and political and economic transition across thirteen post-Soviet and post-socialist countries, primarily located in Eastern Europe. Adopting a critical case-study approach, building on historical and comparative frameworks, the book uses sport as a symbolic lens through which to examine the transition of Eastern European countries to the Western capitalist system. Covering a wide geographical area, from Poland to the Caucuses and Turkmenistan, it explores key themes such as nationalism, governance, power relations, political ideology, separatism, commercialisation and economic development, and the symbolic value of mega-events. Sport, Statehood and Transition in Europe is fascinating reading for anybody with an interest in sport policy, the politics of sport or political science.

This book examines the political significance of sport and its importance for nation-state building and political and economic transition across thirteen post-Soviet and post-socialist countries, primarily located in Eastern Europe. Adopting a critical case-study approach, building on historical and comparative frameworks, the book uses sport as a symbolic lens through which to examine the transition of Eastern European countries to the Western capitalist system. Covering a wide geographical area, from Poland to the Caucuses and Turkmenistan, it explores key themes such as nationalism, governance, power relations, political ideology, separatism, commercialisation and economic development, and the symbolic value of mega-events. Sport, Statehood and Transition in Europe is fascinating reading for anybody with an interest in sport policy, the politics of sport or political science.

This book serves as a resource for and manifestation of a student-led research-informed approach to learning and teaching in higher education. It represents a novel model of supporting student writing and development. The majority of chapters are mentored and reviewed examples of student writing, as condensed versions of extended research projects, including undergraduate dissertations and masters and PhD theses. Chapters are framed within a Sport Studies context incorporating the key themes of Sport and British Fandom and Sport and International Development. Chapters in the former section relate to football fandom and identity in Wales, rivalry and violence in English football, status in elite British sport, and international football tournaments. Chapters in the latter section focus on a university sporting initiative at a Tibetan Village in India, a futsal-based social involvement programme in a Thai slum, Jewish and Arab integration in Israel via the Football for Peace project, football and the extra-national youths of Thailand and Myanmar, the American soccer coaching industry, and the application of Olympic values in Russia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Football hooliganism has been prevalent in almost every country where the game is played. This has particularly been the case in Britain, where the phenomenon has produced consequences of varying degrees of severity. Many academic investigations have examined the problem by gauging opinions of hooligans and to a lesser extent, the police. The perspectives of the non-violent majority of supporters have been consistently overlooked, yet they often share the same space, rituals and social characteristics as hooligans, and also witness football violence and the processes that instigate and escalate it. This work therefore involved ascertaining the views of non-hooligan supporters who regularly attend matches from eight British teams. This book examines a plethora of related literature and the methodological implications of researching football fandom. Accessing the previously underrepresented perspectives of key fan bases, this work also addresses supporter attitudes towards definitional issues, the severity and causes of the problem, media representation, and the socio- legal and socio-political responses to British football hooliganism.