Soccer, Masculinity, and Violence in Northern Ireland

Abstract

Despite, or arguably because of, the marked decrease in the level of politically motivated violence in Northern Ireland since 1994, greater attention can now be paid to other forms of violence. The article argues that hegemonic masculinity encourages patterned male violence at large and that this was formerly an important element in the persistence of terrorist violence. The latter existed on the same continuum as other manifestations of hegemonic masculinity including the antisocial behavior of certain soccer fans. Specific attention is paid in the article to the relationship between loyalist paramilitary violence and the activities of young Protestant working-class men at soccer games. The two phenomena are revealed as interconnected responses to a crisis of masculinity rooted in economic and political uncertainty.