Abstract
This chapter illustrates the emotions, tactics, and successful collective mobilization of Swansea City supporters in late 2001 and early 2002 that led to the formation of a Supporters’ Trust. In particular, it focuses on the relationships between people in online and offline space and how these modes of interaction come together when the club’s future was threatened. It then considers some of the challenges now facing the ownership model of the Supporters’ Trust at the club as a result of the takeover of a majority of the shares by an American consortium in 2016.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Alinsky, S. (1971). Rules for Radicals. London: Vintage Books.
Kennedy, D., & Kennedy, P. (2007). Preserving and Extending the Commodification of Football Supporter Relations: A Cultural Economy of Supporters Direct. Sociological Research Online, 12(1). http://www.socresonline.org.uk/12/1/kennedy.html
Weber, M. (2001 [1930]). The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Abingdon: Routledge.
Coleman, J. S. (1990). Rational Organization. Rationality and Society, 2(1), 94–105.
Blumer, H. (1951). Collective Behavior. In A. M. Lee (Ed.), Principles of Sociology. New York: Barnes & Noble.
Bourdieu, P. (1986). The Forms of Capital. In J. E. Richardson (Ed.), Handbook of Theory of Research for the Sociology of Education. London: Greenwood.
Brown, A. (2008). ‘Our Club, Our Rules’: Fan Communities at FC United of Manchester. Soccer and Society, 9(3), 346–358.
Burkitt, I. (2014). Emotions and Social Relations. London: Sage.
Castells, M. (2013 [2009]). Communication Power. Oxford: Blackwell.
Castells, M. (2015 [2012]). Networks of Outrage and Hope: Social Movements in the Internet Age. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Cleland, J. (2010). From Passive to Active: The Changing Relationship Between Football Clubs and Football Supporters. Soccer and Society, 11(5), 537–552.
Cleland, J. (2015a). A Sociology of Football in a Global Context. London: Routledge.
Cleland, J., & Cashmore, E. (2016). ‘Football Fans’ Views of Racism in British Football. International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 51(1), 27–43.
Cleland, J., & Dixon, K. (2015). ‘Black and Whiters’: The Relative Powerlessness of ‘Active’ Supporter Organization Mobility at English Premier League Football Clubs. Soccer and Society, 16(4), 540–554.
Coleman, J. S. (1973). Resources for Social Change. New York: Wiley.
Collins, R. (2004). Interaction Ritual Chains. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Conn, D. (2002 [1997]). The Football Business: The Modern Football Classic. London: Mainstream.
Crossley, N. (2011). Towards Relational Sociology. Abingdon: Routledge.
Crossley, N. (2015a). Relational Sociology and Culture. International Review of Sociology, 25(1), 65–85.
Dunn, C. (2017). The Impact of the Supporters’ Trust Movement on Women’s Feelings and Practices of Their Football Fandom. Soccer and Society, 18(4), 462–475.
Frink, B., & Prinz, J. (2006). Crisis? What Crisis? Football in Germany. Journal of Sports Economics, 7(1), 60–75.
Gamson, W. A. (1990 [1975]). The Strategy of Social Protest. Belmont: Wadsworth.
Garcia, B., & Welford, J. (2015). Supporters and Football Governance, from Customers to Stakeholders: A Literature Review and Agenda for Research. Sport Management Review, 18(4), 517–528.
Giugni, M. G. (1998). The Outcomes of Social Movements: A Review of the Literature. Annual Review of Sociology, 24, 371–393.
Hill, T., Canniford, R., & Millward, P. (2016). Against Modern Football: Mobilizing Protest Movements in Social Media. Sociology. First published online August 9, 2016. https://doi.org/10.1177/0038038516660040
Hirsch, E. L. (1990). Sacrifice for the Cause: Group Processes, Recruitment, and Commitment in a Student Social Movement. American Sociological Review, 55(2), 243–254.
Ibrahim, J. (2015). Bourdieu and Social Movements. Basingstoke: Palgrave.
Jasper, J. M. (1997). The Art of Moral Protest. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Jasper, J. M. (1998). The Emotions of Protest. Sociological Forum, 13, 397–424.
Kiernan, A., & Porter, C. (2014). Little United and the Big Society: Negotiating the Gaps Between Football, Community and the Politics of Inclusion. Soccer & Society, 15(6), 847–863.
Kossakowski, R. (2017). From Communist Fan Clubs to Professional Hooligans: A History of Polish Fandom as a Social Process. Sociology of Sport Journal, 34(3), 281–292.
Kriesi, H., Koopmans, R., Duyvendak, J. W., & Giugni, M. (1995). New Social Movements in Western Europe. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Lomax, B. (2000). Democracy and Fandom: Developing a Supporters’ Trust at Northampton Town FC. Soccer & Society, 1(1), 79–87.
Luhmann, N. (2017 [1979]). Trust and Power. Cambridge: Polity.
Martin, P. (2007). Football, Community and Cooperation: A Critical Analysis of Supporter Trusts in England. Soccer & Society, 8(4), 636–653.
McAdam, D. (1986). Recruitment to High-Risk Activism: The Case of Freedom Summer. American Journal of Sociology, 92(1), 64–90.
McCarthy, J. D., & Zald, M. N. (2001). The Enduring Vitality of the Resource Mobilization Theory of Social Movements. In J. H. Turner (Ed.), Handbook of Sociological Theory: Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research. Boston: Springer.
Michie, J., & Oughton, C. (2005). The Corporate Governance of Professional Football Clubs in England. Corporate Governance: An International Review, 13(4), 517–531.
Millward, P. (2011). The Global Football League: Transnational Networks, Social Movements and Sport in the New Media Age. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Pearson, G. (2012). An Ethnography of English Football Fans: Cans, Cops and Carnivals. Manchester: Manchester University Press.
Porter, C. (2015). Loyal to What? FC United’s ‘Shaping Walk’ Through Football’s ‘Muck of Ages’. Sport in Society, 18(4), 452–465.
Rosie, M., & Gorringe, H. (2009). ‘The Anarchists’ World Cup’: Respectable Protest and Media Panics. Social Movement Studies, 8(1), 35–53.
Smith, C. (2000). Strengthening the Voice of Supporters. Soccer & Society, 1(3), 13–16.
Smithey, L. A. (2009). Social Movement Strategy, Tactics, and Collective Identity. Sociology Compass, 3(4), 658–671.
Sumbler, P. (2013). From Graveyard to Ambition: The Official History of the Swansea City Supporters’ Trust. Stroud: Amberley Publishing.
Sztompka, P. (2003 [1999]). Trust: A Sociological Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Turner, M. (2017). “Football Without Fans Is Nothing”: Contemporary Fan Protests and Resistance Communities in the English Premier League. In R. Elliott (Ed.), The English Premier League: A Socio-Cultural Analysis. New York/Abingdon: Routledge.
Walters, G., & Tacon, R. (2010). Corporate Social Responsibility in Sport: Stakeholder Management in the UK Football Industry. Journal of Management & Organization, 16(4), 566–586.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Cleland, J., Doidge, M., Millward, P., Widdop, P. (2018). Supporters’ Trusts as Collective Action: Swansea City in Focus. In: Collective Action and Football Fandom. Palgrave Studies in Relational Sociology. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-73141-4_5
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-73141-4_5
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-73140-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-73141-4
eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)