Marching Altogether? Football Fans Taking a Stand Against Racism

Abstract

This chapter focuses on an anti-racism campaign by a group of fans at Leeds United, and the cultural change it helped to bring about amongst the club’s match-going fans. In describing the campaign and highlighting some of the key issues involved, it hopes to suggest points for consideration by those working not only against racism across a variety of sporting situations, but also against anti-racism generally. In doing so, the chapter is not offering the Leeds fans’ campaign as a ‘model’ of good practice, as there were plenty of limitations and mistakes involved. Indeed, other anti-racist football academic commentators have questioned the Leeds campaign’s focus on the role of organised racist groups, and the consequent style and tone of our campaign materials (Back et al., 2001). These criticisms are analysed and discussed below. Nevertheless, Leeds Fans United Against Racism and Fascism (LFUARAF) was one of the pioneering, locally-based initiatives that have helped transform English football over the past twenty years to a situation where, although there is still much to do, as the work of Kick it Out shows, many of the more positive facets of multicultural Britain are now on display in the stands as well as on the pitch.