Gangsters Paradise: How soccer has become more than a sport - Amar Parikh

One thing I have come to learn about soccer is how the culture of a certain cub is shaped based on the supporters. The thing about soccer is that it has a lot of political/racial/social aspects within the various clubs and the rivalries with opposing clubs. In chapter 1 The Gangster’s Paradise Foer talks about his experience with the Red Star fan club called The Ultra Bad Boy and how their image boosted Serbian nationalism during the 1990s. The image of the club has become tainted do to violent fans committing acts of hooliganism.

In soccer, their fans known as ultras, which are, die hard fans showing their support with flares and banners during games. These fans are unfortunately also known for their violence towards opposite fans. The Heysel stadium disaster was an incident that occurred in Belgium in which Liverpool supporters broke a fence and pushed it up against Juventus supporters essentially crushing them. This incident caused a huge uproar within the British media because British hooliganism was already an issue both in the UK and aboard. This incident causes all British teams to be banned from all European tournaments indefinitely, which would later be uplifted in 3 years.

 Soccer is a sport in which clubs can become aligned with the idea of a certain movement. An example of this is the rivalry of Real Madrid and FC Barcelona, dubbed the El Clasico (the classic) is arguably the biggest rivalry ever seen in sports. From the outside it may seem like it is just a sports rivalry however, there is a lot of political tension between the two teams and their fans. The region of Catalonia where Barcelona is located has strong sense Catalanism. They oppose Real Madrid who aligned themselves with Spanish nationalism. During the Spanish civil war dictator Francisco Franco banned all regional languages and culture in favor of a uniform Spanish identity. This threatens to destroy Catalonian culture and many of its citizens were heavily opposed to Franco’s movement. This very oppression has caused the Catalonian citizens to have great pride in FC Barcelona because it represents the very idea of Catalonian culture and heritage.

This tension between two teams can also be seen in the international game as well. During the Falkland War there was territorial dispute between the UK and Argentina over the Falkland Island. Four years after the war England and Argentina played in a knockout match of the world cup in which Diego Maradona scored the “hand of god”.  This angered many English fans because of the obvious handball but it was never called. Fans saw this as a form of revenge because the British won the war and left the Argentinians embarrassed.

            World soccer shows up that a club can be more than a club for a group of individuals. Their identity and ideology can be expressed by the club and gives their supporters a sense of pride. Soccer rivalries can expresses political rivalries, ethnic rivalries, and even religious rivalries. As long as there is opposition in race/religion/politics there will be opposition in soccer.  

Foer, Franklin. How Soccer Explains the World: An Unlikely Theory of Globalization. New York: HarperCollins, 2004. Print.

Ellie Silverman Blog Post 4

Media coverage of the Holocaust, influence on globalization


Over the summer I traveled with this university’s Hillel on a trip to Poland to learn about the past, present and future of Jewish life. We walked around the area that used to host the Warsaw Ghetto, the largest of all the Jewish ghettos in Nazi-occupied Europe where over 4000,000 Jews resided in the 4.3km area. Many of these people were sent to the Treblinka extermination camp in 1942 where they faced a certain death. We also walked the grounds of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the German concentration camp that became the largest site for the mass extermination of Jews. More than 1,100,000 lives were lost there.

Learning about the mass extermination of a group or “race” of people is one thing. But traveling to Poland, seeing the places you read about in texts books and visiting the nearby towns that were once largely occupied by Jews and now have no Jewish residents – well that’s something else. I could not comprehend how those people, who were not Jewish, living in these towns, could idly stand by why this injustice was occurring. Moreover, I could not understand how a camp as large as Auschwitz-Birkenau continued to exist for so long without international intervention. In past lectures we have discussed the concept of globalization and how it includes the flow and spread of ideas across nations. This can be applied to how anti-Semitism was spread during World War II and other times throughout history. The New York Times, one of the most widely read and respected papers, did not help in spreading accurate news during this time.


Among “all the news that’s fit to print” on the front page of one of the most widely and influential newspapers in the U.S. on July 2, 1942 the only stories on World War II involve British fleets in Alexandria, conflicts in Egypt and the Nazi’s capture of Russia’s Black Sea naval base. Buried on page six is a story on a proposal that reported the “slaughter of 700,000 Jews in German-occupied territories.” This is one-fifth of the entire Jewish population of Poland, the story reported. The article highlighted certain aspects of the report, including that “children in orphanages, old persons in almshouses, the sick in hospitals and women were slain in the streets.” At the very bottom of the story on page six, it is reported that gas chambers were being used to murder Jews and that about 35,000 Jews were gassed daily in Lodz between Jan. 2 and Jan. 9. The fact that the Nazi’s are mass exterminating people in camps and gas chambers should have been the headline on the front-page of the New York Times and every media outlet across the country.


Reading the New York Times in 1942 would not have given Americans the information they needed to realize the Holocaust was taking place. Yes, information regarding the mass extermination of Jews was in the paper, but it was buried in a side column on page six. News outlets are supposed to be gatekeepers and agenda-setters as well as framing a story to correctly portray its newsworthiness to readers, viewers or listeners. Placing this story on page six diminished its importance and did not follow any of the following roles the New York Times is supposed to fulfill.


Even after World War II, the founding of Israel and the spread of Jews to countries outside of Europe, Foer points out that Jews never fully became accepted within globalization. When looking at this one case study, it does not surprise me that Foer said that anti-Semitism is still prevalent in today’s society stating that is as “pervasive as it has ever been,” (Foer, 71).

Journalism is just one median to spread ideas, but it is still a powerful one that can influence the effects of globalization in terms of sharing ideas and promoting positive interactions.

Karla Perez

Corruption: A Negative Effect of Globalization

In “How Soccer Explains the World” Franklin Foer argues that globalization has had no effect on positively changing or eradicating corruption at the local level in under-developed countries. Globalization’s benefits are prominent in developed nations with strong financial and government structures. In developing nations that become more involved in the world economy with significantly weaker institutions however, globalization leads to corruption within these already weak institutions.

            Already existing corruption is only entrenched and “undermines the potential benefits of globalization” in undeveloped or developing nations. This corruption only further pushes away foreign investment and chases away any additional capital that could enter these states. This could be seen as a significant reason for why developing nations are left behind as a cause of globalization, the relation between globalization and corruption is increasingly tied to this observation. The known corruption of these nations often times affects the foreign aid that these developing nations receive as well, only adding more strain to their economic situation. An example of this is seen in many African countries like Uganda in which conducted study showed that only twenty seven cents of every dollar donated to the country for education actually went to the cause. Unfortunately the bulk of such aid and donation was invested into local political purposes. While donations are being skimmed by corrupt politicians and elites of such countries, the overall economic prosperity of the nation declines and the corruption remains the same.

            Corruption is an issue within the legal systems of under developed nations. Some argue that this corruption enables more income distribution however the flaws are far more detrimental to the overall condition of these countries. The main small-scale and local corruption of officers that accept bribes when issuing tickets propagates and continues to support the large scale level corruption of multibillion dollar organizations. This essentially creates a culture of crime and corruption within these organizations and their entire nations as well. (http://yourknowledge.hubpages.com/hub/Negative-Effects-of-Globalization-Corruption)

           Globalization can obviously have many benefits, but the distinction of its effects is clear between developed and developing nations. Corruption is definitely among the most signaled negative effects of globalization among under-developed nations because the weak institutions within these nations become an easy breeding ground for the corruption to occur in the first place.