Juridification of fandom: dealing with spectators’ expressions of ‘too much joy’ in Swedish football

Abstract

ABSTRACT The essay address different forms of ‘extensive joyfulness’ among football spectators, and the Swedish legal responses to these actions, due to the actions’ classification as pitch invasion and trespassing, in legal terms. The essay presents the legal context, by focusing on external regulation of public order and surveillance as well as internal by-laws dealing with spectator security. By using two cases, from the district court, the essay reflects on the legal systems possibility and relevance in order to react on expressions of ‘too much joy’, as a legal sign of pitch invasion and the disturbance of public order. The analysi focuses on the problems of juridification when the law has to handle various mundane and ‘trivial’ social issues. The argument is that the football management has to amalgamate different forms of ‘extensive joyfulness’, in a discretionary manner, to the logics of entertainment before turning them to legal issues