Framing radicalization and Muslim communities in French sports: political and media discourses

This article examines how political, media, and policy discourses construct radicalization in relation to Muslim participation in sport in France. Drawing on framing theory and a qualitative content analysis of press coverage, parliamentary debates, and policy documents published between 2015 and 2024, it explores how sport becomes a site where concerns about security, identity, citizenship, and national cohesion are articulated. Situating these debates within the history of French approaches to Islam, integration, and security, the study identifies three frames: sport as a security risk, Muslim visibility as a marker of radicalization, and sport clubs as spaces of surveillance and governance. Together, these frames advance securitization through which ordinary sporting practices and expressions of Muslim identity become objects of suspicion, regulation, and intervention. Rather than treating radicalization as fixed, the article shows how it is discursively produced and mobilized as a contested category shaping the governance of Muslim participation in sport.