Local identities in a global game: the social production of football space in Liverpool

This paper explores the tensions between local identities and the globalization of the English Premier League by presenting a case study of football fandom in Liverpool. Our findings are based on participant observation and numerous interviews in Liverpool, UK. We examine the tensions resulting from reliance on, and resistance to, tourist-based consumption of the game. We use a Lefebvrian theoretical framework that analyses how football spaces in Liverpool are socially and economically produced, and how the supporters’ groups of different teams in the city work to both globalize and glocalize the football culture of the city. We also look at how supporters are attempting to reshape their relationship with football’s current economic and cultural space. As Liverpool increasingly relies on a tourist-based economy with sport as its focus, the relationships between local and distant supporters, their clubs, and other fans are altered.