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Football, Fascism and Fandom The UltraS of Italian Football Alberto Testa and Gary Armstrong Published by A&C Black Publishers Ltd, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square London WC1B 3DP www.bloomsbury.com Copyright © 2010 Alberto Testa and Gary Armstrong ISBN (print): 978 1 4081 2371 3 ISBN (e-pub): 978 1 4081 3262 3 ISBN (e-pdf): 978 1 4081 6607 9 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means – graphic, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or information storage and retrieval systems – without the prior permission in writing of the publishers. Alberto Testa and Gary Armstrong have asserted their rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identifi ed as the authors of this work. A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Note: throughout the book players and offi cials are referred to as ‘he’. This should, of course, be taken to mean ‘he or she’ where applicable. Acknowledgements Cover photograph © Shutterstock Inside photographs © Getty Images/PA Images/Colorsport Designed by James Watson Commissioned by Charlotte Croft Edited by David Pearson CONTENTS Foreword by Professor Nicola Porro v Acknowledgements xiii Introduction 1 01 Chains of Meaning 13 02 The Set-Up 17 03 The Stadio Olimpico and its Heroes 29 04 Rome and Glory 43 05 ‘Dare, Believe, Be Reckless’ 55 06 An Emerging Social Movement? 69 07 Political Ideology and the UltraS 87 08 UltraS Society 105 09 ‘True’ UltraS and the Modern World 119 10 The ‘Warrior Spirit’ 135 11 Race and the Fatherland 153 12 The Italian Media and the UltraS 171 13 The Enemy 185 14 Rising Sons? 207 Appendix: Other studies of UltraS and ultrá 217 References 223 Index 235 iii AT: To my Mum with love. GA: In memory of Eduardo Archetti whose wisdom, generosity and humanity made him exceptional. FOREWORD This is an important book, the merit of which lies in the authors’ abil- ities to present the signifi cance of the trilogy that is Italian football fandom, the prevalence of nostalgia for fascism, and the socio-political history of the Italian capital city of Rome. Unique in its depth of ethno- graphic detail, the text provides testimonies from some of the main proponents of a particular manifestation of contemporary Italian neo- fascism, a political phenomenon that has attracted much commentary but very little by way of fi rst-hand evidence as to how it is sustained and operates. The authors present to a reader the iconic artefacts produced by two neo-fascist football fan groups, and offer explanations for such groups’ persistence and transformation. The main analysis specifi cally focuses on the collective sense of identity – and its concomitant moral coda – created and sustained by the supporters of Rome’s two largest football clubs, AS Roma and SS Lazio. These groupings remind us of what American political scientist Benedict Anderson termed ‘imagined communities’. Such entities – similar to football fans the world over – are characterised by the dynamics of who’s in and who isn’t. This dichotomy operates primarily at the local level and demarcates those who can and cannot join such gatherings. But a similar notion of distinction has resonance at the national level and affects Italian football loyalties nation-wide. This has produced a labyrinth of football fan alliances and confl icts, which in recent years has taken on a political dimension. As the authors illus- trate, the sense of a specifi cally football-related neo-fascist notion of community draws on sophisticated means of communication via fanzines, websites and radio broadcasts. Central to these processes is both an ideological and iconic resonance that admires and promotes a belief system that locates its origins in Ancient Rome and is synonymous with the First Republic era of Benito Mussolini. Many ‘ordinary’ Italians consider the pre-1938 fascist adminis- tration as a model of good governance. The same people, however, are quick to deny the racial laws enacted by Mussolini or explain away his alliance with Hitler’s Nazi regime. That such opinions can be articu- lated without embarrassment may refl ect the political cleansing that has been conferred on the past by the government of Silvio Berlusconi. The v Football, Fascism and Fandom Premier has relied on other elected members whose politics are of the far-right – none more so than Gianfranco Fini, former President of Alleanza Nazionale (AN), a political party that grew out of of the neo- fascist Movimento Sociale Italiano (MSI). Fini’s AN merged in March 2009 with the Forza Italia movement to constitute the centre-right Partito delle Liberta (PDL, Party of Freedom) to create a government under the Presidency of Silvio Berlusconi. Fini is now President of the Chamber of Deputies. With a philosophy embedded in the 2000-year-old ideals of civili- sation and democracy, these ideas and the sentiments of the overtly fascist far-right (be they via the formal Party apparatus or via the extra- parliamentary movements) presents the Italian state with a real problem. A rhetoric of hatred underpins much of the neo-fascist proclamations. Opposing such sentiment is not straightforward. Its appeal is not to an identifi able demographic; some sympathisers are ‘well-to-do’, others exist in run-down neighbourhoods and live cheek-by-jowl with immi- grant peoples. The latter populations suffer discrimination and violence, and note the failure of the Italian populace to condemn the neo-fascists in its midst. Over the past decade a sense of hysteria around the ‘foreigner’ has been built up around the incomers’ assumed propensity to drug-dealing, illegal occupation of premises and violence against women. In this ecology of fear, a sense of mission has been articulated by the Italian far-right which has seduced many. The tough talk and public displays of fascist symbolism have become the armour assumed by many who speak of the need for some form of urban resistance and national renewal. Statistically, however, Rome remains one of the safest cities in Europe. Fascism still fascinates millions of Italians. In 2005, some 50 years after the death of the Italian fascist dictator Benito Mussolini, Italian state television broadcast a documentary titled Combat Film which showed footage of Italy taken by Allied forces during the Second World War. Amid these archives was the day following the execution of Mussolini.Viewers saw the body of the man known to his co-patriots as Il Duce (the Leader) lying alongside his similarly executed mistress, Claretta Petacci. The broadcast attracted an audience percentage hitherto unprecedented for such a broadcasting genre. This provoked vi Foreword social scientist Robert Ventresca to state: ‘In death, as in life, Musso- lini’s fi gure exerts an unmistakable infl uence on the Italian imagination and in politics, galvanizing the public interest as few historical fi gures can.’ After more than fi ve decades Mussolini’s ghost is still rattling its chains in 21st century Italy. His legacy remains very evident in one of Italy’s most popular cultural practices: Il Calcio (football). The past holds a fascination for both the politically inspired and the devout football follower. This symbiosis has produced a highly politi- cised fandom in Italy. The soccer curve (terraces), including those of Rome, represent in 21st-century Italy the epicentre of a football supporter subculture inspired by fascism. That a place breathtaking in its beauty and referred to by many commentators as The Eternal City is centrally involved in such dynamics should not come as a surprise. As the bureaucratic capital of the Italian state, Rome was re-born during the years of Mussolini’s rule and was to provide the most spectacular backdrop to the celebrations of the fascist regime. Celebrations are evident today, albeit on a lesser scale and mainly in the city’s Olympic Stadium which hosts both AS Roma and SS Lazio. In the 1990s, as Italy experienced the transition from the First to the Second Republic, neo- fascist sentiments were expressed more frequently in the AS Roma curve. Hitherto such words and actions had been the preserve of fans of SS Lazio. For the next decade one could witness these long-standing Roman rivals newly affi liated by a shared neo-fascist ideology: fascist sentiment trumped football loyalty. The two clubs have proud histories and attract large followings. That said Rome had never been the capital of Italian football; the clubs of Milan and Turin have always over- shadowed it. This reality has almost metaphorical qualities. The capital is considered by those in the North as parasitic, bureaucratic and prone to Mediterranean vices. By contrast, the northerners consider them- selves astute and business-like. The game in Italy thus dramatises the ongoing and ever-incomplete unifi cation of Italy. Some remember that, unlike the northern cities, Rome did not see the mass mobilisation of its populace resist the fascist regime. Its people, however, were later involved in heroic acts of resistance to the occu- pying Nazis. Commentators note how Rome and its surrounding regions have long expressed a nostalgia for fascism in a variety of forms and its vii Football, Fascism and Fandom electorate has voted for fascist candidates far and above national averages. Football has never been inoculated from such sentiment. The fi rst league championship won by AS Roma in 1942 was awarded amid suspicion that Mussolini had obtained favours in high places which benefi tted the club. Such details go some way to explaining the synthesis evident in this text between football fandom and the language and values of neo-fascism. The youthful revolutions of 1960s and 70s Italy, with their concomitant radical left idealism, saw their utopian visions opposed in Rome more than anywhere else in the country. The main opponents were neo-fascist sympathisers. Rome might be the epicentre of neo- fascist fandom, but it is not alone. In June 2009 the Italian Supreme Court judged the leader of Verona UltraS under the Mancini Laws which punished incitement to racial and ideological violence. The same man had convictions going back 20 years. Italian sports journalist Corrado Zunino has written of what he termed the ‘secret fascination’ of Italian football with fascism. The facts speak for themselves. In October 2008, Christian Abbiati, the goalkeeper of AC Milan and the Italian national side, was revealed to be an associate of the Milan-based neo-fascist gathering, Black Heart. When asked to explain his association to the group, he replied: ‘I share the fascist ideals of fatherland, the ideals of the Catholic religion and the ability to retain order in society.’ The 2006 World Cup winning Italian goalkeeper, Gianluigi Buffon, once appeared in Rome’s Olympic Stadium with the number 88 on the back of his jersey. The number is used as a code of identifi cation among neo-Nazis; H is the 8th letter of the alphabet, so 88 is taken to stand for HH which in turn means ‘Heil Hitler’, the proclamation of the Waffen SS. Ignoring the outrage of Italian Jews, Buffon later wore a T-shirt bearing the phrase ‘Boia Chi Molla’ (‘To Hell those who give up’). During the 2006 victory parade in Rome the same man posed in front of a statue bearing the Celtic cross (a symbol with neo-fascist resonance) and the words ‘Fiero Di Essere Italiano’ (‘Proud to be Italian’). The captain of the Italian national team, Fabio Cannavaro, held aloft an Italian fl ag bearing a fascist symbol while plying his trade in Madrid. In 2007 he lent his name to radio adverts for Eva Perón summer camps run by the Italian radical right. And so it goes on. AS Roma midfi elder Daniele viii Foreword de Rossi is public in his support for the neo-fascist Forza Nova party. His former teammate, Alberto Aquilani, now in England with Liverpool FC, has a large collection of busts of Mussolini. Other players are known to have the song Faccetta Nera programmed as their mobile ringtone. Players with left-wing sympathies are few or prefer to remain silent. Such sentiments need an identifi able target – some are easy to hand at football matches. Incidents of racism in Italian football stadia are ever-present. The talented 19-year-old Inter Milan striker Mario Balo- telli – born to Ghanaian parents but having adopted Italian citizenship – complained in early 2010 of the racist and fascist insults hurled at him by rival fans, one of whom proclaimed ‘There are no black Italians’. Explanations for the proliferation of such attitudes and behaviours have to be found in the socio-cultural history of Italy; a nation that will seek security in its glorious memories yet willingly celebrates foreign models, and is resentful and triumphant in its isolationism. The proc- esses of globalisation have revealed weaknesses in its armour. Over the past 20 years, fi ve million ‘new citizens’ have entered the Italian peninsula mainly from Africa and Eastern Europe. Among many of the cities, Rome is experiencing the crises and neuroses of modernity but, having avoided the experiences of urban industrialisation, it has some catching up to do. Rome is a bureaucratic city par excellence and mani- fests a demographic that has not changed much in nature in the 50 years since Mussolini took power. The new multi-ethnic presence has provoked in many a nostalgic search which is ethnocentric and exalting of a glorious and romanticised past. The might of history sits alongside – in many senses – the anachronistic cult of tradition. Football fans would recognise this correlate. While neo-fascists colonise some Italian football stadia they have – as this study illustrates so well – an existence beyond the 90-minute game. In the fi rst decade of the new millennium the historic piazzas of Rome have witnessed fascist-inspired disorder. In early 2000 an American tourist was stabbed by two assailants whose homes revealed to police an arsenal of weaponry and fascist paraphernalia. In the same location in 2006, AS Roma’s Nucleo Eur gathering established a notoriety that resulted in them being outlawed. Curiously the group ix

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