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Between Grassroots Democracy and Professional Commercialism in Sweden
Örebro universitet.ORCID iD: 0000-0002-1983-6591
Örebro universitet.ORCID iD: 0000-0002-4985-3595
Malmö University, Faculty of Education and Society (LS), Department of Sports Sciences (IDV).ORCID iD: 0000-0002-2914-4476
2023 (English)In: Football in the Nordic Countries: Practices, Equality and Influence / [ed] Szerovay, M.; Nevala, A., ; Itkonen, H., London: Routledge, 2023, p. 64-76Chapter in book (Refereed)
Abstract [en]

In the late 19th century, football entered Sweden's coastal cities, such as Malmö, Halmstad and Gothenburg. The sport grew quickly, and the Swedish Football Association (SvFF) was founded in 1904. In the following decades, the popularity of football increased and in the 1950s it was perceived as the national sport of Sweden. However, at that time the sport was non-professional and in practice only for men. In order to keep up with hardening international competition, SvFF overturned the amateur regulations in 1967. Professionalisation was slow due to the lack of revenue but accelerated for male players after the Bosman ruling in 1995. Women's football developed gradually from the 1960s and in 1972 a national league organised by SvFF was formed. Youth football also grew substantially. Despite the differences in resources football became well-established amongst both men and women. However, the tensions between idealism, voluntarism and inclusion on the one hand, and commercialism, professionalism and selection, on the other hand, remain. This is best exemplified by the 51% rule, which states that clubs must be majority-owned by the members. This is hailed by some as a guarantee for democratic football, while others argue that it restricts clubs’ financial development.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
London: Routledge, 2023. p. 64-76
Series
Critical Research in Football
Keywords [en]
football, Sweden, democracy, amateurism, professionalization, sports for all
National Category
History Sport and Fitness Sciences
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:mau:diva-59320DOI: 10.4324/9781003280729-7ISI: 001123653300007ISBN: 9781003280729 (electronic)ISBN: 9781032249131 (print)OAI: oai:DiVA.org:mau-59320DiVA, id: diva2:1752201
Available from: 2023-04-21 Created: 2023-04-21 Last updated: 2025-03-06Bibliographically approved

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Svensson, Daniel

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