folks-uni

Hier reden wir: die Gesellschaft
beschreibt sich selbst

Heinz Steinert

The organization of  public enthusiasm

The organization of major public events, using up enormous funds and effort and accessible to and involving practically the whole society has one common denominator: they allow to build up and enjoy public enthusiasm. This is true for festivities of all scopes, from the private grill- (and drinking-) party through local community events (traditionally religious ceremonies through the year, including their "holy days" and the local "Kirtag"), theatrical or musical events of more than local involvement (the latest addition to this type are huge commercial music and dance festivals like Pop Concerts in a stadium or an open field or the more recent Love Parade in most major cities) up to international events like the annual Vienna or Salzburg Festival, visits by foreign politicians or even the Pope or Football Championships. Festivities have a long historical tradition and there is ample material from cultural anthropology, sociology, psychology and historical research to show the meaning and the importance of such festivities (and the symbols created and used on such occasions) for societies, their self-expression and thus identity and their integration. Such expression of society does, of course, include their system of domination, which is playfully turned upside down (the original meaning of Fools’ Festivities and the Carnival), providing what has been called "Ventilsitten", rituals of regulated excess, down to outright celebrations of domination, like the Nazi "Reichsparteitage" as documented in Riefenstahl's films.

Sociological analysis focuses on the interplay between the festivity as it is "officially" arranged and the range of what people in different positions make of it, what they use the offer for according to their own needs and interests. The assumption is that there is one main trajectory planned by the organizers, who are also aware of a variety of needs and interests that have to be cared for. But the public is not just passive: they create their own festivity (which includes the one extreme of opting out of it and doing something else instead and the other extreme of trying to disrupt and disturb the official program) and thereby produce their own offers for others to take up and join. In the case of a championship the actual trajectory is not completely in the hands of the organizers: beyond the element of chance (relative to what can be planned) in the outcomes of matches there is active participation by a public that cannot be completely controlled. We have to expect an interaction between the official and the personal trajectories.

1/ The typical trajectory as it is organized is a number of inter-connected arches of tension:

There are preparatory activities that build up interest, tension and enthusiasm many months in advance. They start with the competition over which countries will organize the championship and continue through the matching of teams for the first round to the competition for tickets and the gradual announcements on the teams and their chances as well as the entertainment that will be offered on TV and in public in the cities concerned.

* Such planning as well as publicized preparation is done by the organizers using the full range of media and addressing the whole population and potentially the whole world.

* Different participants do their own tension management, most consequentially the media themselves and following their own agenda (of sale).

To insert an example that could already be observed before the games started:

When a number of allegedly Al-Kaida sympathizers were taken into custody first in Germany, then even in Vienna around middle of September, 2007, the Viennese paper "Österreich" connected this to the EM 08 in the headline: "Terrorist plante Attentat auf Fußball-EM" (20.9.07, p. 1). Quite apart from any factual truth (close reading of the article shows that the elements of fact in this line are next to non-existent) such a headline goes two ways: it uses the peace- and joyful spectacle of the EM 08 to highlight the heinous character of the "terrorist" who would go so far as to turning it into a "blood-bath" (there is a second headline on p. 14 of the same issue: "Plante er EM-Blutbad?"); and it uses the occasion of a terrorism scare to reinforce this element of tension to the EM preparations: will the festivities be safe? Since the 1970s and reinforced again since 2001 questions of safety and disaster (either technical or criminal) are a big part of the public interest in mega-events of all kinds.

* Individuals who plan to participate also do their preparing – by finding out what will be offered, by accordingly making their own social arrangements of possible joint participation and by pumping up their enthusiasm or beginning to. Enthusiasm is not something passive but has to be brought about actively. It pre-supposes a measure of information and, more importantly, willingness to "let go" and social support and mutual reinforcement in doing so. Masks and costumes (or uniforms), noise, light, rhythmic movement and not least drugs are the main techniques people actively search for and use in the actual realization of enthusiasm. Preparatory activities aim at securing the proper company for these activities and anticipate some of the joy that can be expected.

2/ The tensions and enthusiasms built up before and released in the festivity vary in content: they can be narcissistic (enthusiasm in the enjoyment of oneself – the paradigm would be the ecstatic dancer), erotic (enthusiasm over desirable others – the pure case would be the orgy) or aggressive (enthusiastic collective unity and identification against  a common enemy – the brawl in the pub, war enthusiasm, the lynch-mob, the pogrom). In a concrete case all three dimensions will be active in changing proportions and admixtures. In a complex mis-en-scène of enthusiasm different participants can be driven by different enthusiasms and motives.

Football-championships are traditionally charged in an aggressive mode and with patriotic up to nationalist enthusiasm.

We put up the thesis that the erotic charge becomes more important than the aggressive component in organized public enthusiasm today than it used to. (Cf. the Love Parade, Party-Zones/"Fan Miles"). What remains of the aggressive component becomes disruptive and unacceptable. (For some, this may constitute an extra "kick" and make aggressiveness or a show of it even more attractive.)

3/ Parts of the population, concentrated in specific social positions, refuse to be drawn into public enthusiasm, can even be said to fear and despise them.

* There are historical examples of organized enthusiasm getting out of hands, most well-known the 16th c. "Carnival in Romans" episode described by Le Roy Ladurie (1978). There is always a danger that organized enthusiasm turns against domination and the very domination that did the organizing and its order. There can be escalations that actually endanger the existing order. Organized enthusiasm, therefore, provides a "Ventilsitte", a harmless way of letting off steam, but it must be managed circumspectively and with a view to preventing "excesses".[1]

* A strict work ethic and other orientation towards the "serious" aspects of life will abhor "licence" and "debauchery", individually and even more collectively, as dangerous and repugnant. In its wiser forms this attitude will demand and accept "moderation" even in enthusiastic events, will exert pressure towards a limited time for them and stern morality afterwards.

* Finally there is a faction of people who, highly individualized and anti-totalitarian as well as anti-nationalistic, find collective enthusiasms intimidating and dangerous. They see their aggressive component only.

* The situation is complicated, even contradictory for those for whom the public event means (additional or intensified) work in the first place. The economic faction can expect extra profit, but has to invest effort and money first, hard work and possibly risky investment. Factions of the administration and service professions (police, others responsible for order and clean streets, garbage collection; ambulance, hospitals) can expect a few weeks of high-pressure work and even situations of crisis. For many the event implies disruptions of routines, distractions and difficulties (traffic difficulties, being barred from parts of the public, fewer customers and problems with employees and business partners). Extra-ordinary controls (at state borders, in public transport and spaces, at site entrances, on site) are put into place and some of them may stay.

Society and individuals pay a price for organized public enthusiasm, not just of the obvious or the indirect material kind (there is not only "indirect gain" – "Umweg-Rentabilität" –, but "indirect adversity" – "Umweg-Beeinträchtigung" – as well), but also in terms of the wishes and fantasies mobilized or at least admitted on such occasions that have to be suppressed again when the festivities end. In order to restore the "gravity of life" participants and/or agents of social order and domination have to stop enthusiasm and abandon and re-instate the reality principle. The difficulty of this often abrupt transition back to a sober mood is well known to the organizers of demonstrations or pop concerts: they have to set a proper finishing event (a speech that is rousing and calming at the same time, a last encore that reduces aggressiveness), but the social and psychic processes of this repression (and often depression) are not too well studied. We assume that this process consists in turning the event into a narrative, not least by talking it through with other participants ("comparing notes") and by recounting it to non-participants ("returning from an adventure").

4/ Phases and locations

A big and drawn-out event like the football championship needs to be structured consecutively and by parallel sub-festivities in different locations.

The over-all structure is a crescendo leading up to the final game and to the "crowning" and celebration of the champion. It is obviously divided in two parts: the preparatory phase, in which it is determined who, which 16 teams take part, and the three weeks of the championship proper with two games a day in June 2008. Here again the last week of semi-finals and final is one more crescendo. These phases have different meanings for fans depending on how "their" team fares, especially on how soon it has to leave the championship. When that happens there is an interesting process of negotiating the disappointment, then a new, probably toned-down loyalty and renewed enthusiasm – or maybe even drop-out at the other extreme.

In terms of location the most important of them is certainly not the stadium but TV. Here again solitary viewing at home at the one end is, if possible, replaced by public viewing of varying scope: with family, with friends, in sports bars, in public places. TV is also an important location for preparatory and post-festum activities, announcements and interviews, interpretations and summaries. These too can be consumed more or less privately or publicly. They will be the subject matter of private discussions and thus the construction of personal meanings of the events.

The stadium location is the most expensive and exclusive and provides for a very well-structured event. Audience reaction there is also televised and often directed to this transmission (the "wave", for instance, but also other colourful and noisy expressions of participation and enthusiasm).

Other important locations are parties of different kinds after a game. They again range from private to public and are well-provided for in so-called "fan-miles". For many participants they may be the most important part of the festivities.

A further location is the transport/walk between the locations already mentioned and the way home after the game or at the end of the evening. Here things are least well-structured and most liable to get out of control.

5/ A complex event like a European championship is not completely under control. It has a built-in element of chance in the games, their quality and their outcomes. Planning and organizing such an event includes organizing for the unforeseen and preparing a set of corrective strategies and adaptations. This includes the need to curb frustrations and resulting aggressiveness as well as the possibility that enthusiasm may need to be re-kindled after a depressing or boring event. Finally there must be a "climax" to the event, a rousing finale to which the whole process works up – ideally this is satisfaction and general exhaustion at the same time. Even with perfect organization such an outcome for all is quite unlikely. The problem of the "small and radical minority" that is not satisfied and cannot find an end (and acts out its frustration or its still high enthusiasm) is well known.

6/ Apart from the immediate difficulty to "find an end" festivities regularly leave behind a more or less prolonged feeling of dissatisfaction. The festivity may not have been as sensational as expected – in the case of a championship the favourite team may have been beaten, resulting in a down instead of a high –; the social relations and the presentation of self were not what they had been hoped for; the satisfaction reached was found lacking in relation what it had been dreamed to be. The disappointment will be the deeper the higher expectations had been before. People must find the difficult balance between the sober preparation for the fact that (practically) nothing in life is as grand as we would like it to be and the possibility that this hard-boiled street wisdom could curb all pleasant anticipation and enthusiasm. We are expected to be able to handle our disappointments without inhibiting all enthusiasm and to finish enthusiastic states and return to normal when demanded. This is a demanding and precarious achievement of civilization (psychologically speaking: of a strong Ego) that cannot always be expected, still less relied on.

The cooling-out phase is in many ways decisive for the success of the whole festivity. Not least is this the phase of public and private negotiation of what exactly it was that has happened and whether this was a success for whom and in what way. As for the annual holiday or for the visit to a museum the meaning and the value (and its justification) of the event appear gradually only in remembering it and in putting together a narrative about it. We can, on the whole, assume a tendency to "optimise" and "rationalize" in hindsight what has demanded an investment from us. (Avoidance of "cognitive dissonance" is a well-known basic process.) Since public events and the organization of public enthusiasm usually take place in a situation of some conflict and opposition, there will also be a tendency to retrospectively diminish the value of the event.

There is hardly any research on these processes of private and public negotiation in retrospect. But it is the result of these negotiations that determined the historical and life-history meaning of an event. Comparison with similar events plays a role, too. The EURO 08 has to live up to a specific comparison with the Word Championship 06 in Germany – an event that was generally defined as highly successful and particularly satisfactory. (The movie about it was called "Ein Sommermärchen", a "summer dream".) There are, of course, also negative anchor points for such comparisons – in this case perhaps the disasters of Munich 72 or Brussels 85. In this comparison it can already be a success if "nothing happened", depending on how high fears of disasters are pushed before.

Conceptual background and questions of interpretation

"Culture industry", as first spelled out by Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno in Dialectic of Enlightenment in 1944/47 and much misunderstood since, is not a theory of manipulation. Linear models of sender – medium – recipient or even the slightly more refined one of a "two-step flow of information", as developed around the same time by the Lazarsfeld school, are – in view of the theory of culture industry – actor-centred simplifications that reduce a complex web of influences to an inadmissible directedness with a conspiracy slant.

"Culture industry", in contrast, assumes a structural organisation of the "knowledge" aspect of society according to a logic of commodity (and administration). Simply put, the logic of commodity is one of sale and not of use of the product, the logic of administration (of economy and state) is one of domination in terms of categories of the population. (It can easily be seen that the two go together since the logic of sale also addresses people in terms of categories – of credentials, ability, usefulness, discipline and other dimensions of the labour market, or taste, leisure time, preferences and habits and other dimensions of "consumer behaviour" – that are abstracted for that purpose. Administration – of the economy and of the state – uses the same and adds more categories that are instrumental to structuring society, among them the categories of the market and of commodity production, that are guaranteed by the state.) Culture industry, therefore, is not the doing of some "media moguls" or "PR wizards", but a pervasive logic that dominates social knowledge.

Entertainment is but one field that can be analysed in terms of "culture industry". Examples mentioned by Horkheimer and Adorno that are probably more consequential are the design of buildings and cities (in their most general aspects of organizing daily communications, transport or use of time, to the details of e.g. the lay-out of a kitchen), down to even the design of appliances like door-knobs that allow or discourage certain movements and a specific relation to material things as well as social relations as structured by a door and a specific type of door. The central institutions of society, work relations, family and household, education, and in consequence emotional, including sexual and aggressive relations, are structured according to the imperatives of culture industry. Or, put the other way around: "Culture industry" is the concept used to describe and analyse the structures of social life that are organized in social knowledge and its (instrumental, legitimatory, entertaining) application to material and ideological production and consumption.

A specific sector of entertainment like the highly popular football, or to be more precise: watching football on TV, cannot be interpreted as simply a manipulative device to keep people busy and in a bellicose spirit. There is certainly a vast and multi-facetted industry and a lot of money involved, but outright manipulation is confined to advertising (which is pervasive in today’s capitalism and not more destructive in sports than in other fields of entertainment) and the occasional fiddling of match results. Rather, the culture-industry model implies, people use the occasion actively and for their own purposes. Mostly these purposes just follow the trajectory of what is suggested by the organizers of the occasion, but even then this takes some active effort on the part of those who follow the script. Others have their own agenda for using the occasion and the situations it creates. And a complex event like a European Championship offers a variety of situations and scripts. And single situations may be more-dimensional and even contradictory.

In our own extension of the culture-industry model[2] we have introduced the concept of "working alliance" (derived from the theory of psychotherapy, but generalized to all kinds of situations) to denote the set of norms and cognitive assumptions that are taken for granted in setting up the situation and that must ideally be fulfilled and followed by all participants for the situation to run smoothely. For heuristic purposes we distinguish levels of comprehensivity that can be used to describe and analyze the working alliance: from the cultural level through the institutional, the subcultural, the situational levels to the interpersonal and idiosyncratic levels.[3] "Ideal type" does legitimately apply here: this working alliance that can be reconstructed is a backdrop against which we can see where and when it is in fact not honoured. Such "misunderstandings" have the consequence of corrective action in everyday interactions and they offer a suitable entry for interpretation, for finding out about the working alliance. This piece of theory offers the rationale for the methodology at the same time.

Initiative folks-uni:

Oliver Brüchert (Frankfurt) / Reinhard Kreissl (München/Wien) / Christine Resch (Frankfurt) / Christian Schneider (Frankfurt) / Heinz Steinert (Frankfurt/Wien)