Racist and neo-Nazi panic in the Euro 2012 coverage by the British press: A discursive failure in interculturalism

Abstract

The article demonstrates how the discursive strategies of sport reporting by the media may collide with the vision of sport as a means of promoting intercultural understanding, a generally anticipated cultural effect of mega sport events. This is done by a critical discourse reading of 35 news articles that appeared across the British national press in May and June 2012, directly before the opening of the 14th UEFA European Football Championship (Euro 2012) jointly hosted by Poland and Ukraine. Influenced by a BBC television documentary and linked by the central topic of the two countries as strongholds of racism, xenophobia and vicious hooliganism, these articles constitute an instance of a moral panic. A discussion of the panic as a mode of discourse leads to the conclusion that the priorities and practices of British newspaper journalism acted against the culturally integrating potential of Euro 2012.