Football activism as political contention: Contextual determinants of membership in the association of supporters of Hajduk Split

Where do politically activist football supporters come from? What are the social conditions under which they are successfully recruited and mobilised? This article answers those questions by analysing a unique dataset of more than 43,000 members of Our Hajduk – the association of supporters of the Croatian club Hajduk Split – as well as a host of data on the communities they live in. The analysis shows that Our Hajduk thrives in exactly the same areas where most other social, civil and political organisations thrive: among the more educated and more socioeconomically successful. Most importantly, the analysis shows that the pattern of Our Hajduk
membership closely follows the patterns of political affiliation and participation in Croatia’s
electoral arena and is guided by the opposition to political players who have dominated Croatian
football and turned it into a social field marked by corruption and mismanagement.