Birmingham’s Eastside story: making steps towards sustainability?

Sustainability has come to play a dominant discursive role in the UK planning system, particularly relating to urban regeneration. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the role that sustainability plays in a major regeneration programme, known as Eastside, currently underway in Birmingham, the UK. That this £6 billion redevelopment is now widely talked about by such key players as Birmingham City Council and the Regional Development Agency, Advantage West Midlands, as having a central sustainability agenda points to the growing importance of the ideal of sustainability in planning and regeneration agendas. In this paper, we investigate in detail how and why sustainability has become part of the planning discourse for Eastside and critically evaluate what impact, if any, this is having on public policy decision-making

The hoolifan: Positive fan attitudes to football 'hooliganism'

Popular accounts of ‘football hooliganism’ have identified the phenomenon as being harmful and damaging for both the sport of football and the interests of spectators who attend matches. As a result, it has been generally assumed that ‘non-hooligan’ supporters disapprove of their hooligan counterparts and their activities. However, this one-sided account does not recognize the views of a significant proportion of match-going fans who consistently express positive attitudes towards the ‘hooligans’ who follow their team. Based on a series of ethnographic studies of football fans from 1995 to 2010, this article casts light on the positive role that hooligans are perceived to perform by many fans who attend home and away matches with their club. The research demonstrated that hooligans were believed to play vital roles in distraction, protection and reputation for many non-hooligan fans and even when fans did express disapproval of ‘hooligan’ activity, this was often for practical rather than moral reasons. Furthermore, fans who express positive attitudes to hooliganism – or ‘hoolifans’ – have to be acknowledged and understood if the problem of football crowd disorder is to be controlled

Household growth, housing demand and new settlements in Scotland

The question of how and where to accommodate the increasing number of households in Scotland represents a major challenge for policy makers and planners at the beginning of the twenty-first century. The present research identifies the projected level and geographical incidence of household growth and housing demand in Scotland, identifies the principal alternative options for urban development and, within the context of the current policy and planning environment, assesses the potential contribution of a new settlement strategy to meet the challenge of urban development in contemporary Scotland

'Football's coming home': a critical evaluation of the Homeless World Cup as an internvention to combat social exclusion

A key feature of government policy in the last 30 years is the use of sport programmes as a vehicle for social change aiming to benefit and improve the lives of marginalized and vulnerable members of society. Sports policy-makers and practitioners have sought to use the ‘power of sport’ through sport-based intervention programmes to tackle key social issues. The Homeless World Cup is an example of this, comprising a football tournament held annually since 2003 aiming to re-engage marginalized, vulnerable and socially excluded homeless people. This article focuses on a group of young male homeless players from a United Kingdom squad that attended the inaugural Homeless World Cup. Drawing upon observations and interview material, the findings centre on the benefits of engagement in the programme but also the challenges and difficulties specific to the circumstances surrounding this group of players. The article concludes with a preliminary assessment of the appropriateness of the HWC as a mechanism for assisting homeless people to overcome the multi-faceted and complex issues they face