The accelerating “footballification” of public discourse

[sujonkumar6300]

This lack of transparency is akin to saying ‘Trust us, it works’ without providing evidence, which is far from ideal. As the European Commission (EC, 2019), EU member states, UNESCO and other stakeholders (such as funders) call for more transparency in educational research, it is paramount for researchers and journals to adhere to the so-called FAIR-principles – that research data is Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable.



Is where we assess an action not by what has actually been done on the metaphorical pitch cayman islands email list but instead by the shirt colour of the person who has done it. If they’re on our “team” we cheer them passionately; if they’re playing for the opposition we furiously boo absolutely identical behaviour.’ (O’Brien, 2021, p. 2).

This characterisation of a ‘shirt-colour’ political culture in England is provocatively stimulating for understanding education policy: recognising the chasm that divides people, fuelled by blind loyalty, visceral hostility (including violence) and myths in spite of the evidence to the contrary. Our research shows that the provision of and access to school places is based on a ‘club brand’. The replacement of education policy with education markets has created an environment where loyalty for a ‘logo-ised’ nursery, school, college and university is what matters (see Gunter 2023), and where players compete to secure and retain a team place (see Innes et al., 2023; Hughes et al., 2020; Rayner et al., 2017; Rayner & Gunter, 2020).