Police Role in Promoting the Culture and Etiquette of Spectators in Attending Football Stadiums

It is believed that spectators' familiarity with the etiquette and culture of attending stadiums is effective in improving their security levels; therefore, the purpose of this research was to investigate the role of police in promoting the culture and etiquette of spectators in Iranian football stadiums.

The present study is an exploratory qualitative research. The content analysis method was used to achieve the goals. The study participants were five senior police officers specializing in football security, ten academic experts in the fields of sports security management, violence and aggression, and sports sociology, and three football experts specializing in organizing matches. Purposeful sampling was used for population selection. The interview data was coded, and two fellow experts verified the validity of the coding by reviewing and checking the accuracy of the extracted codes and re-coding the interviews.

The police force can be divided into four main categories and nine (9) subcategories; With the titles of cultural context building (cultural planning, cultural content creation, knowledge and awareness raising), cultural acceptability (training of citizens and empowerment of law enforcement forces), control policies (supervisory measures and executive requirements) and communication and interaction management (systematic coordination and cooperation and cross-sectoral interactions); these factors are influential in promoting the culture and etiquette of spectators in football stadiums should play a role.

The police force is one of the main players in improving the space and environment of football stadiums and can reduce the level of violence and aggression of spectators and other people present in stadiums by developing the culture and etiquette of attending stadiums and improving the level of stadium safety and sense of security participants.