Contested conceptions of identity, community and multiculturalism in the staging of alternative sport events: a case study of the Amsterdam World Cup football tournament

This article provides a case study of the Amsterdam World Cup (WK Amsterdam), an annual amateur football competition and multicultural festival. Placing the event within the context of Dutch integration policy, it examines the differing and contested conceptions of identity, community and multiculturalism articulated by participants and organisers and, more broadly, the role that 'alternative' events play in resisting or reinforcing dominant political ideologies. Based on observational fieldwork, the analysis primarily addresses three main issues. First, it considers the extent to which the tournament provides a public space for community mobilisation and, as is the case with mainstream sporting events, the articulation of ethnic, national and gender identities. Second, it discusses associations between whiteness and national identity, and the role of alternative sporting events in facilitating the articulation of oppositional post-colonial identities. Third, it evaluates the tournament's capacity to promote multiculturalism, cultural interaction and integration into a municipal Amsterdam identity. The article demonstrates that, whilst the tournament has the potential to play a significant role in challenging racism and destabilising white privilege in dominant local football cultures, aspects of the event - analogous to many other supposedly 'alternative' sport events actually reproduce the inequalities and exclusionary practices of mainstream sport.