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The past 25 years have seen an unprecedented Europeanisation of the structures and governance in football across the continent. A European (and global) transfer market for players and managers has become the norm and a pan-European league system has been established that regularly exposes supporters to transnational competitions and players from all over Europe. At the same time, manifold typologies of football fans have been established, distinguishing groups of fans based on, for example, fan intensity, fan behaviour or their attitudes towards different actors in the field. The attitudes towards Europe and the self-identification of these fans within Europeanised football have not played a role in any of these typologies so far. This paper steps into that void and develops a typology of football fans in (Western) Europe that takes their attitudes towards Europeanisation as a point of departure. Based on data from an online survey among fans of first league clubs in England, France, Austria and Germany, two dimensions are identified as key categories: the intensity of fandom, and fans' attitudes towards Europeanisation – which here manifests as a divide between the national/local belonging versus appreciating diversity and transnational spaces/developments or more succinctly, a divide between cosmopolitanism and communitarianism. Our analysis uncovers the existence of four types of fans: occasional cosmopolitans, occasional communitarians, frequent cosmopolitans and frequent communitarians.

Discursive approaches to Europe usually focus on elite discourses and target a narrow political understanding of Europe. Against the backdrop of rising Euroscepticism and the known elite-mass divide on issues of European identity, it seems important to shift the focus toward non-elite discourses on Europe. Given that club football is largely Europeanised (player markets, continent-wide club competitions and broadcasting of matches), we analyse how fans of the English Premier League club Manchester United discursively construct 'Europe' in relation to their sport. Our main research question aims at identifying how identifications of fans have been unconsciously Europeanised in the wake of an ongoing Europeanisation of the game. We explore online discourses on rivalry, competition and player transfers in club football as these areas are strongly influenced by the interplay of national and European inclinations. Preliminary results of our qualitative content analysis demonstrate that Manchester United fans, inasmuch as their club 'goes Europe' on a frequent basis, have developed transnational perspectives on football. Distinctions between 'us' and 'them' are not predominantly based on nationality, even though they remain complex. However, European orientations (not the European Union as such) seem to play more of a prominent role than commonly assumed.

AbstractThis research note introduces the EPINetz Twitter Politicians Dataset, a comprehensive dataset of 2449 Twitter accounts of German parliamentarians, minsters, state secretaries, parties, and ministries on a state, federal, and European Union level for the year 2021. This hand-curated dataset not only provides up-to-date information on elected officials, but it also includes additional variables such as their party affiliation, age, and gender. Furthermore, it provides linkages to additional data sources by providing the accounts' Wikidata and Abgeordnetenwatch (Parliamentwatch) IDs. While it does not provide actual tweet data, the dataset will be a valuable resource for researchers by providing easy access to elected German politicians. We demonstrate some of the dataset's uses with an analysis of the 2021 German Federal Elections. The full dataset can be accessed via https://doi.org/10.7802/2415.

Beeinflussen Massenmedien den Gang der internationalen Politik? Alexander Brand gibt hierauf eine differenzierte Antwort, die Medien weder zu Sündenböcken für fehlgeschlagene politische Projekte macht noch deren eigenständige Wirkmächtigkeit abstreitet. Auch widerspricht er einer technologiefixierten Lesart, wie sie bei der Rede vom »CNN-Effekt« oder der »Twitter-Revolution« dominiert. Auf der Basis eines modifizierten konstruktivistischen Ansatzes für die Internationalen Beziehungen erläutert die Studie, wo genau sich Medieneffekte in internationalen politischen Dynamiken niederschlagen - und zeigt, dass dies weder einseitig gerichtet noch mit durchweg erwartbaren Konsequenzen geschieht.

This textbook provides access to the most important problem areas in the field of international politics. It systematically conveys basic knowledge about protagonists, problems of classification, and conflicts in the international system. It takes into account both the theoretical principles of international relations and the increase in the significance of non-state actors. The new edition has been completely revised and updated.