26.3.-27.7.2008 – Rote Fabrik, Zurich
The international football tournament, like the World and European Cups, has evolved into a mass urban event with the establishment of zones known as “Public-Viewing” areas and “Fan Miles” in representative places in the city: entire city centers are transformed into consumer and experience zones. The host cities are trying to actively use the growing popularity of football events for their own location marketing; while the private event holders dictate the marketing requirements and occupy the central city locations for their exclusive sponsors’ advertisements. At the same time, the mass events provide a reason to implement further surveillance and control dispositives. This is done in the form of large scale police and army operations, extensive “anti-hooligan” measures, police barriers and access control in city spaces as well as the testing of new surveillance technology. The FANCITY event series discusses massive football events like the 2006 World Cup in Germany and the upcoming 2008 European Cup in Switzerland and Austria as symptoms of the current neoliberal urban development. Furthermore, it will discuss the effects on the city and public spaces with a focus on commercialization and control.
A series of events by the Rote Fabrik in collaboration with Anke Hagemann, Big Brother Awards Switzerland and the stadt.labor
Wednesday, March 26
SCHAUPLATZ (SITE): Location, Event and Marketing
Short presentations and podium discussions
8pm, Clubraum Rote Fabrik, Zurich
Location marketing, promotion of tourism and anticipated corporate image benefits are important motivations for countries and cities for the costly hosting of large sports events. Nation branding and urban profiling are becoming increasingly important in the competition for providing the best location; as they also are with the establishment of a collective identity. In the meantime, large events belong to the classic repertoire of corporate city politics – often at the expense of socially sustainable urban development. However, while the cities put themselves on the scene with the football events, the private organizers FIFA and UEFA use the city in equal measure as advertising space: Like the stadiums, the “Fan Zones” are also dominated by commercial interests and the staging of exclusive sponsors: global name brands occupy strategic places in the city.
With: Marika Molter (graphic designer, Düsseldorf/Zurich), Barbara Schönig (sociology of urban planning and architecture, TU Berlin.), Wolfram Manzenreiter (social anthropologist, University of Vienna), Christian Schmid (urban geographer, ETH Zurich), Luzius Theiler ("Committee Against the €-08-Dictates", Bern)
Moderation: Richard Wolff (urban researcher, INURA, Zurich)
Wednesday, April 2
Series "Frühlingsueberwachen": Police - which Police?
8pm, Clubraum Rote Fabrik, Zurich
With: Reto Moosmann (secretary GSoA, association grundrechte.ch, Bern)
and
Daniel Vischer (lawyer, National Councillor, Green Party, Zurich).
Wednesday, April 9
STRAFRAUM (PENALTY BOX): Security Rhetoric and Urban Control
Short presentations and podium discussion
8pm, Clubraum Rote Fabrik, Zurich
Major sports events like the World Cup and the European Cup are accompanied by an increase in surveillance and control on an urban, national and international scale. The expected crowds of visitors as well as the assumed dangers from terrorism, hooliganism and increased criminality are the grounds for an unprecedented increase in police operations, private security guards in public spaces, army operations, extensive “hooligan” databanks and the intensificationof border control. Urban spaces are affected by additional “security rings” around the stadiums, the broadening of video surveillance and the fencing in and controlling of the “public viewing” mass events. The publicly financed security measures are often associated with private corporate interests. The building up of an urban control regime is legitimized by the state of emergency rhetoric. At the same time, a testing field for new surveillance technologies is provided. Many procedures, which increasingly restrict data privacy and civil liberties, remain in effect even after the events.
With: Francisco Klauser (geographer, University of Durham), Volker Eick (political scientist, FU Berlin), Bernhard Hachleitner (historian, Vienna), Moderation: Christoph Müller (sociologist, Big Brother Awards, Zurich), amongst others
Monday, April 14
HEIMSPIEL (HOME GAME): March Over the Tracks
City walking tour with commentary from Letzigrund to Hardturm Stadium
Talk with: Marie-Claude Bétrix (architect, Bétrix
& Consolascio
Architects), representative of the FCZ-Südkurve, Christian
Schmid (urban
geographer, resident), Tania Schellenberg (environmental studies
specialist, resident).
6pm, meeting point: Letzigrund tram station, please bring a bike with
you.
The hosting of large sports events is often accompanied with the building of modern stadiums – large occasions are gladly used to efficiently implement controversial plans. Whether it’s an urban multifunctional arena or a privately financed football stadium with additional commercial facilities: sport arenas have long since become architectural icons for the event, the association or the city. On a city tour, we will ask the Letzigrund architect Marie-Claude Bétrix how open one can design a stadium and we will talk with the representative of the FCZ-Südkurve about how fan culture is changing with the European Cup 2008. We will also discuss what role the new stadium building has in neighborhood development with the urban researcher Christian Schmid. Tania Schellenberg will provide information about opposition to the new building plans.
Wednesday, April 16
Series "Frühlingsueberwachen": Filters, Valves and Locks:
Stadium
Architecture and Access Regulation
8pm, Clubraum Rote Fabrik, Zurich
lecture by Anke Hagemann and discussion
Wednesday, April 23
Series "Frühlingsueberwachen": Intimidating, Cordoning,
Excluding
8pm, Clubraum Rote Fabrik, Zurich
lecture and discussion, with a member of gipfelsoli.org and others
June/July 2008
FANCITYMAP: Workshop and Exhibition
05.-12.06.2008: Mapping Workshop on the European Cup 2008 in Zurich
27.06. - 27.07.2008: Exhibition in the Shedhalle
How is the city of Zurich changing during the European Cup 2008? How is it presenting itself as a name brand? How is it being used as an advertising space? How are security measures and discourses reflected in urban space? What spontaneous and informal structures have an impact on the city? In a one-week-long workshop at the beginning of the European Cup 2008, the effects of football tournaments on urban spaces will be examined, documented and visualized in a collective mapping project. The workshop is inviting architects, artists and urban researchers and is open to all others who are interested; notably students from space-oriented, creative and artistic courses of study. The FANCITY map will be distributed as a printed fold-out map and presented in an exhibition in the Shedhalle.
©
fancity 2008