Selling Permissible Violence

Abstract

This study uses figurational theory to analyse the articulations between standards of violence control and commodification in Australian rugby league between 1970 and 1995. It is argued that the interdependent social processes of violence regulation and commodification cannot be reduced to a simple cause-and-effect mechanism. Instead, it is imperative to comprehend that myriad social processes interweave to produce fluctuating standards of violence. The major social processes that are addressed include TV, technization, surveillance technologies, judicial structures, negative and positive feedback cycles, marketing and tension-balance.