Punishing the Foreigner: Implicit Discrimination in the Premier League Based on Oppositional Identity

Edoardo Gallo, Thomas Grund () and J Reade

Discussion Papers from Department of Economics, University of Birmingham

Abstract: We present the first empirical study to reveal the presence of implicit discrimination in a non-experimental setting. By using a large dataset of in-match data in the English Premier League, we show that white referees award significantly more yellow cards against non-white players of oppositional identity. We argue that this is the result of implicit discrimination by showing that this discriminatory behaviour (i) increases in how rushed the referee is before making a decision, and (ii) it increases in the level of ambiguity of the decision. The variation in (i) and (ii) cannot be explained by any form of conscious discrimination such as taste-based or statistical discrimination. Moreover, we show that oppositional identity players do not differ in their behaviour from other players along several dimensions related to aggressiveness and style of play providing further evidence that this is not statistical discrimination.

Keywords: Implicit Discrimination; Oppositional Identity; Football (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J71 L83 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 23 pages
Date: 2012-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-spo
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (12)

Downloads: (external link)
https://repec.cal.bham.ac.uk/pdf/12-02.pdf

Related works:
Journal Article: Punishing the Foreigner: Implicit Discrimination in the Premier League Based on Oppositional Identity (2013)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bir:birmec:12-02

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Discussion Papers from Department of Economics, University of Birmingham Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Oleksandr Talavera ().