Who Does It for Self-Defense?

Home , 2009 in DREAM, Badr Hari, Melvin Manhoef, Pat Barry (kickboxer), Peter Aerts

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MMA & WHO DOES IT FOR THE WORKOUT? ICKBOXING HO DOES IT FOR SELF DEFENSE K W - ? IN WHO DOES IT FOR THE SELF-ESTEEM AND

AMSTERDAM CONFIDENCE?

Bachelor thesis

Mixed Martial Arts and

Kickboxing in Amsterdam

Bachelor Thesis Human Geography Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences

Author: Zico Broekstra (6172253) Email: [email protected] Phone number: 0681999120 Supervisor: Mr. Dr. J.D. Markusse Second Reader: Mr. Dr. W.P.C. van Gent

Abstract There seems to be an increase in the popularity of more brutal forms of martial arts. In this bachelor thesis the popularity of mixed martial arts and kickboxing is researched through literature studies, in- depth interviews and questionnaires. Interviews with three mayor or former mayor organizations of MMA and kickboxing events have been held to see who organizes these events today. All three organizations agreed on doing the best for the fighters; give them the podium they deserve. Since the existence of It’s Showtime from Simon Rutz, fighters started to earn a lot of money through professional kickboxing. The other two organizations took this path that Simon started and went on with it, giving young talent the chance to become starts.

To get a picture of who follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam, 169 questionnaires have been filled in by people following lessons at three different MMA or kickboxing schools. Out of these questionnaires came that most people follow lessons for the workout the sports give, female more often follow lessons for the workout while men also follow lessons because the like the sports and the particular martial arts skills learned.

People who like the sport will feel safer on the street due to following lessons for a longer period of time, while people who do it for the workout only feel safer when they get fitter. Men are keen to avoid a fight when they are training for a longer period of time while women do not show a trend towards rather avoiding a fight now they are following lessons in MMA or kickboxing for a longer period of time. That men rather avoid fights after following lessons in more brutal forms of martial arts is in line with the theories about martial arts and the conclusions that came out of the interviews.

Preface To finish my bachelor in Human Geography, may I present to you my bachelor thesis about MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam, a subject I am very interested in as it also has a link to my personal life because I follow lessons in kickboxing myself. In this bachelor thesis I will show the skills I have learned and the tools I now master to set up a research all by myself. Although I have done most of the work myself I could not have written this bachelor thesis without the help of my supervisor Jan Markusse and all the respondents that took the time to help me with my research. Also to the MMA and kickboxing schools that helped me in collecting questionnaires. I really want to extend my thanks. My special thanks go out to the University Library for being open at such ridiculous times and for the GIS working space because of the big screens. Thank you for reading my thesis, I hope you enjoy it.

Table of contents

Abstract 2

Preface 3

Table of contents 4

Chapter 1 Introduction 5

Chapter 2 Theoretical framework 7 § 2.1 MMA and kickboxing 7 § 2.2 Global and local processes 9

Chapter 3 Research design 14 § 3.1 Sub questions 14 § 3.2 Type of research 15 § 3.3 Hypothesis 16 § 3.4 Research units 17 § 3.5 Research methods 18 § 3.6 Operationalization 19

Chapter 4 Who organizes fights 24 § 4.1 Simon Rutz 24 § 4.2 Ali Günyar 27 § 4.3 Rachid Lamalam and Sebastien van Dusschoten 29

Chapter 5 Role safety, power and security and workout 33 § 5.1 People following lessons in MMA or kickboxing 33 § 5.2 Safety 35 § 5.3 Power and security 38 § 5.4 Workout 41

Chapter 6 Role global and local processes 43 § 6.1 Global processes 43 § 6.1 Local processes 45

Chapter 7 Conclusion 51

Discussion 56

Bibliography 57

Appendices 60

Chapter 1

Introduction

Introduction This bachelor thesis will be about the growing popularity of Mixed Martial Arts, following MMA, and kickboxing in Amsterdam. MMA is a sport conceived in the USA and was meant to let people from all different kinds of martial arts fight each other to see what form of martial arts was the most effective. The sport was an enormous commercial success and has been the most popular form of martial arts since (MMA central, 2014). Kickboxing is a combination of boxing and eastern martial arts such as taekwondo and karate and became popular in the early 70’s.

In the last years there seems to be a growing interest in these more brutal forms of martial arts in Amsterdam. This growing popularity in the sports came with positive and negative stories (Delp, 2006). People following lessons become more secure about themselves and are more able to defend themselves when necessary. Badr Hari being arrested and sent to jail for one and a half years due to beating someone up so badly that he had to stay in the hospital for months is one of the negative stories about the sport. Badr Hari is the former world champion in kickboxing.

The scientific relevance in this bachelor thesis subject is the fact that there has not been any research in this subject in Amsterdam. A few articles about MMA and kickboxing in the USA have been written but none about Amsterdam or the Netherlands, while Dutch competitors in the sports top the rankings.

The focus of this bachelor thesis will be the people who follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing and the organizations that organize fighting events. Through questionnaires, in depth interviews and literature studies a broader picture will be made about these two disciplines in Amsterdam. For this bachelor thesis a research question that combines all those factors has been made. The research question in this bachelor thesis will be;

Is the popularity of kickboxing and mixed martial arts in Amsterdam the result of safety issues, the feeling of power and security or the workout that the sports give, and how do global and local processes influence the popularity of mixed martial arts and kickboxing in Amsterdam?

In the following chapter the relevant theories in this research will be set apart. These theories form the framework where the empirical results will be tested. The third chapter will describe the research design of this bachelor thesis, this will include the operationalization of the concepts and the research and sub questions will be pointed out to give a more clear picture of how the questions are going to be answered. This chapter will also explain the research methods that will be used and how these are going to be performed. The fourth till the sixth chapter will involve the empirical results and the feedback towards the theories, also first conclusions will be made to answer the sub questions. The last chapter will be the conclusion where an attempt will be taken to answer the research question. Hypothesis about the popularity of MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam will be given together with possibilities for further research.

Chapter 2

Theoretical framework

This chapter will explain the theoretical concepts that will be used in this research. Although this research is mainly empirical some theoretical concepts have to be set apart. The reason for choosing Amsterdam as the research location will be explained and which martial arts school will be researched will be shown. The sample of people that are involved in this research should be representative for the population, all people following lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam. Therefore different kinds of MMA and kickboxing schools are involved in this research.

MMA and kickboxing MMA and kickboxing are the more brutal forms of martial arts that are very popular these days. In this paragraph the two sports will be further explained.

MMA First mixed martial arts, MMA, a sport officially conceived in 1993 by the UFC. This sport combines different styles of martial arts; the original idea was to see which sport would be the most effective in a free fight. The very first fight only lasted for 13 seconds when Gerard Gordeau kicked out a few of Teila Tuli’s teeth. The sport hardly had any rules at all, biting en stabbing someone in the eye where a few of the existing rules. This takes us back to the arena fights from the old Greek and Roman eras, where the surviving fighter would be the winner. Although the sport immediately was a great success, some extra rules were introduced to guarantee the safety of the athletes (Dooly, 2013). MMA was the first sport to introduce the pay per view construction; people could see a fight on television after paying for it. This was a big commercial success in the United States of America but did not really get off the ground in Europe. The nearly bankrupt UFC bought the sport and put it in a new jacket, making rules and introducing weight classes. Together with the reality series, ‘The Ultimate Fighter, it became an enormous success (Wall street journal, 2009 & Miller, 2008).

Kickboxing Kickboxing originates from the combination of boxing and eastern martial arts and became popular during the 70’s. The sport was established in 1974 to let people from the more traditional martial arts like karate and kung fu compete with each other under the usage of common rules. It is a strictly regulated sport, respect for teachers and opponents are a key element in the sport. The sport offers

7 exercise to all kinds, professional athletes, people trying to get fit and people that want to work on their self-defense (Delp, 2006).

Global and Local processes

Globalization of martial arts MMA and kickboxing are both a combination of different kinds of martial arts that slowly evolved into the sports they are today. The reason for these forms of martial arts to evolve in this particular way has a lot to do with globalization. Globalization is a difficult concept that can be understood in a lot of different ways. It involves the expansion of increasingly instantaneous telecommunication networks, the opening of markets and internationalization of finance markets and the deregulation of those finance systems, which makes traditional nation states, lose more control over their own economies and societies (Bowman, 2010).

The deregulation of the global finance markets that started around the 1970’s had the effect of outflanking all the government’s ability to intervene into their own economy, raising taxes or minimum wages simply led to the capital being moved elsewhere (Bowman, 2010). Castells (2000) explains the radical transformation of the global power relations through the following comparison. First nation states where a sort of receptacles for holding water. They all had the ability to control the flow of water coming in and out through fixed conduits to other receptacles, other nation states. Globalization turned the tables for the nation states, now instead, most receptacles see themselves being emptied of water, money, and instead of controlling their water they float around on the seas, bobbing along, carried by the ebbs and flows of the sea of finance.

But not only the financial world was being influenced by this new phenomenon, globalization, also culture, identity and even forms of martial arts started flowing around the world. The development of the international media is also a big part of the reason that martial arts started to spread, originally martial arts was spread through the military, margins and migration.

Historically, martial arts developed around areas and sites that where in conflict, and their spread came through cultural and social diasporas that spread out from these historical areas and sites. However, since the 1970’s, easy availability of mass media caused martial arts to spread through these new forms of interconnections, making it easy to spread and transform in many ways. The media made people aware and gave them knowledge about martial arts styles from different cultural contexts (Bowman, 2010).

Global success of Bruce Lee’s films and the upcoming of Kung Fu TV series in the beginning of the 1970’s gave martial arts a big boost. These films and shows effectively introduced kung fu to the western society, leading to kung fu and karate schools popping up everywhere in the western world

(Thompson 1993). These schools mostly made various claims to authenticity through some sort of connection to an authentic East Asian lineage. This claiming of an authentic connection to Asia has faded through time but did not disappear (Bowman, 2010).

Postmodern martial arts Right up to recent times the major propellant to developing martial arts has been strongly related to cultural requirements and necessities like defense, conquest, security, domination and survival (Kennedy and Guo, 2005). Is the recent past the nature of the borders on which martial arts develop have arguably been transformed. Instead of martial arts developing on the lines of conflict and warfare, in the contemporary technology and information replete context, innovation of martial arts today is taking place on the borders between styles and approaches. There is strong reasoning for the postmodern proliferation of martial arts; military methods have become increasingly technologized, virtualized and dehumanized. The distance between warfare and computer game-play have increasingly been blurred (Hables Gray, 1997). In modern times, hand to hand combat is decreasing and even in the public space arms like knives and guns are used more often when a violent encounter occurs. Therefore unarmed combat either increases or declines altogether, also the reasoning for following lessons in martial arts can differ. Health, sport, discipline and simple fun can become more significant in other contexts.

Martial arts, migration, military and media Historically martial arts mostly developed on the context of the margin of empire, places where colonizing powers or governments where being resisted. Examples are Kali and Eskrima in the Philippines, Capoeira in Brazil and also Salit in the Dutch East Indies. They originate from a military point but have spread in various ways, ways that are mostly linked to media. Their initial development was linked to military, and the older forms of spreading are linked to migration, the best example of this is Okinawan karate. Although karate was first linked to people associated with military training, the real global spread and representation of karate was due to amazing tales, fantastic legends and fantasies popularized first in travel literature and later in films and Television (Krug, 2001). Krug (2001) says Asian martial arts first appeared in Hollywood films around the 1930s and became a common good in the 1960s. This proliferation of martial arts relates to the military and global geopolitical processes and events at the time. Also the proliferation of the cinema was a cause for martial arts to become a new familiar form of knowledge in the West, also a lot of soldiers who had been in Asia and learned eastern martial arts started their own schools in the West. A standardization and institutionalization of martial arts arose; this institutionalization took the form of formal lesson structures, uniforms and the coloured belt system that arose in the Western Karate scene. This new form of karate had the lethal moves either removed or redefined, in this way the

10 sport has been sanitized. What was once a locally orientated form of martial arts was suddenly globalized and westernized. Karate became connected with the discourses of health, sport and various ideas and beliefs about oriental mysticism and spiritual movements. Krug (2001) thinks martial arts have since then, until the present day been in a relationship not only with the sport in general but also more with bodybuilding as a reason to start following lessons in martial arts.

Forms of martial arts Globalization in martial arts occurs in the sense of fragmentation and splitting of development. Combinations, re-combinations with often unexpected elements borrowed from different societies, styles and cultural traditions created many different styles of martial arts circumnavigating the world. Firstly Judo and karate became the popular martial arts of the West, mainly influenced by the American movie and television industry. Later these sports were combined with western sports like wrestling and boxing, together they formed the martial arts researched in this bachelor thesis, MMA and kickboxing.

Traditional martial arts vs modern self-defense training Self-defense is defined as using different strategies to keep you safe from physical and emotional harm that is initiated by an attacker (Nower, 2007). Self-defense training is something that is needed to require such skills. The content of self-protection instruction is can quite differ. The training can involve traditional martial arts, modern self-defense, classroom education, videotape instruction or a combination of those approaches that combine both physical techniques and knowledge. Traditional martial arts and modern self-defense training are the two most popular forms of learning self- defense. Traditional martial arts are derived from traditional Asian cultures and consist of self- protection systems and codified training and practice made for fighting (Nakamura, 2001). Modern self-defense is mostly a combination of traditional martial arts plus wrestling and boxing. MMA is in that sense the perfect modern self-defense technique as it combines all styles of martial arts (Breitenbecher, 2000). Traditional martial arts do not have a big focus on escape strategies but rather on to disable the attacker as quickly as possible, also the ‘one strike, one kill’ concept is part of the traditional martial arts. These techniques are, when trained well, very reliable for moments where arousal, emotion and anxiety are present (Eysenck & Calvo, 1992). Modern self-defense programs are very variable in the content, focus and intensity of training. The techniques are a combination of traditional martial arts, boxing and wrestling. It is due to the trainer if these techniques are used in the right way, some techniques can only be learned in years of training while others can be learned in a few weeks.

Self-defense and martial arts for women The techniques trained during modern self-defense differ for every trainer, when self-defense training is focused on women, training should be different than training used for men. Angleman et al. ( 2009) argue that training for women should be more focused on training kicks with the legs, as legs are the strongest point of a women and can inflict considerable damage to an attacker. Traditional martial arts are better for learning techniques and a trainer will adjust the program to any individual program while modern self-defense is a ‘one size fits all’ approach. A key for success in self-defense is continuous practice, a technique or move should be an automatic reflex regardless of the form of training. Traditional martial arts techniques are not easy to learn and often not applicable to real life threat situations, modern self-defense like krav maga is more effective and is easier to learn. Hybrid martial arts like modern Karate or kickboxing are the best choices for women. With modern karate and kickboxing specific training for each individual is learned and moves are relatively easy to learn (Frazer & Russel, 2000). All studies done on self-defense regarding women are based on the feeling of safety and not on the increase of preventing, escaping or countering an attack. Hybrid forms of martial arts seem the most suited for women as traditional martial arts mostly takes time and is originally designed for men (Angleman et al., 2009).

Cultural geographies The reason to start following lessons in MMA or kickboxing can differ for different cultures. In Thailand, Muay Thai is a national sport being thought to kids from as early as the age of 4. National competitions for kids are spread all around the country while in many western countries brutal forms of martial arts are not allowed to be thought to kids under 16 (Green, 2011). Wrestling however is a big sport in the United States; children from a young age are put on wrestling lessons. While wrestling might be less aggressive and brutal as Muay Thai is, switching to MMA in quite common as wrestling techniques are combined with kickboxing (United States Youth Wrestling, 2014).

Controversy There is a lot of controversy over brutal forms of martial arts like MMA and kickboxing, on the one hand they are the sports frequently shown in a negative light by the media due to links with the mafia and other gangs, and on the other hand there are a lot of people finding confidence and safety in the sport. In the USA the legislation involved with MMA is a difficult story, as the sport allows almost everything in the ring and a lot of injuries and even deaths occur. Fights within the cage have to follow rules made by the UFC, problems occur when people that are trained in MMA use their skills outside of the cage. Daum (2011) writes about the problems that occur and the legislation that is needed with people that are trained in MMA, these conclusions can be used in this bachelor thesis

12 to see if and how these problems occur in Amsterdam. Lacking of legislation caused for unsafe fights to happen, with devastating results for the fighters.

Brown & Johnson (2000) write about the education of a person through physical education, the physical medium is a tool to teach people to feel more secure about themselves and to behave responsibly toward others throughout their lives. The writers see martial arts as a tool to teach people about life and giving people more security, safety and confidence. In this bachelor thesis research will be done into why people are following MMA or kickboxing lessons, this theory suggests that safety, security and confidence can be the main reason for people to follow lessons.

Chapter 3

Research design

In this chapter the research design of this thesis will be set apart. First the sub questions will be explained, and then the hypothesis will be given followed by the operationalization of the variables used in this thesis.

Sub questions To answers the research question, it is necessary to split the question up in several sub questions that are more measurable and answerable. These sub questions will be answered through empirical and theoretical research; this will be explained further on in the research design chapter. The sub questions for this thesis are:

 Who organizes MMA and kickboxing fights and since when are fights organized in Amsterdam?  What role do safety, the feeling of power and security and the workout MMA and kickboxing gives have in the reason to follow lessons in MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam?  What role do global and local processes play in the popularity of MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam?

These sub questions can be answered through empirical and theoretical research; each question has its own form of research that will be fully explained later on in this research design. The first question is going to be researched through in-depth interviews with organizations that organize fights in MMA and kickboxing, also literature studies will be done to get a clear picture of who organizes fights and how they are being organized. The second question is answered through analyzing the spread questionnaires amongst people following lessons in MMA or kickboxing with SPSS. The third question will partly be answered through literature studies, partly through the in-depth interviews and will be further explained through the questionnaires that will be spread amongst the people that follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing.

Type of research The type of research that is used for this bachelor thesis is a case study; the subject and the research question are a typical case in Amsterdam. A case study is a descriptive, exploratory or explanatory analysis of a typical group (Yin, 2009). In this case the group that is being researched is the people following lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam. The goal for this thesis is to find out why this group is following lessons in the brutal forms of martial arts, and what variables play a role in the decision to start following lessons in these disciplines. Also the organizations that organize fights will be researched; the role they play in the popularity of MMA and kickboxing will be set apart. This research is unique because it has never been done; also a comparable case in another city has not yet been undertaken. This makes it a unique opportunity to do a case study that will be exploratory and hopefully also explanatory.

Hypothesis In this paragraph the most important theoretical assumptions are being shown, this model gives a clear picture on the hypothesis of how the popularity of MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam can be explained.

Global processes

Local

Safety processes

Popularity of Power and MMA and

security kickboxing in Amsterdam

Workout

The concepts safety, power and security, workout and the global and local processes will be further explained in the operationalization. The concepts safety, power and security and workout will be handled as explanatory variables that influence the popularity of MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam. In this causal model the relationship between the explanatory variables and the depended variable is being influenced by the local processes while global processes influence all the variables.

Research units The research units in this bachelor thesis are the people following lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam. Because it is impossible to reach everyone that follows lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam, it has been chosen to take questionnaires from people following lessons among six different MMA and kickboxing schools in Amsterdam. Everyone in those six different schools should have the same chance of getting in this research; therefore different times and different level groups have been chosen to spread the questionnaires amongst. The six different MMA and kickboxing schools are R-Grip, XENASports, VandeVathorst, VosGym, Vu sportcentrum and the USC. These schools are all located in Amsterdam, and all have a different kind of people following lessons, the USC and Vu sportcentrum are both university gyms, while VosGym and VandeVathorst are both located in Amsterdam West, an area with mainly non-western immigrants (CBS.nl, 2011). All MMA and kickboxing schools have two kinds of trainings, training for amateurs and training for people actually fighting in the ring, competition fighters. To give everybody an equal chance to get into the research, visits to the amateur and competition fighting classes will be made. As there is not a sampling frame where a randomized sample can be taken from, this way the sample should be as representative as possible for the population. Classes will be visited at different times, so anyone following lessons will have an equal chance of getting in on the research, also multiple weeks of taking questionnaires will be done so if someone is sick he or she still has a chance the week after. The questionnaire will also be spread online through the Facebook pages of the six different MMA and kickboxing schools, in that way people that for some reason did not go to the lessons in the week during the research are still able to fill in a questionnaire.

Research methods In this thesis different research methods are used to answer the research question and its sub questions. The methods that are being used are in-depth interviews, questionnaires and literature studies.

In-depth interviews Laying contact with organizations that organize fights is done get interviews with managers of these organizations. Contact is been made through email, Facebook and phone calls. Contact is made with Simon Rutz, the former owner of It’s Showtime, one of the biggest kickboxing event organizations in the world that held big kickboxing events in the Amsterdam Arena. Also contact has been laid with Ali Günyar, a former fighter and now owner of Team Günyar, an organization that organizes big kickboxing fights in the Netherlands. Contact has also been made with Cor Hemmers, CEO of Glory Netherlands, the organization that bought It’s Showtime in 2012. An interview has been held with Rachid Lamalam and Sebastien van Dusschoten the two replacing CEO’s of Glory. Glory now organizes MMA and kickboxing fights throughout the world. The interviews with these three key players in the world of organizing MMA and kickboxing fights have been written out and analyzed with Atlas.ti. These analyzes will be further explained in the answering of the first sub question. The item list used during the interviews can be found in the appendices.

Questionnaires Questionnaires have been spread at the six different MMA and kickboxing schools described earlier. The questionnaires started with some personal questions, involving gender, education level and age. Afterwards Likert scale questions about safety issues, workout and the feeling of power and security have been asked. Further explanation will be given in the operationalization paragraph. The questionnaire can also be found in the appendices.

Literature studies Literature studies have been used to explore the history of MMA and kickboxing and how these sports globalized. Multiple articles about martial arts have been used to get a more clear picture of how the sports work and have evolved through time. Statistical data from CBS and O + S Amsterdam have been added to the data.

Operationalization The reason for people to start following lessons in MMA and kickboxing can vary, safety, power and security and a good workout can all be reasons to start following lessons in these disciplines. Although these variables are quite clear to work with, it is necessary to operationalize these variables into more measurable indicators. The concepts global and local processes also have to be operationalized to make them more measurable.

Safety Safety is a concept that seems quite clear but has to be transformed into a variable or indicator that is more measurable. First the concept safety is going to be split up in different dimensions; the dimensions used in this thesis are the feeling of safety, objective safety, self-defense and statistical safety. These dimensions are not yet measurable so they are going to be divided into different variables or indicators.

The feeling of safety The feeling of safety is going to be measured through a set of questions in the questionnaire that is spread among the research population. In the questionnaire, one paragraph regarding the feeling of safety is put in. The paragraph contains a set of propositions with a Likert scale 1 to 5, 1 is completely disagree and 5 is fully agree, 3 is neutral. The propositions are:

 I feel safe, alone at night, in Amsterdam  I have no problem with walking around, alone at night, in Amsterdam  I feel safer, alone on the street, due to following lessons in MMA or kickboxing  After following lessons in MMA or kickboxing, I more often travel alone at night

With these four propositions, anyone following lessons in MMA or kickboxing that fills in a questionnaire can get a score between four and twenty. The score shows the feeling of safety someone has, later on in the thesis there will be calculations with SPSS to see if different kind of people score different scores. An extra question in the questionnaire is do you ever feel threatened on the street? Answers are never, sometimes, often and really often.

Objective safety Objective safety is going to be measured through two questions in the questionnaire. The first question is: Did you ever have a physical confrontation on the street? The possible answers are no, yes before I followed lessons in MMA or kickboxing and yes since I am following lessons in MMA or kickboxing. When someone fills in yes they also have to give an indication of what kind of physical confrontation it was. The second question is: Did you ever have a physical confrontation on the street

19 where 112 was called and the police or ambulance was involved? For this question the same answers are possible as with the first question regarding objective safety.

Self-defense Self-defense can be measured in different ways, the amount of time spent on following lessons in MMA or kickboxing can be an influence on the ability to perform self-defense when necessary. Also the same question that has been asked during the feeling of safety, I feel safer, alone on the street, due to following lessons in MMA or kickboxing, can indicate if someone feels safer, the score on this question is perhaps higher when people are following lessons in MMA or kickboxing for a longer period of time. If a person has been in a physical confrontation after he or she started following lessons in MMA or kickboxing they have to fill in what kind of physical confrontation this was. People might be able to withstand the attacker now they follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing.

Statistical safety Statistical safety is going to be measured through crime rates; these will be found on the O + S site of Amsterdam, the site on statistics of all kinds. The crime rates belonging to the different districts in Amsterdam have been linked to the districts in the dataset in SPSS.

Power and security Power and security are concepts that are not measurable variables yet, as with safety, these concepts first have to be split up in different dimensions. The dimensions that will be used are the feeling of power and security, real power and security and involvement in fights.

The feeling of power and security The feeling of safety is going to be measured through a set of questions in the questionnaire that is spread among the research population. In the questionnaire, one paragraph regarding the feeling of power and security is put in. The paragraph contains a set of propositions with a Likert scale 1 to 5, 1 is completely disagree and 5 is fully agree, 3 is neutral. The propositions are:

 I feel more powerful on the street since I follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing  I feel more confident on the street since I follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing

In chapter 5 calculations with SPSS will be done to check if people answer differently on these propositions when they have a different age, education level, sex or have spent less or more time training. These calculations will be corrected for their reason in following lessons and the district they are living in.

Real power and security To measure the real power and security the following questions in the questionnaire have been asked:

 I would rather avoid a fight since I follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing  I would not evade a fight very quickly now I follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing

Both propositions can be answered through a Likert scale going from 1 to 5, where 1 is completely disagree and 5 is fully agree, 3 is neutral. The answers will be combined to get a total score on real power and security. Because the second proposition is a negative questions the score will be turned around, 5 will be 1, 4 will be 2, 3 stays 3, 2 will be 4 and 1 will be 5. Afterwards the two scores will be added up.

Involvements in fights To measure the concept involvements in fight questions about physical confrontations on the street have been asked. They are explained in the safety paragraph, and will also be used in this paragraph to measure if somebody with a different education level or age has a bigger chance to get involved in fight, this will be measured with SPSS.

Workout Workout is a more measurable concept than safety and power and security but is still not a concept that can be measured without dividing it into dimensions with different variables and indicators. The dimensions that have been used are fitness and the time spent on following lessons in MMA or kickboxing.

Fitness Fitness is measured through a set of Likert scale propositions in a questionnaire, the Likert scales are from 1 to 5, where 1 is completely disagree, 5 is fully agree and 3 is neutral. In the questionnaire a paragraph regarding fitness is put in. The propositions in the paragraph are:

 I feel fit, I have a good stamina  I started following lessons in MMA or kickboxing to work on my fitness and stamina  By following lessons in MMA or kickboxing my fitness and stamina gets better

The scores on these propositions can differ for different kinds of people; with SPSS calculations have been done to see if different kind of people score differently on the variable ‘fitness’.

Amount of time spent on following lessons in MMA or kickboxing Another part of the workout is the amount of time spent on following lessons in MMA or kickboxing, to get an answer to this question, two questions in the questionnaire have been asked. The first question is: How long have you been following lessons in MMA or kickboxing? Please fill in an answer in months. The second question is: On average, how many hours a week do you follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing? The two answers will be combined to get the total amount of time spent on following lessons in MMA or kickboxing. As the first question is in months and the second one in weeks the average amount of hours have to be multiplied with the average amount of weeks that is in a month. With 3 normal years and 1 leap year every 4 years, the average amount of days in a year is 365.25. When you divide this by 12 you have the average amount of days a month, 30.4375. This amount has to be divided by 7 to get the average amount of weeks in a month, 4.348. So the average amount of hours spent a week has to be multiplied with 4.348 before being multiplied with the total amount of months spent on following lessons in MMA or kickboxing. This calculation gives the most accurate answer in the total amount of time spent on following lessons in MMA or kickboxing.

Global en local processes In the hypothesis local processes influence the relationship between the independent and dependent variables, to examine this, this concept first has to be made into more measurable variables. Global processes influences all the variables and therefore also has to be made into more measurable variables and dimensions.

Global processes Global processes are transformed in different dimensions; the dimensions that are used are commercialization, popularity and global brands. These dimensions will be divided in different variables.

Commercialization Commercialization is measured through a set of different variables. These variables are the amount of fights on television, the amount of money a fighter can win in a fight and forms of distribution. These variables have been measured through literature studies.

Popularity Popularity can be measured through the amount of people watching fights on television. Also the amount of countries that distribute the fights on television is a way to calculate the popularity of the

22 two disciplines. Also what time fights are broadcasted is a tool to see how popular a show is on television.

Global brands Global brands are measured through literature studies on the global brands and also with interviews with the organizations that organize MMA or kickboxing fights.

Local processes Local processes is transformed in different dimensions, the dimensions that are used are popularity, safety and accessibility. The dimensions will be divided in different variables.

Popularity Popularity is measured through a question in the questionnaire. The question is: Why did you start following lessons in MMA or kickboxing? It is an open question and the answers will be categorized, which will give an indication of why people start following lessons in these disciplines and if these reasons differ for different kinds of people.

Safety Safety is measured through statistics on safety on the street, crime rates and raid figures have been used to get a picture of the safety issues.

Accessibility Accessibility is measured through the amount of schools giving lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam. Also the costs for following lessons and the costs of buying equipment are important for people to start following lessons or not. The estimated annual costs for following lessons in MMA or kickboxing will be compared with other popular sports in Amsterdam.

Chapter 4

Who organizes MMA and kickboxing fights and since when are fights organized in Amsterdam?

In order to get a clearer picture in who organize fights in Amsterdam and how they do this, this chapter uses in-depth interviews. Interviews with CEO’s of organizations who organize fights have been taken. The first in-depth interview was with Simon Rutz, the former CEO and owner of It’s Showtime. The second interview was with Ali Günyar, the owner and CEO of Team Günyar. The third interview was with Rachid Lamalam and Sebastien van Dusschoten, the two replacing CEO’s of Glory.

Interviews In order to get more information from people actually organizing fights in Amsterdam, three interviews have been done. All interviews had the same item list so the interviewees had the same subjects to discuss; in addition extra questions have been asked when an interviewee had information in a specific subject. The interviews have been analyzed with Atlas.ti to see what subjects the interviewees spoke about the most and to get an overview of all quotes.

Interview Simon Rutz To explore who organizes fights in Amsterdam and how these organizations work, an interview with Simon Rutz was held. Questions about Simon his organization and what role he played in the popularity of the sport have been asked. In this paragraph a summary with the most important outcomes will be given.

It’s Showtime Simon Rutz is the founder and former owner of it’s Showtime, an organization who organized kickboxing fights in the Netherlands and the rest of Europe. He sold the company to Glory in 2012 and has been retired since. He was also the former manager of many famous kick boxers, like Badr Hari and Melvin Manhoef. He made kickboxing the popular sport it is today, and helped legends like Badr and Melvin to become famous. He was the first person to make the athletes real stars, earning a lot of money and fame. ‘Ja, dat is een van de dingen die ik wilde doen, dat was vroeger niet zo. Echt van de vechtsporters sterren maken.’ Translated: Yes, that was one of the things I wanted to do. Really make the fighters into stars.

Simon tells more about the dream he created for the fighter, by making them stars and changing the way the sports are distributed so the fighters start to earn a lot of money. In combinatie met de droom dat ze het op televisie zien, dat ze sterren kunnen zijn, en dan horen ze bedragen die ze kunnen verdienen. Translated, in combination with the dream they see on television, that they can become a star, and they hear what kind of money they can make. Simon talks a lot about the global processes, the television shows that have been distributed to around 180 countries. He is proud of the way he brought the sport to a new level, giving it the attention it never had before. Furthermore he speaks about the television contracts he had with those 180 countries, in the Netherlands being RTL 7.

Global processes Simon Rutz spoke 15 times about global processes in his interview, being the subject he spoke about the most. He spoke about his own organization, It’s Showtime, and about other organizations, Glory, K1 and the UFC. He explains how the system with pay per view works in the United States and how it is difficult to get a similar system in Europe. A pay per view system is a system where people watch the fights at home on their televisions but have to pay per fight. These prices can be quite high; 50 dollars for a fight is no exception. Simon thinks people in Europe are not prepared to pay such amounts of money to see a fight on a television screen. That system, which works in the United States, generates a lot of money, which will also partly come to the fighters themselves. Simon thinks in the long term kickboxing has a bigger chance of being the biggest martial arts, UFC is doing a good thing in the United States, Canada and Brazil but in most countries Kickboxing is the most popular martial arts. He states that a standing fight is more interesting than a fight on the ground and therefore kickboxing potentially a bigger audience. Another problem with the UFC is that most fights are being held in the United States, and with the pay per view system the fights are being held prime time. This makes it difficult for European viewers as most fights are being held in the middle of the night.

Local processes Simon Rutz spoke 11 times about local processes in his interview, being the second most spoken about subject. He started It’s Showtime in 1998, but kickboxing fights are being organized since 30 years earlier according to Simon. He did change the kind of events around a fight; he was the first person to really make a show around the fights. He states that that is also one of the reasons the youth started following lessons in kickboxing in such large numbers. He thinks it is a shame that big fighting events cannot be organized anymore in Amsterdam, like the events he used to organize a few years ago in the Amsterdam Arena. Although there have been problems in the past, Simon thinks organizing big fighting events in Amsterdam will soon be possible again. New legislation for

25 promoters is introduced; an example is the BIBOB research every promoter first has to get through. When you have an approved BIBOB more things become possible, according to Simon. He believes in the background Glory is talking with the city of Amsterdam to get a fight in the Amsterdam Arena once again.

Power, security and self-defense Simon Rutz spoke 8 times about power, security and self-defense. Although the media create a different picture, Simon thinks most people starting lessons in MMA or kickboxing would rather not use their skills on the street. Also scum youth can be taught a lesson, taught respect and how to act on the street without using their fists. He thinks that in most cases, people learn more respect and would rather not fight on the street now they follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing. Discipline and respect are very important inside and outside the Dojo, he thinks most people become a better person and maybe only a few actually use it on the street. Learning kickboxing actually gives people a future, also by having a chance to become a professional. Most will get on the right path rather than becoming bad. He also believes that people that want to intimidate on the street will not follow lessons in martial arts but would rather buy a gun or a knife. This corresponds with Harbles Gray (1997) who thinks fights in the streets are being held with more than only the fists. Simon thinks that for little kid’s parents it might be a safe feeling if their kids know how to defend themselves.

Workout Simon spoke about the workout the sport gives only two times, stating that most people probably follow lessons to get in shape. He thinks 99% is just following lessons and only 1% will actually try to become professional, the rest will mainly do it for the sport and the workout.

Interview Ali Günyar To get a broader picture of who organizes kickboxing fights an interview with Ali Günyar was held. Ali is a former professional kick boxer and current organizer of big kickboxing events. Together with his brother he leads Team Günyar, the organization they themselves own. Team Günyar was also going to organize the fight with Badr Hari the 17th of May but Badr chose to fight in Dubai instead.

Team Günyar Team Günyar is an organization that is owned by Ali and his brother; they try to organize the biggest kickboxing fights in the Netherlands. They started organizing fights in 2001; from then on they had an annual event until 2006. After a break of 2 years they started organizing fights again, bigger and more often. Currently they organize two to four fights a year with around 2500 guests. The fights are mostly broadcasted on television; Team Günyar has contracts with Eurosport. It is Team Günyar’s biggest priority to get the fights on Dutch television, this way they want to attract more people to kickboxing.

Global processes Ali says there used to be a lot of big organizations organizing big fights in the Netherlands but they slowly faded away, partly due to legislation. Although there is a decline in fights being organized an increase in people following lessons can be seen. After football, MMA and kickboxing are probably the second and third biggest sports at the moment, when you don’t count going to the gym as a sport. Ali thinks it is a shame that martial arts and kickboxing in particular have such a bad name in the media. Ali thinks it is a shame that only the negative news about kickboxing is being spread and not all the positive things. He and his brother try to get the sport in a more positive flow, media wise. He thinks MMA could help getting the sport in a more positive vibe, especially the UFC which is popular in a lot of countries and has a better reputation than the kickboxing organizations. The biggest downfall in Ali’s opinion is the way the sport is treated now, you can train as much as you want but you cannot show it in a ring, not legally. Only some events are being held but not enough to give the lower guys a chance. Ali thinks there is a lot of economic potential in kickboxing, not only for fighters but for promoters, television and merchandising companies. Kickboxing is cool to watch on television, not like Karate with all the rules no one understands. ‘als je een karatewedstrijd, met die beknopte regels, gaat uitzenden, iedereen gaat zappen.’ Translated, if you send out a karate match, with all those difficult rules, everyone will change channels. He says karate is just not the sport to watch on television, kickboxing is far more interesting, the same thing Simon Rutz said. Ali says the government should start stimulating kickboxing instead of discouraging it. There is a lot of economic potential in kickboxing, the same counts for football but because the interests are so big no one discourages it, the same should be done with kickboxing to maximize its full potential.

Local processes Ali talks about a federation that is going to be introduced that will be the overruling organization around events, he thinks organizations like his are going to have problems with that. Ali thinks it is strange that some smaller kick boxing events hardly have any rules to follow and for the bigger ones it is hardly possible to legally organize a fight. The municipality does not know what is going on in the kickboxing scene but still does not allow fights to happen. The current policy from the municipality is also strange according to Ali, they subsidize gyms to give lessons to troubled youth but that same youth is not allowed to show their skills in the ring. Smaller fights are allowed but fighting a big event is not, that is not stimulating the youth to train as hard as they should for professional kickboxing. With the amount of training someone who professionally fights has to do, they should have a good wage to come with that. Ali says the municipality does not give kickboxing the chance to grow to its full potential.

Power, security and self-defense Ali says his first priority with people starting lessons at his gym, is to help change him or her into a better person and then into a better kick boxer. He does not only give them kickboxing lessons but also life lessons. Ali thinks when fighters can train a lot but cannot express themselves in the ring and cannot earn money with it, the chance of getting involved with crime becomes bigger. Especially young talented guys get tricked into working for people who do not pay any taxes. Ali thinks that normally no one from his classes will use his or her kickboxing skills outside the ring. He teaches them responsibility and especially when not to use their skills. He also thinks that fights on the streets these days, especially when it is between people from gangs or whosoever are not being fought with fists but with other weapons.

Workout Ali thinks kickboxing is very good for your stamina and general health; this is becoming a general idea. Even all those diet programs on television involve a lot of kickboxing lessons, just because it is a good way to burn fat and get in shape. It is a very intense form of training, although according to Ali, amateur training has become much easier. A lot of parents do not want their kids to get beaten up during training, according to Ali this used to be the case when he was still young, the trainer could do whatever he wanted.

Interview Rachid Lamalam and Sebastien van Dusschoten To get a broader picture in who organizes kickboxing fights, an interview with Rachid Lamalam and Sebastien van Dusschoten was held. They are the two replacing CEO’s of Glory international, at this moment the biggest organizer of kickboxing events in the world.

Glory Sebastien van Dusschoten is one of the replacing CEO’s of Glory but his main job is fighter logistics and fighter administration. Glory Netherlands, where they are placed, is the center of the worldwide organization. When a fighter comes in from talent operations, they take care of everything until he is in the ring. Flights, tickets, medical checks, Everything that is necessary before a fighter can enter the ring is the responsibility of Sebastien. Next to Glory Netherlands there is also an office in the United Kingdom, they are responsible for everything that has got to do with promotion and IT. At this moment Glory has 12 events every year, about eight in the United Stated and about 4 in Europe, these figures can differ per year. At this moment no fights are being organized in the Netherlands, as they cannot get permission to organize big events. Glory took over It’s Showtime from Simon Rutz, Sebastien and Rachid are both former employees of It’s Showtime. Rachid Lamalam has two functions in Glory next to being the replacing CEO. During the fights organized in Europe, Rachid is the floor manager. For the events being organized in the United States, Rachid organizes everything around the production of an event. A big part of his job is getting the visa for everyone involved during a fight, so not only the fighters, but also people from production, medical staff and everyone else involved. Everything around production before a fight is Rachid’s responsibility, photo-shoots, administration and everything backstage during a fight. While most fighters are from Europe, most fights are being organized in the United States. The biggest market for kickboxing fights is in the United States, for the events but also for television. Fighters from the United States are starting to come up now they have a big platform to show their skills but it needs time. In the Netherlands we have a gigantic pool of talent, mainly because former pro fighters start to train their own pupils. Glory would like to organize events in the Netherlands in the future but are now being stopped by the mayor of Amsterdam and Rotterdam. Events in the Amsterdam Arena and Ahoi Rotterdam are not allowed by these mayors for various reasons.

Global processes Sebastien and Rachid spoke 27 times about global processes, as Glory is a global organization this is logically their most spoken about subject. A big problem they have with organizing fights around the world is the legislation; legislation can differ for every county and in the United States for every state. As a kickboxing organization they have a lot of rules to obey, with their own words; kickboxing is always under a magnifying glass.

Rachid and Sebastien have to make sure they obey every rule and do not make any mistakes. As quick as they turned into the biggest organization in the world, they can fall apart and be banned. Glory is hoping for American fighters to arise and becoming a Rocky alike legend. They had a similar situation with Pat Barry, a fighter who fought some good fights last year against Russian fighters. Although Americans really like kickboxing, the sport is not going to last without an all American hero, according to Rachid. Therefor they have implied talent scouts in the United States to make sure American talents stay in the kickboxing sport and do not transfer to the UFC or normal boxing. With Glory as a big platform where they can earn a lot of money, American kickboxing is in the rise. SPIKE TV is the current broadcaster for the fights in the United States, a big player with a lot of potential viewers. K1 and It’s Showtime changed the rules for kickboxing and Muay Thai to make it more interesting for television, no clinching and only 3 rounds compared to the normal 5 rounds. This made it more interesting to watch, Glory continued that path. According to Rachid is MMA a very interesting and cool sport to watch, the only problem is that sometimes you have ground fights where you would see two guys cuddling for 4 to 5 minutes. Kickboxing with the current rules is according to them more interesting to watch as their will not bet any ground fights or clinching. In the Netherlands the fights are broadcasted on RTL 7 a week after the actual fight. As the fights are primetime in the United States it is more interesting to broadcast the fights on a different time in the Netherlands. Rachid also states that it is necessary for them to have fighters from all countries, only fighters from the Netherlands would eventually be non-profitable as it would not be interesting anymore for other people to watch, comparable with speed skating. So talent operations will search for talent from all around. Another thing a fighter needs, especially in the United States, is charisma. A fighter should be able to handle himself in front of the camera, especially Americans really like a part of showmanship. With Glory it is even in their contract, promotional stuff and interviews are obliged. In the United States they act more like stars, a lot of guys also know that if they are good in their sport they can get a scholarship for the University. So when they are from a more poor part of the States they know that through sports they can achieve fame and money. In the Netherlands this professional attitude against sport is still lacking.

That fighters should have a professional attitude is not more than logic thinks Sebastien, but now the fighters are being put under a magnifying glass in such a bad way that they cannot do anything wrong anymore. Rachid says, Hoge bome vangen overal wind, overal en vooral bij het kickboksen, High trees catch a lot of wind, especially with kickboxing. A Dutch phrase meaning that important people attract a lot of attention. They have to watch everything they do and cannot afford to make a single error.

When stating the hypothesis, that martial arts are becoming more brutal and therefore more commercially successful, they both did not agree. With both kickboxing and MMA far more rules are implied since the beginning. Also the medical staff en reports the fighters have to have has increased enormously. After a KO they have to do a lot of checks and cannot fight for at least six weeks. Also boxing, one of the very first martial arts, is still the most profitable martial arts according to Sebastien. And for television they think the sport might have gotten more spectacular but not more extreme, due to all the rules and medical staff arranged.

Local processes Sebastien says there are a lot of smaller kickboxing events in the Netherlands every weekend but the really big events slowly disappeared. You used to have It’s Showtime, SLAM, balance and many more but they are all gone now. The big events have problems with legislation, strange according to Rachid because the smaller events do not have any legislation at all. And all the last incidents, like the one in Hoorn where there was a shooting (NHD, 2011), where at small events. And due to incidents like the one in Hoorn mayors do not want big kickboxing events in their city anymore. Big kickboxing events are not allowed anymore in the Netherlands and smaller events, like the one in Hoorn, still happen every weekend. Rachid says that their job is to sell tickets and have a good event, they do not have to check who is coming to their fights. If a person has been to jail for his crime and is now free, you cannot tell him where not to go. Rachid says that for every football match, hundreds of thousands of euros is spend on police force by the city, never a single penny was spent on a kickboxing event. They paid for security themselves and did not need help from the city. Their audience is probably better than the audience of the average football match but kickboxing is once again under the magnifying glass. They never had any damage made to the city by their audience while the football audience smashed half the city apart, and that was when they won. The thing is that football is more interesting on the commercial side, and therefor they can get away with far more.

Sebastian also talks about the accessibility of kickboxing. While a lot of sports are quite expensive or boring, kickboxing is both affordable and fun. Even people who start kickboxing for the workout get a more secure feeling and learn martial arts as a bonus. Also the offer is huge, with more than 20 schools only in Amsterdam; kickboxing is the third biggest sport after football and going to the gym. For poor kids or for trouble making kids subsidies go to kickboxing and MMA schools with the so called ‘sportpas’ to get the kids to sport and learn them some discipline. The strange thing according to Sebastien is that they cannot show their skills on a big stage in the Netherlands. With It’s Showtime a few years ago they used to do more than the acquired rules, they even had bomb checks and no alcohol before 10 P.M. Strangely enough they could not do events anymore while they worked so hard on following the legislation and even doing more. Bigger events also have the

31 resources to do better checks, detention gates etc. It’s Showtime in the Netherlands before and Glory all around the world now are far more professional than all those small events that are allowed. Another problem in the Netherlands is that the legislation is not cared for nationally but can differ per city, they do not follow the same line and that makes it even more difficult for an organization like Glory to organize an event in the Netherlands.

Power, security and self-defense Sebastien thinks there are probably people following lessons in MMA or kickboxing to get more secure. Probably some parents also put their kids on martial arts so they feel more secure about themselves. Further a lot of pity-crime criminals are being put on martial arts by the police to teach them respect. A friend of Rachid has a martial arts school and 50% of his income comes from kids who are obliged to follow lessons by the police. People also use martial arts to get frustration out of their system, using the sport to abreact. People used to do martial arts for self-defense but this has changed; now it is more for the sport and the workout.

Workout They both agree on martial arts and especially MMA and kickboxing being really intense sports. Even top models are now using kickboxing to get in shape, as you train every aspect of your body. Every MMA or kickboxing training is 90% workout and only 10% actual fighting. With MMA and kickboxing you do learn to collect pushes and kicks and it is not a lot of giving but mainly taking.

Chapter 5

What role do safety, the feeling of power and security and the workout MMA and kickboxing gives have in the reason to follow lessons in MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam?

In order to get a clearer picture in what role safety, the feeling of power and security and the workout MMA and kickboxing give, 169 questionnaires have been filled in by people following lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam. These questionnaires have been spread among people following lessons at the VosGYm, R-Grip, VandeVathorst, USC, Vu-sportcentrum and Xenasports.

People following lessons in MMA or kickboxing 169 questionnaires have been filled in by people following lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam. In this paragraph, what kind of people filled in the questionnaire will be set apart.

Age The average age of people following lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam is 26,46. The standard deviation is 6,478; roughly 80% is between the age of 20 and 36. The mean is 26 and the mode is 22, 23 people in total have the age 22, this is probably due to the high amount of students that filled in a questionnaire in the two university schools. The oldest person who filled in a questionnaire is 54 and the youngest 13.

Sex 64,5 percent of the people that filled in a questionnaire was male, 34,9 percent was female and ,6 percent was unknown. Women are on average a bit younger than men, 26,04 compared to 26,45.

Education level

Figure 1: Education level among people following MMA or kickboxing lessons in Amsterdam

As can been seen in figure 1, the average education level is really high among people following lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam. More than 75% has been to university or university for applied science. This is higher than the average percentage higher educated people in Amsterdam, which is 38 %( O+S Amsterdam, 2012). This is probably due to the high amount of students that filled in a questionnaire.

Time spend training On average a person who is following lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam has been following lessons for 35,34 months, and on average 3,76 hours a week is spend on training. To compute a new variable ‘total time spent training’, these two variables have been multiplied with each other and then with 4,348. This is on average 679 hours in total, not taking in account that people maybe have injuries or go on holiday. On average men have been training for 39,87 months and women for 27,54 months, also women train slightly less hours a week, 3,58 compared to 3,84 for men.

Neighborhood The neighborhood that someone lives in has been requested in the Questionnaire.

Independent variables The variables that have been set apart above are the independent variables in this research, causality between the independent and dependent variables will be searched for.

Safety In the operationalization sector the variable safety was split up in different concepts, these are the feeling of safety and objective safety.

The feeling of safety The variable ‘the feeling of safety’ is computed by adding the scores on four questions that have been asked in the questionnaire. The questions that have been used to compute the score are:

The score on the new variable, ‘the feeling of safety’, can vary from four to twenty, where four is the lowest score possible and twenty the highest. To see if there is any causality with the independent variables, crosstabs have been made with SPSS. The two variables that did have a correlation with ‘the feeling of safety’ are age and the total time spent training in months. The total amount of time spent on training is in hours and is not useful is we want to do a regression analyze as B-coefficients are going to be very low. The Pearson correlation between the total amount of months that a person has been following lessons and ‘the feeling of safety’ is, 204 with a Significance of, 015. A significance of, 05 will be used in this thesis to approve a correlation. The second variable that had a correlation with ‘the feeling of safety’ is age. Age had a correlation of -, 159 with a significance of, 049. A negative correlation means that when a person gets older he or she will score lower on ‘the feeling of safety’, on average. To get a better picture of this correlation regression analyzes have been done.

A linear regression has been done with ‘the feeling of safety’ as the dependent variable and age and the total time spent training in months as independent variables. There is no interdependence between the two independent variables. The R square of the model in total is, 094, which means that 9, 4% of the total variance in ‘the feeling of safety’ is caused by the two independent variables. 90, 6% of the variance is caused by other factors that were not involved in the questionnaire, residues. The model has a significance of, 001 and therefore is significant. Individually the two independent variables are still significant with significances of ,002 and ,005. The B-coefficient for the total time spent training in months is, 019. This means for every extra month of training the score on ‘the feeling of safety’ will go up by, 019. The B-coefficient for age is -, 108. This means that for every year that a person gets older his or her feeling of safety goes down by, 108. This means that if a person gets older but is training, that is feeling of safety will go up. 12 times, 019 is ,228 up for every year of

35 training and, 108 down for every year he or she gets older. In total this adds up to an increase of, 110 on ‘the feeling of safety’ for every year that someone is training.

To see if this result differs if the variable ‘sex’ is added, three-dimensional tables have been made. The correlation between ‘the total time spent training in months’ and ‘the feeling of safety’ is corrected for ‘sex’. The correlation between ‘the total time spent training in months’ and ‘the feeling of safety’ still exists for men but does not apply for women. Only men who train longer will get a higher score on ‘the feeling of safety’, the correlation is significant and the Pearson’s R value is ,216. The same goes for the correlation between ‘age’ and ‘the feeling of safety’, this relation only exists for men. This might be due to the low N of women.

An extra regression analyze has been done to see if this relation between the dependent and independent variables also differs in a regression model. A new linear regression between the independent variables ‘age’ and ‘the total time spent training in months’ and ‘the feeling of safety’ has been done. In the first regression the selected variable ‘sex’ is 1, male. The R square in this model is ,196, meaning that 19,6% in the variance of ‘the feeling of safety’ is explained by the independent variables when the sex is male. The model has a significance of ,000. The total time spent training in months has a b-coefficient of ,019 and a significance of ,001. ‘age’ has a b-coefficient of -,171 and a significance of ,000. Because ‘age’ is in year, the score of the total time spent training in months can be multiplied with 12 to get the b-coefficient for time spend training in years. 12 times ,019 is 0,228. So for every year of training ‘the feeling of safety’ goes up with ,228. ‘the feeling of safety’ also goes down with ,171 for every year that a men gets older. This means that for every year of training ‘the feeling of safety’ of men will go up with ,228-,171= 0,057. The regression with the selected variable ‘sex’ 2, female does not give any significant results.

Objective safety For the variable ‘objective safety’ the question, did you even have a physical confrontation on the street, was asked. Possible answers are no, yes before I started following lessons in kickboxing and yes since I have been following lessons in kickboxing.

Figure 2: Physical confrontations

In figure 2 the answers on the question about physical confrontations can be seen. Most people, 67,33%, never had a physical confrontation on the street. 26,67% had a physical confrontation before they started following lessons in MMA or kickboxing and 10% had a confrontation since they followed lessons in MMA or kickboxing. Crosstabs have been made to see if the independent variables have a correlation with this dependent variable.

Crosstabs between the independent variable and the answer options no have been made. 101 people answered no tot the question if they have ever been in a physical confrontation on the street. The only correlation that was found regarding this question was ‘sex’ and the answer option no. This had a positive correlation of ,189 with a significance of ,021. As male is 1 and female is 2 the positive correlation means that female have a bigger chance of answering no to the question if the ever had a physical confrontation on the street.

In a regression model with all the independent variables and the answer possibility no ‘sex’ is the only independent variable with a significance under ,05 namely ,011. The other independent variables do not have a significance that is under ,05. The Nagelkerke R square of this binary logistic regression model is ,096. This means that 9,6% of the variance in the dependent variable is caused by the independent variables. The exp(B) of ‘sex’ is 2,857. This means that ‘sex’ is of a big influence in the answer to wetter someone did or did not have a physical confrontation in the street. It is above 1,000 so it is a positive correlation. As female is 2 and male is 1 female have a bigger chance of answering no to the question; did you ever have a physical confrontation on the street.

Power and security In the operationalization paragraph the variable power and security was split up in different concepts. The concepts are the feeling of power and security, real power and security and involvements in fights.

The feeling of power and security The variable ‘the feeling of power and security’ is computed by adding the scores on two questions that have been asked in the questionnaire. The questions that have been used to compute the score are:

 I feel more powerful on the street since I follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing  I feel more confident on the street since I follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing

The new variable ‘the feeling of power and security’ have possible scores from 2 to 10, where people with a score of 10 feel very powerful and confident on the street and people with the score 2 do not feel powerful and confident on the street at all.

Crosstabs have been made with the independent variables and the dependent variable ‘the feeling of power and security’. In the crosstabs a correlation between the dependent variable ‘the feeling of power and security’ and the independent variables ‘age’ and ‘education level’ has been found. Unfortunately, there is also a correlation between ‘age’ and ‘education level’, meaning that probably only one is responsible for the variance in ‘the feeling of power and security’ and therefore is a spurious correlation between one of the independent variables and the dependent variable ‘the feeling of power and security’.

The independent variables ‘age’ and ‘education level’ have been put in a regression model with the dependent variable ‘the feeling of power and security’. Because all variables are seen as interval or ratio variables a linear regression analyze has been done. The R square of the model is ,078, so 7,8% of the variance in ‘the feeling of power and security’ is caused by ‘age’ and ‘education level’. In the regression model the significance of ‘age’ suddenly disappears and the significance of ‘education level’ becomes stronger. The B-coefficient that belongs to ‘education level’ is -,351, meaning that with going up one level of education, ‘the feeling of power and security’ will go down by ,351. The correlation between ‘age’ and ‘the feeling of power and security’ is a spurious correlation.

Real power and security The variable ‘real power and security’ is computed by adding the scores on two questions that have been asked in the questionnaire. The questions that have been used to compute the score are:

 I would rather avoid a fight since I follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing  I would not evade a fight very quickly now I follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing

On both propositions people could answer on a Likert scale from 1 to 5, 1 is completely disagree and 5 is fully agree. Since the second proposition is asked negative, the score will be turned around and will then be added up to the first score to get scores on ‘real power and security’. It is possible to get a score from 2 to 10. 10 means someone will always avoid and evade a fight. 2 means someone will not avoid a fight and would not evade a fight very quickly now he or she is following lessons in MMA or kickboxing.

Crosstabs are made between the independent variables and the dependent variable ‘real power and security’. The only correlation that was found was between ‘sex’ and ‘real power and security’. The correlation is negative, meaning that women have a higher chance of having a lower score on the variable. Lower score means they would not avoid a fight that quickly now they follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing. On average men score 7,24 points while women have an average score of 6,51, that is both above the neutral score of 6. This is also what comes out of the regression model, the model is significant and the B-coefficient is -,736. The exact difference between the two averages. The R square is ,049 meaning 4,9% of the variance in ‘real power and security’ is caused by ‘sex’.

Because the two questions are very much alike and they come after on another in the questionnaire there is a chance some people thought it was the same question. If we only take the first question, I would rather avoid a fight since I follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing, there could be different results. Crosstabs are made with only the first question, causing for again ‘sex’ to correlate but also the total hours spent training. ‘sex’ is still a negative correlation, meaning women would score lower on rather avoiding a fight since they follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing compared to men. The total hours spent training has a positive correlation with ‘real power and security’, meaning people who train longer will avoid a fight quicker.

Three-dimensional crosstabs have been made to see if the relationship between training longer and rather avoiding fights still exists when it is corrected for ‘sex’. Interesting enough the correlation still exists for men but does not apply anymore for women. The found correlation found between ‘sex’ and ‘real power and security’ therefore is plausible.

If ‘sex’ is responsible for the difference in the relation between the total hours spent training and ‘real power and security’ a regression model can be made with the original variable ‘real power and security’ and total hours spent training with selected case, male or female. When the selected case for the linear regression is 2, female, there is no significance and the R square is ,000. When the

39 selected case is 1, male, there is a significance of ,017 and an R square of ,066. This means that 6,6% of the variance on the dependent variable ‘real power and security’ for men is caused by the total hours they spend training. The B-coefficient for the total hours spend training per 100 hours is ,026. So for every 100 hours that a men spends on following lessons in MMA or kickboxing he will get a ,026 higher score on ‘real power and security’ and therefore rather avoid a fight in the street. ‘Sex’ is a moderating variable for the correlation between ‘total time spent training’ and ‘real power and security’.

Workout In the operationalization paragraph the variable workout was split up in different concepts. The concepts are ‘fitness’ and the total time spent following lessons in MMA or kickboxing.

Fitness The variable ‘fitness’ is computed by adding the scores on three questions that have been asked in the questionnaire. The questions that have been used to compute the score are:

On all three propositions people can get a score from 1 to 5, 1 is completely disagree and 5 is fully agree. 3 is neutral. When the three propositions are combined a possible score from 3 to 15 is possible. A person scoring a 3 does not feel fit, does not follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing to get fit and does not think his or her stamina is getting any better, this person does not care about the workout the sport gives. A person scoring a 15 will have a very good stamina, will follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing to improve his or her fitness and thinks following lessons helps him or her in this cause.

Crosstabs have been made between the independent variables and the dependent variable ‘fitness’. No correlation was found between the independent variables and the dependent variable ‘fitness’. To see if there is any correlation between the individual questions and the independent variables, a new crosstab with the questions separated is made. A negative correlation between the question, I started following lessons in MMA or kickboxing to work on my fitness and stamina, and ‘age’ was found. It is a negative correlation, meaning that when someone becomes older, it is less likely that that person follows lessons for stamina and fitness. When these two variables are put in a linear regression model the R square is ,038 and is significant. The B-coefficient that belongs to ‘age’ is - ,036. For every year that a person gets older his score on the question, I started following lessons in MMA or kickboxing to work on my fitness and stamina, will go down by 0,36.

Because the variable ‘fitness’ did not have any correlation with the independent variables the other dependent variables have been added in a new crosstab. A positive correlation between ‘fitness’ and ‘the feeling of safety’ was found, the significance belonging to that correlation is ,000. When these two variables are put in a regression model the R square is ,100 and the model is significant. The B- coefficient is ,213. When the variables ‘fitness’ goes up by 1 the score on ‘the feeling of safety’ will go up by ,213. Logically ‘fitness’ will be the independent variable and ‘the feeling of safety’ the dependent variable as feeling safer will probably not make you fitter but feeling fitter will probably make you feel safer.

Chapter 6

What role do global and local processes play in the popularity of MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam?

In this chapter the role that global and local processes play in the popularity of MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam will be researched. The variables explained in the operationalization paragraph will be tested. For this chapter, in-depth interviews, questionnaires and literature studies have been done.

Global en local processes In the causal model global en local processes influence the relationship between the independent and dependent variables, to examine this, these concepts first have to be made into more measurable variables.

Global processes Global processes are transformed in different dimensions; the dimensions that are used are commercialization and popularity. These dimensions will be divided in different variables.

While kickboxing did not use to be a sport where a lot of money can be won, since the existence of It’s Showtime fighters started to become real stars and earn a lot of money. Fighters like Badr Hari and Peter Aerts are now millionaires. Badr Hari won 272.000,- dollar with his last tournament in Dubai (Staredown.nl, 2014). For this tournament he only had to fight two fights, making his income for that tournament 136.000,- dollars per fight. The former biggest championship, the K1, used to give a $1.000.000 price for the winner of the tournament (Coffeen, 2014). To win this tournament a fighter had to win three fights in one day to become the champion, this adds up to $333.333,33 per fight.

The amount of fights on television in the Netherlands differs from year to year, this year all the fights from Glory are broadcasted on Dutch television a week after the fights. The fights are also live on SPIKE tv in the United States, being the first time a big kickboxing event is broadcasted in this way in

43 the United States according to Rachid and Sebastien from Glory. RTL 7 broadcasts all Glory fights in the 2013-2014 season, 13 ‘fight nights’ are broadcasted in total on RTL 7 (RTL.nl, 2014).

Popularity Popularity is measured through the amount of people watching fights on television. Also the amount of countries that distribute the fights on television is a way to calculate the popularity of the two disciplines. Also what time fights are broadcasted is a tool to see how popular a show is on television.

RTL 7 started to broadcast the fights organized by Glory since their existence; figures about the amount of people watching in 2013 are published on their website. Their first broadcasting of the Glory fights in the Netherlands caused for 78.000 people watching the fight on television. The fights after showed a constant grow in the amount of people watching fights, with 128.000 people as their maximum. The fights are broadcasted on the Saturday after the fight at 10 p.m.. The market share of these ‘fight nights’ are around 2% which seems low but is higher than the average market share of Eurosport which is 0,7% (kabelraden.nl, 2014). In the interview held with Simon Rutz and the interview held with Rachid Lamalam and Sebastien van Dusschoten they both said their fights are distributed in 180 countries.

Local processes Local processes is transformed in different dimensions, the dimensions that are used are popularity, safety and accessibility. The dimensions will be divided in different variables.

Popularity Popularity is measured through a question in the questionnaire. The question is: Why did you start following lessons in MMA or kickboxing? It is an open question and the answers are categorized, which will give an indication of why people start following lessons in these disciplines and if these reasons differ for different kinds of people.

The open question was answered by 151 people who all gave answers that can be computed into six categories. The six categories that are made for this new variable ‘reason’ are:

Reason Male Female Total

Self-defense 4,2 1,8 3,3(5)

Workout 28,4 44,6 34,4(52)

Via friends/family 10,5 7,1 9,3(14)

Nice sport 29,5 28,6 29,1(44)

Martial arts skills 20 12,5 17,2(26)

Personal development 7,4 5,4 6,6(10)

Total%(N) 100(95) 100(56) 100(151)

Table 1: Reasons for following MMA or kickboxing lessons

All answers given by the 151 respondents fitted in one of these categories, 95 men and 56 women answered this question. Men mainly follow lessons for the workout or because they think it is a nice sport. Also the particular martial arts skills learned during the lessons are an important reason to follow lessons. Women mainly follow lessons for the workout the sports give and because they think it is a nice sport. The average ‘age’ and fitness level of people does not differ for the new categories. The total time spent training however differs for workout, people who train because they want to workout have trained 401 hours on average. While the averages for the other 5 categories are all around 750 hours. Arguably people who start training because of the workout are more tempted to quit training after a while, while the other categories train for a longer period of time. Also the

45 standard deviation for workout is the lowest so most people do not train much longer than the average of 400 hours. The different categories do not have significant differences for the rest of the variables.

With the categories, reasons, the correlations found in chapter 5 will be tested again. The correlation found between the total time training and ‘the feeling of safety’ will be individually tested for the different reason categories. Also the correlation found between ‘fitness’ and ‘the feeling of safety’ will be tested for these reason categories. And finally correlation between ‘education level’ and ‘the feeling of power and security’ is going to be tested for these reason categories. Other correlations did not get any outcome due to a N that was to low and therefore the cell filling was not high enough.

The first correlation that was found in chapter 5 was the correlation between the total time spent training and ‘the feeling of safety’. When this correlation is corrected for the different reasoning categories the correlation falls away for most categories. Some arguably because of the low N and other do not have a correlation between the total spent training and ‘the feeling of safety’. For people who follow lessons because they think the sport is nice do have a strong correlation between the two variables. The Pearson correlation is ,355 with a significance of ,023, which is quite significant for a model with a N of 41. ‘Workout’ has a higher N but the correlation completely falls away.

The second correlation that has been corrected for the new variable ‘reason’ is the correlation between ‘fitness’ and ‘the feeling of safety’. The correlation falls away for the categories via friends/family, nice sport and martial arts skills. For self-defense the correlation becomes very strong but has a low N and therefore cannot be taken for granted. Also for people who follow lessons because of the workout the sports give the correlation became very strong and significant. The relation between ‘fitness’ and ‘the feeling of safety’ is with a Pearson correlation of ,523 and a significance of ,000 very strong. For people following lessons for personal development the correlation even became stronger but also only has an N of 10 and can therefore be argued about.

Thirdly the correlation between ‘education level’ and ‘the feeling of power and security’ is corrected for the new variable ‘reason’. For all categories except the category nice sport does the correlation fall away. For the category nice sport the correlation becomes even stronger with a Pearson of -,507 and a significance of ,000.

Safety Safety is measured through statistics on safety on the street, crime rates and raid figures have been used to get a picture of the safety issues. In this paragraph the neighborhoods will be recoded into districts which will be linked to the crime figures. With the districts as a new nominal variable the original correlations will be checked for the different districts. And with the crime figures added to the districts, a connection between ‘the feeling of safety’ and crime figures has been researched.

Centrum 9,5

West 21,1

Nieuw-West 28,6

Zuid 23,8

Oost 10,9

Zuidoost 1,4

Noord 4,8

Totaal%(N) 100(147)

Table 2: Districts

Most people following lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam that are involved in this research are living in West, Nieuw-West or Zuid. When the means for the independent and dependent variables are compared there are only few significant differences found. The ‘education level’ in Noord and Nieuw-West are significantly lower than in the other districts, Zuidoost does not count as there is not a sufficient cell filling. Zuid has the highest ‘education level’ with a low standard deviation which is probably caused by the many students that filled in the questionnaire who train at VU sportcentrum. Another significant difference is the total time spent training for Nieuw-West. Most districts have a total time spent training that lays around 400 and 650 hours. Nieuw-West has a total time spent training of 1100 hours, which is a significantly higher than the other districts. On ‘the feeling of safety’ or the question, I feel threatened on the street, there are no differences for the districts.

When the correlation between the total time spent training and ‘the feeling of safety’ is corrected for district, the only district where the correlation still exists is West. In Oost there is almost a significant

47 correlation but probably due to the low N the correlation did not survive. In Nieuw-West the correlation between ‘the feeling of safety’ and the total time spent training completely disappears.

When the correlation between ‘fitness’ and ‘the feeling of safety’ is corrected for districts, the only district where the correlation still exists is Nieuw-West. The correlation became stronger with a significance of ,000 and a Pearson of ,535. In Nieuw-West the total time spent training does not matter but being fit is the indicator for ‘the feeling of safety’. In West the total time spent training is important and not ‘fitness’.

When the correlation between ‘education level’ and ‘the feeling of power and security’ is corrected for district, the correlation does not exist in any district anymore. In all districts the significance is around ,150 so probably due to a low N the correlation cannot be proved.

To see if crime figures influence the outcomes of the dependent variables, crime figures for all districts have been added to the districts. The public violence figures from March and April 2014 will be linked to the districts (Amsterdam.nl, 2014).

Centrum 463

West 216

Nieuw-West 263

Zuid 193

Oost 221

Noord 186

Zuidoost 225

Total 1844

Table 3: Total amount violent crimes for March and April 2014 (Amsterdam.nl, 2014)

Crosstabs have been made to see if the violent crime figures correlate with the independent or dependent variables. No correlations where found, therefore a multinomial logistic regression model is made. The dependent variable is ‘reason’ and the covariate is ‘violent crime figures’. A multinomial regression model is possible because the reason to follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing is a nominal variable and ‘violent crime figures’ is a ratio variable. The multinomial logistic regression model is not

48 significant and therefore can be said that violent crime figures or not responsible for the reason that people follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing.

MMA and kickboxing schools are not linked to a central federation and are therefore difficult to find. Roukens et al (2009) who are linked to the ‘stichting kickboksen en mixed martial arts opleidingen’ did research in how many kickboxing schools existed in the Netherlands. Through different methods they found 21 kickboxing schools in Amsterdam in 2009. Roukens says that even during their research there was an explosion of new schools arising and therefore are these 21 schools probably not the total amount. In addition the two university schools I found where not included. Also MMA schools are not included in their research. MMACENTRAL (2014) says there are five official MMA schools in Amsterdam, together with the 21 kickboxing schools and the two university school who both give kickboxing and MMA lessons the total amount is 28. The most popular sport in Amsterdam, fitness, has 38 centers (sportenindestad, 2014). The MMA and kickboxing schools are spread all around town, for everyone living in Amsterdam there is a MMA or kickboxing school nearby. According to ‘sporten in de stad’ (2014) are fighting sports, after tennis, the most expensive sport in Amsterdam. The high costs are due to the high contributions and the costs for materials. The average price for a year training in the schools that are used in this research is €283,- for unlimited training. According to sporten in de stad is the average contribution €388,- with extra annual costs for gear, €196,-. This €196,- is probably a single deposit for the gear you have to buy and not an annual cost. It is also possible to use materials the schools supply when you are an amateur. Only professional fighters are obliged to buy their own gear. The figures ‘sporten in the stad’ gives are for all martial arts combined and not only kickboxing and MMA, Taekwondo is more expensive because more gear is needed. Therefore the annual costs can be lower than the amount sporten in de stad gives. The €283,- annual costs for MMA and kickboxing would put the sports on the 11th place for annual costs for different sports in Amsterdam. If you are a student following lessons in MMA or kickboxing is even cheaper, €65,- annually for the USC and €160,- annually for VUsportcentrum. This makes it the

49 cheapest sport in Amsterdam for students when compared to the rest of the popular sports in Amsterdam. Even running has an estimated €231,- annual costs according to ‘sporten in de stad’.

Chapter 7

Conclusion

In this bachelor thesis the popularity of MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam has been researched. Three possible reasons for the popularity where used as the explanatory variables for the popularity of the two sports. Local and global processes are together with the three mayor explanatory variables researched to see what influence they have on the popularity of MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam. Local and global processes can be both explanatory as moderating variables. This resulted in the following research question;

All the variables are split up in multiple concepts which themselves have been split up into measureable variables. In chapter 4 through 6 the different variables are researched through literature studies, in-depth interviews and questionnaires. The quantitative data is analyzed with SPSS and the qualitative data is analyzed with Atlas.ti.

In chapter 4 the organizations that organize fights have been researched and what role they play in the popularity of MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam is being looked at. Glory, It’s Showtime and Team Günyar are three mayor or former mayor players in the world of MMA and kickboxing. All three organizations organize their fights in their own way but they have one thing in common, they want the best for the fighters. Where kickboxing used to be a sport where money was not easily made, since the beginning of It’s Showtime fighters started to become real stars and earn real stars money.

Giving the opportunity for fighters to show their skills on a big podium is a goal of all three organizations that have been interviewed. They all thought that giving them a podium and a goal to work for would keep them from the streets. Pity criminals would be put on kickboxing by the police to give them training and teach them respect according to Rachid from Glory. According to the Telegraaf (2014) would this have a devastating effect as 50% of the pity criminals are attending martial arts lessons. A big part of this group is put on martial arts lessons due to being a pity criminal and therefore the Telegraaf mixes up the cause and result. In the results from the questionnaires that have been analyzed with SPSS, there is a link between the total time spent training and rather

51 evading physical confrontations. Especially men who train longer are keen to avoid a fight on the street.

Organizing a big fighting event in the Netherlands can be quite difficult according to Simon, Ali, Sebastien and Rachid. There is a huge amount of legislation where they have to deal with while smaller fights organized by small local organizations do not have any legislation at all. The problems that occur during fights, always occur with these smaller events as there is not as many security and legislation as is with the big fights being organized by It’s Showtime, Glory and Team Günyar. Legislation and the role of the city’s is big, by allowing small events to occur without any legislation the sport has difficulty to get better publicity. The big events, where nog big problems occurred, are banned from the big cities in the Netherlands due to the mayors of Amsterdam and Rotterdam.

All three interviewees did not think that people who follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing will use their skills on the street. Fights on the street these days are not fought with fists but with other weapons. This is in line with the theory of Hables and Grey (1997).

In chapter 5 the results of the questionnaires have been analyzed with SPSS, multiple crosstabs and regression models have been made to find correlations and causality. The three explanatory variables have been split up in different concepts which were split up in different questions that were asked in the questionnaire. The new variable ‘feeling of safety’ has a correlation with the total time spent training in months. When corrected for ‘sex’, it shows that this correlation only counts for men who follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing, men feel safer for every month that they follow lessons. This correlation does not apply for women.

Women are less likely than men to have ever had a physical confrontation on the street. Men had a physical confrontation on the street more often than women but are less likely to have one again now they follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing. Men would rather avoid a fight now they follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing, while with women the score stays about the same. Women have a light trend towards avoiding a fight more quickly now they follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing but not as strong as the trend that men show towards rather avoiding a fight now they follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing as they have a correlation between avoiding a fight and the total amount of time spent training. This is in line with the theory of Brown and Johnson (2000), training martial arts will make people feel more confident about themselves and be more responsible towards others throughout their lives.

Regarding feeling more confident and powerful on the street, there is no difference between men and women but there is a difference in ‘education level’. When someone has a higher ‘education

52 level’, regardless ‘age’, ‘sex’ or the total time spent training, his or her feeling of being more powerful and confident on the street due to following lessons in MMA or kickboxing will be lower than someone with a lower education level.

In the question why did you start following lessons in MMA or kickboxing, the average age did not vary for the different categories, there did was a negative correlation between ‘age’ and the question, I started following lessons to work on my fitness and stamina. Every year someone gets older he will score lower on this question and is less likely to follow lessons to work on his or her fitness and stamina.

When a person scores higher on his or her personal fitness, ‘the feeling of safety’ of the person will be higher than someone with a lower score on ‘fitness’. When a person answered, for the workout, on the question why they started following lessons in MMA or kickboxing, this correlation between ‘fitness’ and ‘the feeling of safety’ becomes stronger. When someone follows lessons for self-defense or personal development, this correlation also becomes stronger but these categories do not have a high N and are can therefore not be taken for granted.

When a person follows lessons because they think MMA or kickboxing is nice sport, the correlation between the total amount of time spent on following lessons and ‘the feeling of safety’ becomes stronger, while with other reasons this correlation falls away. People who follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing for the workout feel safer due to getting fitter while people who follow lessons because they like the sports feel safer due to training for a longer period of time. These correlations do not differ for ‘age’, ‘sex’ or ‘education level’. The other correlation that becomes stronger when a person follows lessons because they like the sports is the correlation between ‘education level’ and ‘the feeling of power and security’. This however is a negative correlation, meaning that with a higher ‘education level’ a person will feel less powerful and secure on the street. This does not differ for, ‘sex’, ‘age’ and time spent training.

When districts are added to the SPSS data, the correlations found between the independent and dependent variables can be corrected for districts. The correlation between the total time spent training and ‘the feeling of safety’ only exists in West and Maybe in Oost but the N is not high enough to get a significant correlation. The correlation between ‘fitness’ and ‘the feeling of safety’ only exists in Nieuw-West, people in Nieuw-West feel far safer when their fitness level is higher. The correlation between ‘education level’ and ‘the feeling of power and security’ falls away for all districts but that is probably due to the low N.

Crime figures in the different districts are not explanatory variables for the popularity of MMA and kickboxing. No correlation was found between crime figures in districts and the reason that people follow lessons in MMA or kickboxing. The variation in reason is thus not found in crime figures but is due to unknown explanatory variables.

A possible reason for the popularity of MMA and kickboxing is the accessibility, especially for students as kickboxing and MMA or one of the cheapest ways to sport in Amsterdam. The biggest group follows lessons in MMA or kickboxing for the workout the sports give, this in combination with the accessibility can be an explanation for the popularity. The second biggest reason for following lessons in MMA or kickboxing is because they think they are nice sports. With growing amounts of people watching the Glory fights on television, this can be one of the reasons why people think the sports are nice. As came out of the interviews, all organizations thought that kickboxing is simply the most fun martial arts to watch, and therefore maybe also to do yourself.

Safety, the workout and power and security are all reasons for the popularity of MMA and kickboxing, local processes are influencing these reasons and make the correlation between the independent and dependent variables stronger. Global processes are arguably also responsible for the popularity of MMA and kickboxing. All correlation can be found in the causal model beneath.

CONTEXT: Global processes

Reason Local processes

Age

Popularity of Education Power and MMA and level Security kickboxing in Amsterdam

Total time spent Safety training

Workout

Sex

Causal model

Discussion In this bachelor thesis the popularity of MMA and kickboxing in Amsterdam has been researched, explanatory and moderating variables have been searched for and have been found. The questionnaire that has been used to find out why people started following lessons in MMA or kickboxing was not extended enough to find all answers that were searched for. Questions about the global processes and the organizations that have been interviewed should have been in the questionnaire as well. Also ‘mass’ as an indicator for ‘the feeling of safety’ might have been an explanatory variable for ‘the feeling of safety’. Mass would have been calculated by multiplying the length with the weight of a person. A person with a higher mass might also feel safer due to the lesser attraction such a person has to be attacked. A two meter men weighing over 100 kilos is less attractive to rob or to fight with and therefore he might feel safer on the street.

On the other hand would it not have been that easy to get as many respondents when the questionnaire would have been substantially longer than the one used now. People were quite keen in filling in a questionnaire that only took them about 3 to 5 minutes, this was also the max as the lessons mostly started 5 minutes after they came in.

With a higher N more results would have been possible because with the N that had to be worked with now correcting correlations was only possible to some extend without losing out on the cell filling. Now some possible significant correlations were last due to an N that was not high enough. When there would have been more time, more MMA and kickboxing schools would have been used in the research to get a broader picture. Because two university schools were used and in the other schools also a lot of students followed lessons the research population might not representative for all the people following lessons in MMA or kickboxing in Amsterdam.

In this research a correlation between total time spent training and rather avoiding a fight for men was found. This correlation did not fall away when corrected for ‘education level’ or ‘age’. Therefore MMA and kickboxing can possibly make men more cautious and self-aware about what they can do. Further research will be needed to see if this founding is representative for all people following lessons in MMA or kickboxing and if following lessons in more brutal forms of martial arts actually helps people from avoiding fights in the future.

Further research is necessary to find out if all the correlations found are still plausible when a higher N is used. This same research can also be copied to other cities in or out the Netherlands to see of they will find the same results.

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Appendices

Questionnaire MMA en Kickboksen in Amsterdam

Bedankt dat u mee wilt werken aan mijn onderzoek.Ik ben Zico Broekstra, student aan de Universiteit van Amsterdam en doe in het kader van mijn scriptie onderzoek naar de groeiende populariteit van MMA en kickboksen in Amsterdam. Om een duidelijker beeld te krijgen bij de redenen voor het volgen van lessen in MMA of kickboksen heb ik de bijgeleverde enquête gemaakt. Deze zal ongeveer 5 minuten duren om in te vullen.

De enquête begint eerst met enkele persoonlijke vragen

1. Wat is uw leeftijd? Leeftijd:______

2. Wat is uw geslacht? Geslacht:______

3. Wat is uw burgerlijke staat?

Alleenstaand / Samenwonend zonder kinderen / Getrouwd zonder kinderen / Gescheiden met kinderen / Samenwonend met kinderen / Getrouwd met kinderen / Weduwe of Weduwnaar

4. Wat is uw hoogst genoten opleiding? Vul ook WO, MBO of HBO in als u momenteel een WO, MBO of HBO opleiding volgt.

Lager onderwijs / Middelbare school / VMBO / MBO 1 of 2 / MBO 3 of 4 / Middelbare school HAVO of VWO / HBO / WO

5. In welke buurt woont u? Buurt:______

Nu volgen enkele vragen over het volgen van lessen in kickboksen of MMA

6. Hoe lang volgt u al lessen in MMA of kickboksen? Graag een antwoord in aantal maanden Maanden:______

7. Hoeveel uur in de week doet u gemiddeld aan MMA of kickboksen? Aantal uur:_____

8. Wat is de reden dat u bent begonnen met MMA of kickboksen? Reden:______

Nu volgen enkele stellingen over het werken aan uw conditie door middel van kickboksen of MMA. Elke stelling kan worden beantwoord met cijfers 1 t/m 5, 1 voor helemaal me oneens, 2 voor een beetje me oneens, 3 neutraal, 4 mee eens en 5 helemaal mee eens.

9. Ik voel mij fit, ik heb een goede conditie