Crowd safety starts with belonging

By Eszter Hollósy, Intern at ESI

Organizing safe events goes beyond fences and regulations. Research reveals that crowd psychology, especially the social identity approach (SIA), offers transformative benefits, backed by real-world applications, including Roskilde Festival, and best practices from SXSW, the UK, Hungary, and The Netherlands.

The social identity approach (SIA) explains how people’s behaviour changes in crowds depending on whether they feel part of a group and perceive the organizer as part of the same group. When organizers communicate in ways that build trust, inclusion, and shared purpose, the crowd often self-regulates better, without needing constant enforcement.

This insight is not just academic. It’s backed by real-world practices from events like Roskilde, SXSW, and Sziget, as well as field work by Professor John Drury from the UK, an expert on this topic.

The power of shared identity

Roskilde Festival (Denmark), after the tragic crowd incident in 2000, rebuilt its safety strategy around shared identity. Stewards were trained to act like friendly insiders, not authoritarian figures, cementing the sense “we are in this together.” The result? A calmer, more cooperative crowd, with participants proactively helping one another and staff. As a prime example, this proves SIA isn’t just theory, it works in practice.

Real-world wins from the field

But it’s not only Denmark. Interviews that I conducted with professionals from SXSW (USA), UK, and Sziget festival (Hungary) show how crowd psychology is already being applied, often without explicitly naming it.

• SXSW, a big inner-city festival in Austin (Texas) focuses heavily on targeted messaging: tailoring information to different groups – visitors, staff, locals – so everyone feels seen and considered.
• In the UK, festival security staff are trained to use inclusive language, present themselves as part of the crowd and avoid top-down enforcement. This strengthens trust and cooperation.
• At Sziget festival, the tone is causal and community-drive. Staff aim to create a space of freedom and shared responsibility, helping maintain calm and mutual respect even with huge crowds.

These three examples from different countries and cultures show that when people feel they belong, they are more likely to follow rules, help others, and respond positively to communication. It is not just good practice – it is applied psychology.

Communication is not just logistics, it is psychology

It is common to see apps, maps and signs used only for efficiency, so audiences know which routes to take, or which tellers are still free. However, to influence behaviours in a broader sense and get the crowd to behave like you would like to, communication must appeal to the identity of the crowd. For example:

• Emails and app notifications that say “let’s stay together” rather than lists of rules.
• Staff wearing approachable and visible ‘tribal’ colours that correspond with that of the audience, trained to engage with empathy.

These are the tactics that do more than just inform, they empower crowds to self-regulate and prioritize safety.

Responding to changing crowd behaviours

Events are constantly evolving, and so are the people who attend them. As festivals grow larger and tend to attract a more diverse audience, the behaviour of crowds becomes more complex and less predictable. When a crowd is no longer sharing a strong common identity as fan or regular visitor, more is needed to appeal to a ‘new’ shared identity and common behavioural norms. It makes traditional, top-down safety messaging less effective.

The conducted research shows that organizers who adapt their strategies to these shifts, by using inclusive communication and building a shared sense of identity, are more successful in guiding safe behaviour. For example, festivals like Roskilde, Sziget, and Paaspop use tone, visibility, and staff engagement to foster connection rather than control. This approach reduces tension, increases compliance, and encourages peer cooperation.

Instead of asking, “How do we manage the crowd?” these organizers ask, “How do we make the crowd feel like part of the event’s identity?” That shift in mindset is exactly what social identity theory/approach helps us understand, and what can make crowd safety both smarter and more human.

Your toolkit for safer events

Here is a simple starter checklist based on the findings:

Acknowledgements

This research would not have been possible without the generous time and insights shared by event professionals across Europe and the United States. A special thank you goes to the teams behind Rebirth, Paaspop, and Awakenings Upclose for openly sharing their crowd strategies and logistics insights.

I also deeply appreciate the valuable contributions from my international interviewees, Professor John Drury from the United Kingdom; Becky Stevens director and senior safety consultant Hybred Events from the United Kingdom; Tami Richter vice president of event operations at SXSW from Austin United States, and Zsolt Szicso owner of Rawsolutions Ltd. from Hungary. Their openness and expertise added rich, real-world context to this research. Your willingness to share not only your successes but also your challenges helped shape practical recommendations that can serve the broader industry.

Thank you for helping me move one step closer towards safer, more inclusive, and psychologically informed events.