Abstract
FIFA’s recent (rhetorical) embrace of human rights prominently includes commitments to address gender discrimination and promote gender equality both on and off the pitch. What promise does FIFA’s ‘first-ever global strategy for women’s football’ hold as a means of fulfilling such commitments? A feminist institutionalist approach to this question offers insights into the bounded model of change endorsed by the Women’s Football Strategy. It reveals that the Strategy’s three key objectives serve as ‘common carriers’ for both long-standing institutional interests (in power, profit, and prestige) and newer institutional interests (in women footballers, women’s football, and women in football governance). The assumption that these two sets of interests are mutually reinforcing is brought into question by exposing the ways in which FIFA’s mainline institutional priorities, combined with certain structural features of football governance, blunt the reformist potential of the Women’s Football Strategy. Bounded by old institutional features, the Strategy reflects a partial and incremental, rather than comprehensive and revolutionary, approach to addressing gender discrimination. FIFA’s commitment to human rights therefore remains unfulfilled vis-à-vis women in football.
Highlights
A First for FIFAFIFA has long touted humanitarian values and objectives, grounded in the potential of football to be a force for social good
The primary tool developed for this purpose appears to be FIFA’s ‘first-ever global strategy for women’s football’
Carriers’[3] for both traditional institutional interests and new institutional interests, which creates a risk that the former will ‘blunt the reformist potential’ of the latter.[4]. Illuminating this tension between old and new institutional objectives allows for an assessment of how far FIFA’s Women’s Football Strategy goes toward implementing its human rights commitments with respect to gender equality and non-discrimination
Summary
FIFA has long touted humanitarian values and objectives, grounded in the potential of football to be a force for social good. My approach to this question, inspired by feminist institutionalism, is to consider the institutional negotiation between FIFA’s mainline goals and strategies, on the one hand, and its gender equality goals and strategies, on the other. Carriers’[3] for both traditional institutional interests (in power, profit, and prestige) and new institutional interests (in women footballers, women’s football, and women in football), which creates a risk that the former will ‘blunt the reformist potential’ of the latter.[4] Illuminating this tension between old and new institutional objectives allows for an assessment of how far FIFA’s Women’s Football Strategy goes toward implementing its human rights commitments with respect to gender equality and non-discrimination.
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