Football is the most popular sport in the world. Globalisation and commercialisation of the game, however, have created new conflicts and challenges. This book explores the role of the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) within the rising significance of football in Asia, drawing on three key theoretical perspectives: globalisation, neo-institutionalism and governance, as well as comprehensive data from interviews and archive material. It explores the organisational structure of AFC, its decision-making processes, relations with other actors, and policies put forward. To understand the specificities AFC has faced in its 60-year history, the broader historical, political, economic, socio-cultural and geographic contexts of football in Asia are taken into account.

This book is the first comprehensive study on history, culture, and business of football in Asia. Football has been a symbol of the modern invention, a catalyst of local, national and regional identities, all time favourite among kids and youths, and even a harbinger for cultural globalization and consumerism in Asia. The economic growth and the current proliferation of football culture in Asia make it imperative to examine the complex relationship between the globalization of football and the local appropriation. The essays in the book deal with various topics on football in Asia from history of football in Asia, football and local, national and regional identities, to commercialization of football cultures, global mobility and athletes’ migration, and then new Asianism and football. This book argues that football in Asia contributes to reconfiguring both national and regional identities among football fans in the active interconnection with the global flows of football and cultural globalization without homogenizing Asian identities into a cosmopolitan one. This is the textbook to presents football’s implication and influence on Asian populace and social changes while using football as a lens assessing the modern development and current diversification of Asia. This book was published as a special issue of Soccer and Society.

This book is the first comprehensive study on history, culture, and business of football in Asia. Football has been a symbol of the modern invention, a catalyst of local, national and regional identities, all time favourite among kids and youths, and even a harbinger for cultural globalization and consumerism in Asia. The economic growth and the current proliferation of football culture in Asia make it imperative to examine the complex relationship between the globalization of football and the local appropriation. The essays in the book deal with various topics on football in Asia from history of football in Asia, football and local, national and regional identities, to commercialization of football cultures, global mobility and athletes’ migration, and then new Asianism and football. This book argues that football in Asia contributes to reconfiguring both national and regional identities among football fans in the active interconnection with the global flows of football and cultural globalization without homogenizing Asian identities into a cosmopolitan one. This is the textbook to presents football’s implication and influence on Asian populace and social changes while using football as a lens assessing the modern development and current diversification of Asia. This book was published as a special issue of Soccer and Society.

Football is the most popular sport in the world. Globalisation and commercialisation of the game, however, have created new conflicts and challenges. This book explores the role of the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) within the rising significance of football in Asia, drawing on three key theoretical perspectives: globalisation, neo-institutionalism and governance, as well as comprehensive data from interviews and archive material. It explores the organisational structure of AFC, its decision-making processes, relations with other actors, and policies put forward. To understand the specificities AFC has faced in its 60-year history, the broader historical, political, economic, socio-cultural and geographic contexts of football in Asia are taken into account.

Global popular culture and big business have revolutionised the East in a generation. Football, Sport of the masses and now commercial super power, has travelled with this tide of change in the East in its own right. The development of football as a major participatory sport in Japan, Korea and China makes it an ideal case study for analysis of the complex relationship between sport, culture, society and economy in the East. Football is also a useful entry point for examination of the phenomena of increasing globalisation, and this theme is widely discussed. This broad ranging collection of essays includes: - Social change and national identity - Women's football and gender traditions - Finance and investment in football - The development of professional football - Football and the media - Football Fans, 'hooligans' and soccer supporter culture

The place of football in the colonial and post-colonial past is explored and both British and Portuguese influences on the development of the game are considered. Contemporary issues such as the impact of the professional league in India and the role of UK Asians in the organization of the Indian game are considered. Future scenarios are explored and models for progression and problems facing the sport in south Asia are outlined.