‘The Future is Asia'? The Role of the Asian Football Confederation inthe Governance and Development of Football in Asia

Abstract

In accordance with its slogan ‘The Future is Asia’, the Asian Football Confederation initiated the Vision Asia football development programme in 2003. Focusing on marketing, grass roots, coach education, referees, sports medicine, men's competitions, women's competitions, futsal, media, and fans, it is claimed to be a comprehensive complement to FIFA's Goal Project. Furthermore the AFC has introduced a financial aid programme called AID27 and its social responsibility campaign titled Dream Asia focusing on utilising football as vehicle for achieving development, peace and social justice. Aimed at exploring the role of the football governing body AFC in the transnational governance and development of football in Asia in the context of a globalised game, this article provides an overview of the history of the AFC and its political relations with FIFA and Asian member associations. In addition it contains an analysis of the AFC's institutional structure, its policies and network relations. Accordingly thearticle implies a description of how specifically the AID27 and Vision Asia programmes are aimed at developing and increasing the standards of Asian football.

Keywords:

• Asian Football Confederation
• football in Asia
• governance and development of football
• FIFA
• Vision Asia
• AID27

Notes

 1. Goldblatt, The Ball is Round, 839; Kramer, Dettmar, ‘The Road to Success of Asian Football’ (guest lecture, AFC coaching course module, Sportschule Hennef, Germany, July 2005).

 2. Fan Hong and Mangan, ‘Will the “Iron Roses” Bloom Forever?’, 52.

 3. Dato Paul Mony Samuel (former general secretary, AFC), in discussion with the author, Kuala Lumpur, 5 Aug. 2008; on the impact of success in sports on fan identification see Schütz, ‘Ausländische Spieler in der Fußball-Bundesliga’; Manzenreiter and Horne, ‘Playing the Post-Fordist Game’, 565, 573.

 4. Quoted in Manzenreiter and Horne, ‘Playing the Post-Fordist Game’, 562.

 5. On the interdisciplinary dimension of studying football see Mittag and Nieland, ‘DerVolkssport als Spielball’, 13; Hassan and Hamil, ‘Models of Football Governance’, 352.

 6. Lee, ‘Moving the Goalposts’, 112–20; Giulianotti and Robertson, Globalization and Football, 114–16; Groll, ‘Wir sind Fußball’, 188–9; Houlihan, ‘Politics, Power, Policy and Sport’, 31.

 7. On the significance of transnationalism in the organisation and governance of socially and culturally globalized football see Giulianotti and Robertson, ‘Recovering the Social: Globalization, Football and Transnationalism’, 170–1; Henry, ‘Globalisation, Governance and Policy’, 8.

 8. In this sense governance is understood as the process of steering, defining and regulating political procedures and policies within complex network systems in which international sport federations constitute traditionally autonomous but increasingly contested actors belonging to the so called third sector. Based on the assumption of the existence of both ‘politics of sport’ and ‘politics in sport’, the analytical subject, namely the AFC, is here regarded as non-governmental but sport-politically relevant actor in the transnational governance of football in Asia. See Lösche, ‘Sportpolity, Sportpolitics und Sportpolicy’, 13; Tokarski et al., A Perfect Match?, 42, 43; Spitaler, ‘Politikwissenschaft und Sport’, 274; Houlihan, ‘Politics, Power, Policy and Sport’, 47.

 9. Regarding the current state of research on football in Asia, it is noteworthy that this field continues to be largely understudied. Dimeo and Mills have edited a book on football inSouth-east Asia, while the role of football in the Far East has been in the focus of the works of Horne and Manzenreiter. In addition Majumdar and Bandyopadhyay have authored a book on football in India. Apart from one chapter in Sugden and Tomlinson's book on the global governing body, FIFA, that deals with the role of the AFC in particular, this specific topic, though, remains significantly underexposed in Anglophone literature. Further reading: Dimeo and Mills, Soccer in South Asia; Majumdar and Bandyopadhyay, Striving to Score; Horne and Manzenreiter, Japan, Korea and the 2002 World Cup; Horne and Manzenreiter, Football Goes East; Sugden and Tomlinson, FIFA and the Contest for World Football.

10. Since the AFC doesn't have a systematised archive or an accessible collection of historically valuable sources, the only comprehensive work available on its history has been published by the AFC itself in cooperation with AFC Marketing Limited; it is mostly based on interviews and observation. Consequently this historical overview of the AFC cannot avoid drawing upon the official line of historisation with a strong focus on the confederation's presidents: Asian Football Confederation, The Power of Dreams, 24.

11. Asian Football Confederation, The Power of Dreams, 24, 26, 34, 35.

12. Ibid., 26, 36.

13. Ibid., 26.

14. Ibid., 24, 36, 41.

15. Ibid. 26, 27, 38.

16. Ibid. 27, 39; Dawn Media Group Online, ‘Asian football adopting business mentality’, available at http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/sport/08-asian-football-adopting-business-mentality-ts-04.

17. Incl. quote Asian Football Confederation, The Power of Dreams, 44, 45.

18. Eisenberg, ‘Fußball als globales Phänomen’, 13–14; Eisenberg, ‘Der Weltfuß-ballverband FIFA im 20. Jahrhundert', 232–4; Dato Paul Mony Samuel (former general secretary, AFC), in discussion with the author, Kuala Lumpur, 5 Aug. 2008.

19. Homburg, ‘FIFA and the “Chinese Question”’, 81ff.

20. Four teams from Asia could qualify directly while the `half' refers to another possible place that had to be determined through an intercontinental play-off game; J. Weinreich, ‘AFC: Revolution gegen Bin Hammam’, 17 February 2009, available at http://www.jensweinreich.de/2009//02/17/afc-arger-fur-bin-hammam/

21. Quoted in Reuters, ‘AFC Election. Bitter Asian power battle reaches pivotal climax’, 5 May 2009, available at http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story?id=643454&sec=global&cc=5739

22. Quoted in Asian Football Confederation, ‘Bin Hammam retains FIFA Exco seat’, 9 May 2009, available at http://the-afc.com/en/congress-news/24115

23. A. Jennings, ‘Turmoil at the Top as Blatter faces possible challenge’, Sunday Herald, 15 Aug. 2010.

24. Quoted in ‘Bin Hammam wants to stay as head of Asia and backs Blatter’, Inside World Football, 30 August 2010, available at http://www.insideworldfootball.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=8416:bin-hammam-want-to-stay-as-head-of-asia-and-backs-blatter&catid=49:asia&Itemid=61.

25. Quoted in S. Coerts, ‘Chung Mong-Joon Considering Challenging Sepp Blatter For FIFA Presidency’, 7 October 2010, available at http://www.goal.com/en/news/745/fifa/2010/10/07/2155142/chung-mong-joon-considering-challenging-sepp-blatter-for

26. Inside World Football, ‘Chung claims he will not stand against Blatter for FIFA President’, 12 October 2010, available at http://www.insideworldfootball.com/worldfootball/asia/8548-chung-claims-he-will-not-stand-against-blatter-for-fifa-president

27. Sugden, ‘Network Football’, 62–3; Amara et al., ‘The Governance of Professional Soccer’, 190–2; Henry and Lee, ‘Governance and Ethics in Sport’, 26–7

28. Asian Football Confederation, ‘Statutes of the Asian Football Confederation’, 13–16,available at http://images.the-afc.com/Documents/common/cms/afc/afc-statutes-20100709.pdf

29. Ibid., 18–21.

30. Ibid., 22–3.

31. Ibid., 24–9.

32. FAO, ‘AFC and FAO sign agreement to battle hunger’, 18 May 2010, available at http://www.fao.org/getinvolved/getinvolved-home/getinvolved-highlights/fr-detail-high/fr/item/42495/icode/; FIFA, ‘English FA to help Asian football development’, 6 February 2007, available at http://www.fifa.com/worldfootball/news/newsid=111234.html; ‘Kenyon: AFC Deal ‘Crucial’ For Chelsea Profile', FourFourTwo, 1 March 2007, available at http://au.fourfourtwo.com/news/46764,kenyon-afc-deal-crucial-for-chelsea-profile.aspx

33. Schulze, Sportverbände ohne Markt und Staat, 17.

34. Asian Football Confederation, ‘Statutes of the Asian Football Confederation’, 34.

35. Asian Football Confederation, The Power of Dreams, 104, 105.

36. Asian Football Confederation, ‘Final Assessment’, available at http://www.the-afc.com/uploads/Documents/common/cms/afc/AFC%20PRO-LEAGUE%20ADHOC%20 COMMITTEE%20ASSESSMENT%20CHARTS%201.pdf

37. Asian Football Confederation, ‘Statutes of the Asian Football Confederation’, 34.

38. Quoted in Asian Football Confederation, ‘AFC, WSG renew landmark partnership’, 24 November 2009, available at http://www.the-afc.com/en/inside-afc/676-afc-news/26119-afc-wsg-renew-landmark-partnership

39. M. Glendinning, ‘Qtel to sponsor 2011 AFC Asian Cup’, 11 May 2008, available at http://www.sportbusiness.com/news/168214/qtel-sponsor-2011-afc-asian-cup; Emirates, ‘Emirates Remains Committed to Asian Football’s Future’, 7 July 2009, available at http://www.emirates.com/jp/japanese/about/news/news_detail.aspx?article=397114; Hödl, ‘Wirtschaft und Spor’, 132.

40. Asian Football Confederation, Vision Asia, 1.

41. Ibid., 2.

42. Ibid., 3.

43. Ibid., 4, 5.

44. Asian Football Confederation, ‘Vision Asia Elements’, availlable at http://www.the-afc.com/en/elements

45. Asian Football Confederation, Vision Asia, 10, 11.

46. Eisenberg, ‘ FIFA 1975–2000’, 65.

47. Asian Football Confederation, ‘AFC AID27 Regulations’, version 01/2010, 5, 6, 15, available at http://www.the-afc.com/uploads/Documents/2010/regs/AFCAID27Regulations.pdf

48. Ibid., 7, 8, 9, 12.

49. Kidd, ‘A New Social Movement’, 371.

50. Asian Football Confederation, ‘Introduction to Dream Asia’, available at http://www.the-afc.com/en/dream-asia.

51. Ibid.

52. Coalter, ‘Sport for Development’, 315.