Can Football Survive the Future?

Jacques sees the increasingly diverse national teams as a powerful symbol of soccer's liberal and progressive potential, but he envisages growing competition between club and nation as the organizing principle of the game. Just as corporations today stain against national boundaries and their attendant responsibilities as they drive towards a supranational existence that transcends national borders in pursuit of markets, skills, cheaper inputs and tax relief, so are the top tier of soccer teams increasingly straining against the nation state (or more specifically, the national football federation). For fans, there's no question that representing one's country is the highest possible honor. But the reality for players is that it is their clubs, not their countries, that pay their wages. And for clubs, the players are prized assets constantly at risk of losing some or all of their value due to injury each time they turn out for the national team. The top clubs would rather their players didn't have to turn out for the national team at all.

The tendency among players from many African countries is to put the interests of their European clubs above those of their countries — there's a certain trick to it, of course: Make sure you're available during the World Cup or similar tournaments when buyers from the major teams are out scouting for talent, but cry injury, or even "retire" from the national team to avoid all those tedious qualifiers and friendlies in between. Countries such as South Africa, Australia and Senegal have increasingly recognized this reality, given that most of their natural picks for the national team now earn their living in Europe. They are increasingly adapting their national setups to accommodate the foreign-based players by, for example, holding friendly matches in Europe, and refraining from calling up the players with major clubs for the less important games on the international schedule.

But many of the elite teams want nothing short of a revolution in the traditional order that has put nation above club in players' commitments. A G-14, representing Europe's 18 leading clubs, has begun legal proceedings in an effort to force FIFA to share with clubs the revenue generated by such huge international tournaments as the World Cup and Euro 2004, as a way of compensating them for making their prized assets available for international duty. They've also tried to create their own permanent Champion's League, fencing off the elite from the rest of the clubs — such a supranational league currently exists, of course, but teams qualify on the basis of their previous year's performance in their domestic league.

The international federation FIFA, as an agglomeration of the world's national football federations, has long had unquestioned power over everything from the rules of the game to its competitive schedules. But the clubs are only beginning to emerge as global giants, the equivalent of transnational corporations. And, as Jacques suggests, the club vs. country faultline is likely to dominate the political battle over how the game is organized for decades to come.

The American practice of franchises moving from one city to another has, until now, been unthinkable in European soccer. But the dynamics of globalization of the game are now such that it's no longer wholly inconceivable, particularly in light of the emerging cartel spirit among the G-14. The political events of the past decade suggest that despite the optimism of globalization's cheerleaders, the process has hardly dissipated sectarian and ethnic political passions in historical trouble spots. But the dynamics of globalization in the game suggest it may become increasingly hard to sustain soccer as an outlet for them.