Sport Mega-Events as Drivers of Gender Equality: Women's Football in Spain

The professionalization, commercialization, and mediatization of women’s football have opened new opportunities for fan attachments, engagements, and identities. Yet limited empirical research has addressed how or why fandom develops for women’s football, particularly in comparative perspective. We rely on in-depth interview data collected with adults in England (n = 49) and the United States (n = 53) who attended live matches of the 2019 Women’s World Cup to address pathways into and motivations for fandom. We find that awareness of and attachment to women’s football developed through exposure to women’s football mega events or online women’s football communities, through having played football, or after being recruited by existing fans. For English fans only, fandom included when men’s teams added women’s sides or through attending local women’s matches. Motivations for fandom included connections to players, family, and friends, appreciation of athletic talent, a commitment to gender equality, entertainment, and the inclusivity of fan cultures.

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Mobilising gender equality: A discourse analysis of bids to host the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023™

International Review for the Sociology of Sport ◽

10.1177/1012690221998131 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 101269022199813

Author(s):

Bridgette M Desjardins

Keyword(s):

Discourse Analysis ◽

Gender Equality ◽

Gender Inequality ◽

Equal Opportunity ◽

Narrative Strategies ◽

Women's Sport ◽

World Cup ◽

And Gender ◽

Bidding Process ◽

Women's Football

After an exciting bidding process featuring competing submissions from Brazil, Colombia and Japan, Australia and New Zealand were chosen to co-host the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023™. Using feminist discourse analysis to examine the narrative strategies employed by the bidding nations, this article demonstrates that bidding nations discursively mobilised themes of gender equality to position their bids favourably. They did so by asserting themselves as leaders in women’s sport and gender equality, and by emphasising strategies for growing women’s football. Bidding nations situate themselves as benevolent rescuers of struggling women’s sport without acknowledging their accountability for policies and practices that disenfranchised women’s football in the first place. This article argues that the mobilisation of gender equality discourses by bidding nations problematically uses neoliberal feminist logics, stripping pro-women messages such as equal opportunity and empowerment of political context and repackaging them in commercially viable ways. Ultimately, although bidding nations use discourses of gender equality to position themselves favourably, existing levels of gender inequality reveal the limits of their positioning.

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An institutional analysis of gender (in)equalities, covid-19 and governance of elite women’s football in Australia, England and USA.

10.31236/osf.io/ut6zm ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Beth G Clarkson ◽

Keith D. Parry ◽

Alex Culvin ◽

Stacey Pope

Keyword(s):

Economic Impact ◽

Gender Equality ◽

Institutional Pressures ◽

Framework Analysis ◽

Government Officials ◽

Major Question ◽

Wide Range ◽

Global Impacts ◽

Active Communication ◽

Women's Football

Women’s football faces an existential threat in light of covid-19. Using case studies, we explore the covid-19 responses of three highly-ranked countries’ national football associations (Australia, England, and USA) and their professional women’s football leagues to: (a) compare and shed new insights into the wide range of covid-19 responses, and (b) identify ways that other nations could successfully manage the tensions between the economic impact of covid-19 and their social and ethical responsibilities to women’s football. Drawing on institutional theory, a framework analysis was undertaken. 71 articles were examined to analyse the gendered global impacts that covid-19 is having on women’s football. The results highlight several important recommendations for nations to consider during the pandemic: (1) maintain active communication with the community to allay worries about the future of women’s football, (2) gather support from health and government officials, (3) seek out commercial and broadcasting partnerships to drive revenue, and (4) the interests of women’s football are best served when responsibility for the elite women’s league does not rest (solely) with national football associations. The study is first to explore institutional pressures and football governing bodies during covid-19 and provides a framework for other nations to manage major crises. A major question for the women’s football community emerged: should our expectations of gender equality in football shift in light of covid-19? We argue sport is an interwoven part of society and cannot be separated from gender equality issues.

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