How Soccer Explains the World

Review: Franklin Foer, How Soccer Explains the World: An Unlikely Theory of Globalization (Harper Perennial, 2004).

I enjoyed this book, probably because, like Foer, I like soccer. I learned something new about world soccerdom in each chapter. The title of the book, however, is a bit overstated. Since each chapter is related to the others only in the largest thematic ways, Foer fails to really present any kind of "theory" of globalization - in other words, the book lacks a central thesis. What he offers instead is a series of pastiches illuminating the impact of globalization upon soccer, and even to some extent the impact of soccer on globalization. The book probably succeeds more in provoking thought about globalization than in making any real explanations. I definitely think soccer proved a good choice for exploring the impact of globalization at the local level in a variety of locales. Since he focuses on club soccer more than international soccer, he can zoom in on the most local of rivalries and see how they have been changed by progress of globalization. Not all the chapters do this as well as some, however.

I was particaulrly intrigued by the inter-play between local (or national) rivalries/group identification within a global culture. One assumes that the world's sport operates simlarly wherever one might go. This might be true on the pitch, although we are all familiar with the different styles of soccer found in the various locales of world soccer. What we find, though, is that the cultural, economic, and political background of each locale affects the nature of the soccer in each locale. What drives a local rivalry in Glasgow, and how the clubs themselves treat it, is not even the same as close as London. Yet, there are some more global aspects to be found in a wider context, such as anti-semitism (although there is little of this outside Europe, so again we see the regional variation with a global culture). Likewise, when powerful economic or political forces get involved in football, the very nature of the game in that region can be affected, whether we are talking about the Brazilian diaspora or Italian catenaccio. And of course, soccer itself can play a political role, as was seen in the chapters on Serbia and Iran.

For me, this book followed nicely on Nick Hornby's Fever Pitch, whose insights into English hooliganism meshed well with several of Foer's chapters. As an insightful glimpse into the world of football, the book succeeded masterfully. As a sustained argument about globalization, however, it falls a little flat. This book essentially leaves it to the reader to draw some significant conclusions from these 10 case studies. It really demands deeper discussion than I can muster up here by myself. The publisher even provides a series of questions to provoke further discussion, many of which I would love to discuss with someone in the know.

RPC