GLOBAL GOVERNANCE IN ALL ITS DISCRETE FORMS: THE GAME, FIFA, AND THE THIRD WORLD

Abstract

This paper uses the governance praxis of the Federation of International Football Associations [FIFA] to illustrate the impact of several intensive, discrete, and rarely-studied global governance actors whose internal processes and procedures mirror the core concerns of Third World Approaches to International Law [TWAIL] scholars regarding the legitimation of a hegemonic category and the marginalization of Third World and subaltern interests. It is argued that FIFA has become an important international organization and global governance actor whose transnational rule-making characteristics should be studied in light of the incipient migration from “international law” to “global governance”.      It will be shown that not only are FIFA’s rules impinging on sovereign imagination but that the tendencies of inequality, unfairness and domination afflicting the practices of traditional or state-centric international organizations are as prevalent in the procedures of such less-studied global governance actors regardless that their rule-making activities exert significant impact on governments, especially those in Africa and other parts of the Third World. More significantly, the essay looks at possible domestic political and socio-legal implications of discrete globalization of the kind exemplified by FIFA on Africa and the Third World and how important it is to integrate this concern into TWAIL scholarship going forward.