Contesting global hierarchies through football. Diego Armando Maradona and the Association Internationale des Footballeurs Professionnels

Abstract. Diego Armando Maradona is unanimously considered the  best player of all time, alongside Pelé. However, while the Brazilian has  always represented the establishment, Maradona positioned himself as  the critical consciousness of world football, fiercely criticising the most  important football institutions. Many aspects of Maradona’s life have  been extensively explored, both journalistically and academically. There  is, however, a lesser-known event that serves as a perfect metaphor for  his relationship with power: the establishment of the Association Internationale des Footballeurs Professionnels (AIFP), which he founded in  1995. Despite having generated significant media attention, AIFP ulti mately failed to challenge the role of players within the global football  system. This chapter aims to investigate the development of AIFP, as  well as the factors that contributed to its dissolution. Moreover, it at tempts to show how the agency of top-level athletes can expose struc tural injustices within sports organisations and contribute to institu tional change.  

Keywords: Diego Armando Maradona, Association Internationale des  Footballeurs Professionnels, footballers’ union, FIFA, contestation.