Bookshelf: Against the Elements (Chapter 6)

    

Against the Elements: The Eruption of Icelandic Football (Matt McGinn)

Chapter 6: Joining the Network

McGinn argues that two developments in the 1990s played sizable roles in Iceland's evolution from an insular soccer country to the integrated soccer country it is today. Those two developments were Iceland's membership in the European Economic Area (EEA) in 1994, and the European Court of Justice's "Bosman Ruling" in 1995.

The former event involved Iceland's economy as a whole becoming more integrated in the European network of economies, and the latter event allowed Iceland's soccer economy to become more integrated in Europe's soccer networks.

After making that initial argument, McGinn analyzes Iceland's success at developing soccer players eager and capable of playing abroad, the pros and cons of developing players eager and capable of playing abroad, and the overall soccer economy that has grown in the country since the 1990s.