As One 2023, conjunctural politics, and commercialisation of gender equality and women's empowerment: the force awakens

Hosting rights for the 2023 Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) Women's World Cup (2023 FWWC) were awarded to Australia and New Zealand. The joint bid – known as Australia New Zealand As One 2023 (As One 2023) – was the first bid selected to host a major women's football tournament following FIFA's landmark reform package known as FIFA 2.0: The Vision for the Future. This chapter interrogates the conjunctural politics of 2023 FWWC competitive bid process, exploring the unique ways in which the As One 2023 bid drawing on McGillivray and Turner's critical commentary on event bidding, and the chapter explores the As One 2023 bid's positioning and priorities as they were shaped by FIFA imperatives. We find As One 2023 “bid positioning” occurred by signalling a politics of unity and mobilising discourses of gender equality and women's empowerment. Building upon these symbolic and mobilising narratives of the bid's positioning, the As One 2023 “bid priorities” advanced commercial interests, economic returns, and the growing commercialisation of women's football. This chapter demonstrates a mutually constitutive and dialectic relationship between sporting international non-governmental organisations (SINGOs) and bid organisers in order to secure hosting rights.