Türk Futbol Alanında Varoluşsal Anlam Arayışı: Egemen Kurumsal Mantıklar
The Search for Existential Meaning in the Turkish Football Field: Dominant Institutional Logics

Summary/Abstract: Due to its power to influence the masses and its ability to transfer value to them, football is an activity area with great potential to create a significant impact on social life. Football, which has become a popular culture field worldwide, carries more than just being a sport; it is loaded with social meanings. Since the meaning frameworks that reflect the common cognition of an institutional field and shape the values, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors of the actors in that area constitute an institutional logic, it can be said that the dominant view in football literature is shaped by the opinions that 'football is not just football but reflects a way of existence beyond that.' To understand whether this institutional logic prevails in the Turkish football field, the values of the basic actors in this area, namely the Turkish Football Federation (TFF) and the Union of Clubs, along with the clubs in the Super League during the 2023-2024 season, were analyzed using a qualitative method with an interpretative phenomenological approach. In the descriptive coding phase, it was observed that three institutional logics, which neither compete nor complement each other, exist simultaneously in the Turkish football field. These categories were named football for society, football for sports, and football for the club. In the pattern coding phase, it was found that among these institutional logics, the logic of football for the club was particularly central for the clubs, while the logic of football for sports was dominant for the TFF and the Union of Clubs.

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