"A girl playing soccer?": a qualitative study of capital conversion and gendered power structures among Korean female athletes.

introductionWomen’s football in South Korea exists within a male-centered football field where gendered valuation and institutional priorities shape athletes’ opportunities and recognition. In this field, female athletes face a complex process of shaping their identities and social positions, regardless of their performance, while dealing with psychological burdens and structural barriers. To gain a better understanding of the mental and structural support needed for sustainable female athletic development, we investigated how Korean female soccer players are acquiring and converting cultural and social capital into economic capital within women’s football-specific gendered power relations and organizational structures. Grounded in Bourdieu’s capital theory and gender power theory, with an intersectionality lens, we explore the structural inequalities constraining capital accumulation and the athletes’ strategic responses to such constraints.

methodsA qualitative case study approach is adopted in this study, examining the life experiences of former Korean female soccer players. Ten former athletes, with experience in semi-professional leagues, collegiate teams, or elite youth programs, were recruited using purposive sampling. Data were gathered through semi-structured in-depth interviews and document analysis. The analysis followed a systematic and iterative process to identify thematic patterns related to structural constraints and agentive responses. The participants were informed of the study’s purpose, and written consent was obtained prior to their involvement in the study.

resultsThe women reported facing persistent structural barriers throughout their athletic careers, including limited financial support, restricted opportunities for skill development, and exclusion from formal social networks. Within the women’s football environment in South Korea, these constraints were described as being sustained by institutionally limited investment in women’s teams, wage and contract arrangements that signaled unequal valuation, and fragile competitive infrastructures with insufficient routinized league fixtures and scouting-visible opportunities. Accordingly, economic capital accumulation was constrained by low wages and contract instability, whereas cultural capital acquisition was limited by unstable match-based learning and evaluative visibility. Social capital accumulation was also shaped by coach-centered, informal networks that operated as gatekeeping routes for information, placement, and post-playing opportunities. Additionally, participants’ alternative strategies (international careers, certifications, digital self-branding) were positioned as compensatory adaptations to gendered valuation and organizational gatekeeping rather than as levers of institutional change.

conclusionsTaken together, the findings suggest that gendered inequality in women’s football is reproduced through the combined operation of unequal valuation, constrained opportunity structures, and gatekeeping, which jointly shape athletes’ capital trajectories and limit conversion, particularly around career transition and post-playing planning. The findings indicate the need for reforms that stabilize investment and contract conditions, strengthen routinized competitive infrastructures and visibility pathways, and formalize transparent transition routes into coaching and administration, while also recognizing the psychosocial conditions under which athletes sustain motivation, self-evaluation, and future orientation.