Concacaf — Confederation of North, Central America and Caribbean Association Football

What is Concacaf?

Concacaf — the Confederation of North, Central America and Caribbean Association Football — describes itself as “one of FIFA’s six continental confederations” and states its mission as “to develop, promote, and manage football across our region with integrity, transparency, and passion”.^[3]

Article 1 of its statutes sets out its form: it “shall be a membership organization. Its members shall comprise Member Associations in North America, Central America and the Caribbean or other Member Associations pursuant to these Statutes. Concacaf is a Bahamian not-for-profit entity with its legal domicile in Nassau, Bahamas.”^[2] Legal domicile and headquarters are thus in different countries: the same article places the headquarters and principal place of business in Miami, Florida.^[2] Its official languages are English, Spanish, French and Dutch (Article 7).^[2]

It covers association football — soccer — for men and women, at senior, youth and club level, and in futsal and beach soccer, for each of which it publishes tournament regulations.^[6] FIFA’s Statutes list it among the six recognised confederations as “Confederation of North, Central America and Caribbean Association Football – Concacaf”.^[1]

What does Concacaf govern or do?

Concacaf’s central power over the game is the one in Article 60 of its statutes: “Concacaf shall have the sole jurisdiction to organize and sanction international competitions in North America, Central America and the Caribbean in which Member Associations and/or their Clubs participate. FIFA competitions shall not be affected by this Article.”^[2] Its Council approves the regulations for each competition, and by entering a team a member association or club agrees “to fully comply with the Statutes, Regulations and decisions of Concacaf and FIFA, and their bodies”.^[2] The same article allows Concacaf to refuse admission to a club or association involved in arranging or influencing the outcome of a match — a match-fixing provision.^[2]

It publishes tournament regulations for each of its men’s, women’s, club and youth competitions, and for beach soccer and futsal.^[6] Disputes go to the Court of Arbitration for Sport: Articles 51 to 54 of the statutes recognise the CAS, give it exclusive jurisdiction over disputes between Concacaf and its member associations, leagues, clubs, players and officials, and allow appeals against final Concacaf decisions within 21 days, subject to listed exceptions.^[2]

The members are national and territorial associations, and Article 60 is framed around international competitions in which those associations and their clubs take part; a single country’s championship such as Mexico’s Liga MX falls outside that wording.^[2]

When was Concacaf founded and where is it based?

Concacaf’s history page states that it “was established in 1961 from a vision of unity, officially formed through the merger of the North American Football Union (NAFU) and the Football Confederation of Central America and the Caribbean (CCCF)”.^[4] The year and the merger rest on the confederation’s own account; no independent source for them, and no day or place of founding, was retrieved.

The seat is split by statute between a legal domicile and an operating headquarters. Article 1 reads: “Concacaf is a Bahamian not-for-profit entity with its legal domicile in Nassau, Bahamas,” and “The headquarters and principal place of business of Concacaf shall be in Miami, Florida and may be transferred by a resolution of the Concacaf Council.”^[2] Concacaf also lists offices in Guatemala City and in Kingston, Jamaica.^[3]

The statutes cited here are the English text Concacaf publishes in a file dated 29 May 2024; the text retrieved carries no adoption date of its own.^[2] Founding and recognition are separate dates: the date on which FIFA first recognised Concacaf could not be established from the documents retrieved, and the May 2024 FIFA Statutes record the recognition as it stands today.^[1] The club competition’s renamings are dated by Concacaf itself: the Champions’ Cup (1962–2008), the Champions League (2008–2023) and, from 2024, the Champions Cup.^[4]

How is Concacaf recognised?

The recognising act is FIFA’s. Article 22(1) of the FIFA Statutes (May 2024 edition) reads: “Member associations that belong to the same continent have formed the following confederations, which are recognised by FIFA”, and lists CONMEBOL, the AFC, UEFA, CAF, Concacaf and the OFC.^[1] Under Article 11(2), “Membership is only permitted if an association is currently a member of a confederation.”^[1] Concacaf’s own Article 1 states: “Concacaf is a confederation recognized by FIFA.”^[2]

Recognition carries duties. Article 22(3) of the FIFA Statutes requires each confederation, among other things, “to comply with and enforce compliance with the Statutes, regulations and decisions of FIFA”, “to organise its own interclub competitions, in compliance with the international match calendar” and “to organise all of its own international competitions in compliance with the international match calendar”; under Article 22(5) its statutes and regulations must be notified to FIFA.^[1] Article 60 of Concacaf’s statutes mirrors this, reserving FIFA competitions from its own sole jurisdiction.^[2]

In the continental multi-sport movement, football is one of the 38 sports on the programme of the Lima 2027 Pan American Games, which Panam Sports schedules for 23 July to 8 August 2027.^[7] Panam Sports links its list of recognised sports confederations to ACODEPA, whose site could not be retrieved; no source retrieved names the body Panam Sports recognises for the football tournament.

What does Concacaf organise?

Concacaf lists its competitions as the Nations League and the Gold Cup for men’s national teams; the W Gold Cup and W Championship for women’s national teams; the Champions Cup, Central American Cup, Caribbean Cup, Leagues Cup and W Champions Cup for clubs; and under-20 and under-17 events for youth teams.^[3]

Concacaf describes the 2024 relaunch of its club competition as an “expanded, all-knockout tournament”.^[4] The Gold Cup site calls the 2027 edition the 19th of a biennial competition.^[8] FIFA competitions played in the region, such as the FIFA World Cup, are FIFA’s: Article 60 of the Concacaf statutes provides that “FIFA competitions shall not be affected by this Article.”^[2]

Who are its members?

Concacaf counts “a football family of 41 Member Associations”, which its history page describes as running “from Canada in the north to Guyana, Suriname, and French Guiana in the south”.^[3][4] Article 9 of the statutes groups them in three unions: 31 in the Caribbean Football Union (CFU), from Anguilla to the US Virgin Islands, including Bonaire, French Guiana, Guadeloupe, Martinique, St. Maarten and St. Martin; seven in the Central American Football Union (UNCAF) — Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama; and three in the North American Football Union (NAFU) — Canada, Mexico and the United States.^[2] Its member-associations page lists the same 41.^[5]

The statutes have two categories. Full Membership is approved by the Congress on the Council’s request; Associate Membership may be granted by the Council to associations that do not meet the full criteria. Associate Members “shall be entitled to all the privileges of Full Members, except an Associate Member shall have no right to vote at any Congress and may not propose candidates to hold office on the Concacaf or FIFA Councils or serve as members on any standing committees” (Article 9(5)).^[2] Only one association is recognised per country or territory, and an association outside the region may join if it belongs to no other confederation (Article 9(2)–(3)).^[2]