Abstract
This chapter analyses the migrations of African international student-athletes (ISAs) within Japanese high school, university and professional basketball. World-systems theory is used as a frame to evaluate the movements of ISAs from Africa to Japan within a global basketball system. We identify Africa as a peripheral basketball region, characterised by low-level commercial development, but offering considerable raw talent. Conversely, Japan exists within basketball’s semi-periphery, with a mid-tier high school and professional system. The one-way pipeline that emerges feeds the Japanese high school basketball system with migrant talent. We detail the complexities of the pathways ISAs encounter, discussing how Japanese pipelines may ‘under-develop’ ISA talent. Subsequently, African former ISAs struggle to compete with US players who migrate to the Japanese professional levels as a consequence of the North American ‘overproduction’ of talent. We note that these migrations from peripheral to semi-peripheral countries emerge due to, and perpetuate, disparities within the world basketball system, and the ‘hoop dreams’ of African ISAs are often precarious and limited.