How corruption and football are connected in Brazil

The Brazilian Football Association (CBF) was created in 1914, back when football was an amateur game. In 1950, when Brazil hosted the World Cup for the first time, six teams from Europe and Asia forfeited the invitation owing to a lack of money to be able to make the trip. Soon, however, football became the world’s most popular sport – and a multi-billion-dollar industry to boot. In 2014, when Brazil hosted its second World Cup, FIFA, the governing body of world football which describes itself as being “not for profit,” had a turnover of USD 5 billion.

But compliance practices have not evolved since the early days of the CBF, which means that they remain practically nonexistent. While the world has changed, Brazilian football remains ruled by authoritarian, outdated and opaque business models. An equation...