A rede do gol: cartorialismo e clientelismo na Estrutura Política Esportiva Brasileira (EPEB)

Abstract

The central hypothesis is that behind the economical and management problems in sports lie political questions that define the actions of the involved agents. These questions have a direct relation with the “power grammar and mechanisms” traditionally existent in all national sports. Therefore, there is a way of understanding and managing sportive activities that can’t sustain itself economically and is harmful to a good management level. It is part of the same systemic arrangement the alliance between capital, through the sponsors and mainly the sportive broadcasting and distribution platforms, with the political elite of sports in Brazil – PESB, also known as “Cartolagem”. This constitutes the predatory command of professional sportive activities in the country, sustained by general failure and backwardness. This arrangement is based on the clientelist practice sustained by a notarial mechanism, whose main agents are the members of the PESB. These political elite maintains itself through the economic and management bankruptcy of Brazilian Soccer Teams (BST) and are part of it the teams president and directors, state federations presidents and directors, the directors of CBF and, recurrently, traditional politicians and businessmen. To investigate the subject it was used the historic and current context of the assessed objects, with the most important period dating from the 1990s until nowadays. The neo institutionalist method, soccer current scenario, its main agents and their power structure were taken into account for the purpose of understanding the operation and maintenance of this arrangement. It is also pointed that it is conducted through the current clientelist grammar network, combined with a “notarial situation of sport”, which is supported by the federative arrangement of national sports, specifically the state federations, creating a unique configuration when compared to other countries.