SOCIEDADE ANÔNIMA DO FUTEBOL (SAF): O QUE ESTÁ EM JOGO NA EMPRESARIALIZAÇÃO DOS CLUBES
SOCIEDADE ANÔNIMA DO FUTEBOL (SAF): O QUE ESTÁ EM JOGO NA EMPRESARIALIZAÇÃO DOS CLUBES
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.22533/at.ed.864122629045
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Palavras-chave: Sociedade Anônima do Futebol (SAF); Governança Corporativa; Gestão Esportiva; Futebol Brasileiro; Empresarialização; Teoria da Agência
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Keywords: Brazilian Football Corporation (SAF); Corporate Governance; Sports Management; Brazilian Football; Corporatization; Agency Theory
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Abstract: Brazilian professional football has long faced a tension between economic relevance and the organizational fragility of association-based clubs, a context that motivated the creation of the Football Corporation (Sociedade Anônima do Futebol – SAF) by Law No. 14,193/2021. This chapter discusses the economic, institutional, and governance foundations underlying the corporatization of Brazilian clubs, focusing on the SAF model. The discussion draws on the literature on dual mission, agency theory, soft budget constraints, and organizational capabilities, contrasting relevant international experiences, particularly the English and German models, with early Brazilian implementation cases. We argue that the SAF represents a potentially relevant institutional instrument for addressing the sector's historical problems, but its effectiveness depends on variables that go beyond changes in legal form. Three tensions cut across the analysis: between corporate form and effective governance quality; between capitalization and preservation of institutional identity; and between soft budget constraints and formal financial discipline. The Brazilian cases illustrate that institutional arrangements do not determine outcomes by themselves, and that corporatization produces heterogeneous trajectories depending on investor profile, management quality, and regulatory context. We conclude that substantive evaluation of the SAF must take place at the level of the contractual, managerial, and regulatory arrangements in which the model operates, not at the level of the legal change alone.
- Felipe Marques do Santos
- Darlan Perondi
- João Vitor Alves Pereira Fialho