Concerns about corruption regularly surface in football. They can take a variety of forms: ‘bungs’ over the transfer of players; money laundering; tax evasion; allegations of bribes to officials etc. However, in some developing countries these problems can be more endemic, possibly because the government itself is thoroughly corrupt and is not interested in checking corruption in civil society. Occasionally countries are compared to kleptocracies because ruling elites or families appropriate large portions of economic output for themselves.
Concerns about corruption regularly surface in football. They can take a variety of forms: ‘bungs’ over the transfer of players; money laundering; tax evasion; allegations of bribes to officials etc. However, in some developing countries these problems can be more endemic, possibly because the government itself is thoroughly corrupt and is not interested in checking corruption in civil society. Occasionally countries are compared to kleptocracies because ruling elites or families appropriate large portions of economic output for themselves.
However, in some countries there is sufficient robustness and transparency in civil society for allegations of corruption to be made public and investigated. This appears to be the case in relation to charges of corruption in Indonesian football.