Palmeiras? How Football Clubs Help You to Understand Brazil

From immigrant influences to regional differences, stadiums describe the entire country.

This month, football teams like FC Bayern Munich and Tigres will take part in the FIFA World Club Championship. The event takes place in Doha, Qatar. Representing South America is Sociedade Esportiva Palmeiras. Or, as most Brazilians know it, Palmeiras.

Palmeiras is not an strange institution at football. Stage figures like Ademir da Guia in the 70s, the striker Edmundo in the 90s, the goalkeeper and World Cup champion Marcos and most recently the Manchester City versatile forward Gabriel Jesus played there.

I am not a supporter of Palmeiras, but from another Brazilian football club called Santos -sadly defeated by Palmeiras in the final of the Libertadores cup, which is the equivalent of the UEFA Champions Cup in South America.

One thing that people do not realize is that, while football is an always present subject in Brazil, it is also useful to understand the country. In Brazil, football is at the same time uniting and opposing people.

This article has some generalizations. Not all fans from Palmeiras have Italian background, and not all from Corinthians live in the dense east side of São Paulo. But the exception, in these cases, confirms the rule, and both these teams, as well as the others mentioned, are tied to their cradles.

Palmeiras, Vasco da Gama, Portuguesa, Grêmio and the Immigrant Heritage

Brazil is a country made by immigrants, and so are some of the greatest Brazilian football clubs.

The history of Palmeiras started on August 26th, 1914, with four Italian immigrants who arrived in the State of Sao Paulo. They were Cervo, Marzo, Simone and Ragonetti. The group created a club to involve the Italian diaspora in the European sport they already loved, but still uncommon in Brazil. The first name of Palmeiras was Palestra Itália. During the II World War, Brazil joined the allies, and the club needed to change its name to avoid any link with the enemy.

Vasco da Gama started as rowing club of Portuguese immigrants in Rio de Janeiro. They found the club at the same time Portugal celebrated the 4th centenary that the explorer Vasco da Gama discovered the route from Europe to India. They name the club in his honor. The club shield has the same cross (Cruz da Ordem de Cristo) of the Portuguese flag. The rowing club expanded to a sports club. Today, their football team has over 5 million supporters. Another state, São Paulo, also has a team linked to the Portuguese community, Portuguesa, a runner-up in the 1986 national championship.

Italians and Portugueses were not the only immigrants involved in football in Brazilian lands. Germans settled in the southern regions of Brazil. There, they contributed with one of the most victorious national clubs, the three-times Libertadores champions Grêmio Foot-Ball Porto Alegrense.

Flamengo, Corinthians, São Paulo, and Social Classes

Brazil is not a rich country, so it would be only logical that the two teams associated with the poorer share of the population gather the largest crowds. This is the case of Flamengo and Corinthians, respectively from the states of Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo.

A research from Pluri Consultoria concluded that this is still true for Flamengo. Corinthians supporters, however, have a per capita income similar to other teams of the same state. One justification for this is that the State of Sao Paulo, the most industrialized in the country, also have comparatively high social-mobility rates, so the profile of Corinthians fanbase changed across the years.

This also explains why São Paulo Futebol Clube, a team once related with upper classes, currently has the largest share of their fans in the middle class. This happens besides having their stadium at Morumbi, a fancy district populated by millionaires and traditional families.

In the last few years, political nuances shone on some club rivalries. This is more because of certain high-profile politicians being vocal about the clubs they support. Examples are Lula, the leftist president and Corinthians supporter, and Bolsonaro, the right-wing president who supports Palmeiras. To add laughter to the situation, Corinthians is Palmeiras’ biggest rival.

With all these differences, there is one common thing among almost all Brazilian football clubs. They have worse management than their European counterparts. There were recent advances, but still it is common to see corruption scandals in directive boards, and riots among supporters.

This is Brazil, after all.

There are, however, some interesting initiatives, like Red Bull investing in Bragantino, a small club of São Paulo, and adding Brazil to the Austrian energy-drink football strategy.

Levi Borba is CEO of expatriateconsultancy.com and a best-selling author. You can check his books here, his other articles here, or his Linkedin here.