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One of the things that has struck me in writing about the Newcastle ownership issues is that people think it's a simple truism that a state shouldn't own a football club but that corporations can.
However, casting your eye over the evolution of Western polity, it becomes pretty clear that what has happened is the emergence of an inversion of the status of the corporation and state. Where the state used to control corporate interests, it feels like that has reversed now.
Why might this be interesting? We'll because rather than a separation between the corporation and the state existing, it feels like government has become another arm of corporate interest.
In the West, then, despite our claims that states owning football clubs seems obvious, there is a sense that this supposed separation of state and corporation is just offering us plausible deniability.
Is corporation owning a football club that different to a Middle Eastern state owning a football club. Yes in terms of how they are using it to disperse power (c.f. Red Bull) but no in terms of the fact that both are using it as a mechanism through which to use power.
And, for me, the state should be moderating how power is being used. When it comes to football ownership, that means regulating ownership and protecting the fans' interest. How can you do that when you're essentially protecting business interest as your raison d'etre?
Again, this is not to justify the Saudi takeover, but to say that the arguments surrounding it need to be more robust. The separation of corporation and state is essentially non-existent so shouldn't we talk more about corporate ownership of clubs?
