Legal Determinants of World Cup Success

Abstract

The "law matters" theory advanced in a series of empirical works by Rafael La Porta, Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes, Andrei Shleifer, and Robert Vishny ("LLSV"), has become a centerpiece of recent corporate law debate. Using LLSV methodology, this Article examines the relation between legal protections and soccer success, using as the dependent variable the number of points each country has in the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Rankings. The statistically significant findings reported herein may or may not have implications of momentous import for various aspects of the human experience.