National Security
Business & Sports · Issue No. VII
LIV and Let Live
What everyone should know about LIV Golf — the Saudi-backed tour that is reshaping professional golf and the politics of sports.
Special.Report Editors
Summer 2023
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
LIV Golf's emergence as a Saudi-backed rival to the PGA Tour has forced a reckoning with the intersection of sports, geopolitics and money that extends well beyond professional golf. This report examines the business model, the political controversy and the implications of sovereign wealth fund investment in American sports.
THE REPORT
The Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia's investment in professional golf through LIV Golf represents a new chapter in the use of sports as an instrument of national strategy. The controversy it has generated — about sportswashing, player loyalty and the governance of professional sports — raises questions that will outlast the specific dispute between LIV and the PGA Tour.
The proposed merger between LIV Golf and the PGA Tour, announced in June 2023 and subsequently complicated by congressional scrutiny and internal opposition, illustrates the difficulty of resolving conflicts that involve national security concerns, antitrust questions and the commercial interests of players, sponsors and broadcasters.
