A democracia no Brasil: presidencialismo, coalizão partidária e processo decisório

Since mid-1980s crime rates in Brazil started to increase with the transition from military dictatorship to democracy, a period marked by the rise of poverty and hyperinflation. Given levels of police corruption and protection of criminal gangs, trust in the criminal justice system was low, leading to a heightened dependence on private security, gated communities and the politicisation of law and order politics. An impressive punitive turn began at in the 1990s. This paper analysed penal policies under successive left-wing Lula and Dilma governments from 2003 to 2014. During this period the rise of 'postneoliberal' and 'postneoconservative' politics, led by the Workers Party, developed governmental strategies and initiatives that formulated and legitimized rich and complex expressions of traditionally left-wing politics. Despite the simultaneous implementation of distributive policies, the increase of human development levels throughout the country, the reduction of social inequalities and the redirection of the official discourse of Federal Government security policies towards crime prevention, incarceration rates continued to increase. This article examines why efforts to build an effective public security policy committed to upholding civil rights and improving the control of police and police activities have failed. KeywordsIncarceration rates; Brazil; law and order politics; punitive populism.

The instabilities experienced in Brazil, especially during 2014 when World Cup spending triggered a series of protests in the country, showed a weakness in the distribution of political power in the country. This study proposes an improved distribution of power that could ensure greater government autonomy and stability in the republic. This is accomplished by applying the principles of Stafford Beer's viable system model to the three state powers of Brazil: the executive, legislative and judiciary. We found that the current distribution of power requires greater autonomy of the judiciary, as well as breaking from the procedure of the political parties' pre‐selection. This would ensure greater representation of citizen demands. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Brazil experienced a dramatic see-saw in relations with Africa in the first two decades of the 21 st Century. Booming ties in diplomacy, development cooperation and trade saw Brazil established as a major partner for the continent under the leadership of Lula's PT administration. Subsequent governments increasingly dismantled many of the policies supporting this boom. However, this collapse, and what it signifies about Brazil's Africa relations, is still little understood and more widely, there are few detailed case studies of this trend. This chapter tackles both gaps with a study of Brazil-Tanzania, which mirrored the wider boom and bust. Its analysis demonstrates the degree to which the spread of ties beyond Lusophone countries was state-initiated, with diplomacy playing a central role, but then implemented by companies, who shaped what occurred 'on the ground'. This created a weakness in Brazil-Africa relations, given Brazil's presidential system and its influence over foreign policy priorities and development cooperation spending. Additionally, the chapter introduces the concept of naivety amongst Brazilian actors, as a misreading of Tanzanian politics prevented infrastructure companies from establishing projects. However, the chapter concludes by arguing that any understanding of Brazil-Africa must appreciate the crucial role of African agency. As demonstrated here by Tanzanian politicians and government officials, countries on the continent fundamentally shape the processes, activities and successes of Brazilian involvement.