“Hegemonia, revolução passiva e globalização: o sistema G7/8”, a book by Leonardo Ramos published in 2013 by Editora PUC Minas, outbreaks a central issue of the contemporary international system and, consequently, of International Relations as an independent field of study: the relationship between hierarchy, order and change. In fact, several traditions of the political and economic thought removed the inequality of power and conditions among social actors as well as external constraints from the analysis of the international scenario. For […]

The enactment of the 1988 Constitution aroused pessimistic interpretations regarding the chances of fulfilling its promises. Some considered that the institutions established or re-established by the constitution would make the country ungovernable. Furthermore, they also argued (and still argue) that the list of constitutionalized social policies did not fit into the government budget. Others, however, faced the challenge of designing a complex institutional architecture capable of putting into practice some of the constitutionalized social rights. The most challenging task was […]

This article is a contribution to the study of the decision-making behind social policies. The literature usually stresses the role of elected politicians and the parliament in framing policies and underestimates governmental stakeholders, who do not hold elected offices, and bureaucrats. This article aims to highlight the active role of high-level federal bureaucrats in the design of policies. The analysis reclaims the classical categories and concepts developed by Lindblom (1980) and Crozier (1964), which points to the hybrid behaviour of […]

The article seeks to discuss strengths and problems of the assumptions of difference and of the ideals of sociopolitical integration in multiculturalist perspectives. The analysis is divided into three parts. In the first I look to show that the incorporation of two themes central to communitarianism – its questioning of the procedural demarcation of the boundaries between private and public spaces, and its critique of the theory of the subject that sustains liberal theses – has been essential to how […]

Studies on the effects of the internet on elections have revealed how Social Network Sites (SNSs) are used by citizens to learn about, choose and contact their representatives. This article analyzes 27 Twitter accounts managed by Fortaleza’s city councilors who ran for reelection in October 2012. The study aimed to discover the importance of Twitter in the councilors’ campaign strategies: what kind of messages were sent by the councilors who adopted digital communication strategies to their followers, and the relationship […]

I still have memories of the impact that caused me reading the book ‘Identity, Competition and Electoral Availability: the Stabilisation of Europe Electorates’, 1885-1995, by Stefano Bartolini and Peter Mair (1990), while still doing my doctorate. Today, I consider it one of the most elegant and well-made books of contemporary Political Science. And the reason is simple: the rare combination of a detailed conceptual discussion – particularly the concept of cleavage – and a dense empirical research. The authors collected […]

Two phenomena have been especially prevalent in Latin America during the decades of the 1980s and 1990s: re-democratization and economic liberalization. In this context, it is legitimate to wonder if it is possible for democracy itself to become a hostage to investors. A vast literature argues that in emerging economies such as those of Latin America, the market has greater capacity to influence political outcomes and also has preference for candidates based on their position on the party-political spectrum. That […]

From presidential misconduct to the Rio Olympics and the Zika virus outbreak, Brazilian political and economic issues have been making headlines all over the world. As interest in Brazilian politics and economics grows, Christina Stolte’s book, ‘Brazil’s African Strategy: Role Conception and the Drive for International Status’, comes at an excellent time to explore Brazil’s growing and ever-changing international status. Stolte (2015) focuses on three important aspects of Brazilian foreign policy and international relations. She begins her book with an […]

No country responds to epidemics in the same way. What makes some countries to be more successful than others in coping with epidemics? It is this question which Eduardo Gómez (2015) tries to answer in his research. He compares the responses that have been given by the United States and Brazil, since the early twentieth century, to the emergence of what he calls contested epidemics , such as syphilis, polio, AIDS, tuberculosis, malnutrition and, currently, obesity. Contested epidemics usually imply […]

This article examines the relationship between the Brazilian foreign aid, in the context of South-South Cooperation (SSC), and the formation of coalitions in the IMF and the World Bank. It explores whether the participation of a country in the bloc led by Brazil in the two organizations affects the volume of Brazilian foreign aid received by this country. As decisions are made by the Executive Board both in the IMF and the World Bank, the study focus on the alliances […]

Research on executive-legislative relations in presidential systems have emphasized how presidents use cabinet appointments to form and manage government coalitions in the absence of majority legislative support. Yet not all coalitions are similar, as some are larger and, consequently, more prone to agency and coordination problems than others. But what shapes presidents’ decision to include more parties in their coalitions? While several hypotheses exist in the literature, few have been tested in a systematic fashion, none focusing on why surplus […]

Studies combining psychology and political science have shown that personality traits such as extroversion and openness to experiences are conditioning factors of political activism. However, the mechanisms through which this effect occurs are still poorly understood. Aiming to advance this topic, this article presents the results of an investigation that looked to analyse the mediated effects of personality traits in the Brazilian context, taking as mediating conditioning factors various attitudes and subjective dispositions commonly found in the literature, such as […]