This volume presents in-depth insights into the polity, politics and policies of the Brazilian political system. It reassesses the processes of change since the country's return to democracy in the 1980s, in the light of autocratic societal structures and suboptimal institutional design, on the one hand, and the political and economic achievements observed, on the other. In their contributions, top Brazilian and international scholars critically examine the development of the political system with a focus on the Lula and Rousseff administrations, and place their actions and failures in the socio-political and economic context so as to uncover the underlying institutional structures, constellations and diverging interests of actors on various decision-making levels and in different political fields. It is the central aim of this book to present a differentiated portrait of the current political landscape and remaining contradictions in Latin America's largest country.

This volume presents in-depth insights into the polity, politics and policies of the Brazilian political system. It reassesses the processes of change since the country's return to democracy in the 1980s, in the light of autocratic societal structures and suboptimal institutional design, on the one hand, and the political and economic achievements observed, on the other. In their contributions, top Brazilian and international scholars critically examine the development of the political system with a focus on the Lula and Rousseff administrations, and place their actions and failures in the socio-political and economic context so as to uncover the underlying institutional structures, constellations and diverging interests of actors on various decision-making levels and in different political fields. It is the central aim of this book to present a differentiated portrait of the current political landscape and remaining contradictions in Latin America's largest country.

Dieses Buch fuhrt ein in die Politik, die Okonomie und die Gesellschaft Brasiliens, in seine zentralen politischen Institutionen, Akteure und Politikfelder. Es fragt insbesondere nach der Entwicklung der demokratischen Institutionen seit dem Ende der Militardiktatur 1985 und der Ruckkehr zur Demokratie und liefert zudem in jedem Kapitel eine erste Bilanz der in vielerlei Hinsicht bedeutsamen Regierung von Lula da Silva."

Brazil is considered to be one of the future economic and political global powers. However, despite its recent economic success, Brazil's innovative capacity is rather low when compared to other world regions. This dissertation argues that the performance of an innovation system crucially depends on negotiation between different levels of the political system and their inclusion in policy-making. The underperformance of the Brazilian innovation system points toward the obstacles to effective policy-making that inhibit better coordination among actors and levels and improving innovative capacities. The political dimension and the institutionalized governance and power relations between the national and the subnational levels have seldom been incorporated in the analysis of innovation systems, and, up to now, no study has captured the dynamics of multi-level governance and innovation policies in Brazil. This study closes the gap and presents a detailed descriptive analysis of the Brazilian multi-actor innovation policy arena and multi-level governance structures, and continues to present evidence of two regional innovation systems (Rio Grande do Sul and Espirito Santo). Dissertation.