This article analyzes the mechanisms of the Program of Support for the Restructuring and Expansion of Brazilian Federal Universities (REUNI) that are linked to a new pattern of intervention from the State as they show to be in tune with the discourse of the New Public Management. For so, the article, firstly, makes comments on the crisis and reform of the State and the new management paradigms; secondly, it discusses the reform of the Brazilian State and its bonds with the ideals of reform worldwide; thirdly, it assesses REUNI, establishing common points between the approaches of the reform of the State and the educational system and, finally, it concludes that REUNI tries to give answers to the crisis in the system as it values the introduction of new organizational arrangements and management mechanisms so as to obtain more efficiency concerning public expenses with the basic assumption that contractualizing results is the right path to solving the problems of expansion of the system.
New Public Management; State Reform; Educational Policies; Efficiency; Contractualization