Local government autonomy and interdependence among jurisdictions: analysis of the changes occurred in access and spending on education in Brazil (2000-2014)

ABSTRACT:

The main goal of this article is to explore the ongoing changes in access to basic education and local government’s expenditures from 2000-2014 in Brazil, to stress the relations among jurisdictions for the provision of education policies. Municipalities play a central role in the analysis, since they are the main providers of daycares, preschools and elementary schools in Brazil. State governments affect local government decisions on education policy given that some of them display homogeneity of access. The FUNDEF and FUNDEB policies also play an important role on both the access and the distribution of spending. Spending on early childhood provision is increasing gradually and daycare users tend to be the major beneficiaries in this context of change. Finally, the conclusion is that the trend, in recent years, of diversification of spending between different levels of education is a reflection of the increase of local autonomy on the education policy and it is a consequence of changes in the policy decision making made by the federal government.

Keywords:
federalism; local autonomy; access to education; spending in education; municipalization of education