Antagonism, modernism, and inertia: the Brazilian regulatory policy in three acts

Abstract Regulatory policy in Brazil has evolved as a result of the political-ideological interchanges between political coalitions that have governed the country over the last two decades. However, this has not been the only element outlining the policy. Since the State reform in the 1990s, regulation has been conceptually attached to a liberalizing rationale of economic policy and it is, from the theoretical viewpoint, highly dependent on modernizing currents in the field of international public management. The main consequence of this consists in poorly structured and, to some extent, incoherent movements regarding this public policy. At different moments, the assimilation of modernizing global trends has lost ground to ideological antagonisms or periods of significant stagnation. Thus, this article aims to prospect the main stages of the recent history of the Brazilian regulatory policy by means of a detailed evaluation of the most relevant aspects behind this public policy. The three acts demarcating distinct phases and the specific problems that have changed the core of the policy for regulatory management will be introduced. The relation between State, market, and society is crucial to understand the creation of this public policy, as well as the assimilation and resilience degrees of regulatory tools adopted by the country. In the end, it is possible to notice that the regulatory policy still remains partial and deficient at the federal level, although clear tendencies are already perceptible, particularly the permeability to resocialization and decentralization elements.