How Bolsonaro is wrecking Brazil’s education system

Millions of Brazilian students have been left abandoned for a year. Photo: Rodolfo Santos/Shutterstock

After a lengthy delay, President Jair Bolsonaro finally signed off on this year’s federal budget last week. In order to avoid further cuts to parliamentary grants— which benefit lawmakers and the president himself — the federal administration froze BRL 9.2 billion (USD 1.68 billion) in funding to cabinet ministries and government agencies. Among the cuts, the Education Ministry was by far the most affected department, with a total of BRL 2.7 billion slashed from this year’s education budget.

While the freeze will not affect mandatory expenses — such as payroll and pensions — experts estimate that the budget cut will affect important programs, such as one focused on expanding access to high-school education.

Indeed, this is not the first time that the Bolsonaro administration has shown its disregard for education. With the exception of one recently implemented program — the not-yet fully operational Brasil na Escola initiative, focused on elementary schooling — the Education Ministry under Mr. Bolsonaro...

Beatriz Rey

Beatriz Rey is an SNF Agora Visiting Fellow at Johns Hopkins University and an APSA Congressional Fellow (2021-2022). She holds a Ph.D. in political science from Syracuse University and an M.A. in political science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.