Brazil recently experienced a change in government with the election of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, but Brazilian newspapers’ coverage of congressional earmarks has remained the same. Last week, articles criticized the president’s office for handing out billions in grants to members of Congress, while others used the data to say Lula is no different from his far-right predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro.
Journalists have so far missed many points in these stories. Budgetary earmarks themselves are the problem, nor is their use in coalition-building.
As I have discussed elsewhere, earmarks are a legitimate mechanism of democratic representation that promotes a win-win-win game: voters get improvements in their districts, legislators get votes in return, and presidents get support for their agenda in the legislative arena.
The issue is the current format of the budget earmark system. Legislative changes in 2015 and 2019 made the payment of individual and collective earmarks both mandatory and egalitarian — reducing the bargaining power of presidents with legislators.
The problem Lula now faces is the same as Mr. Bolsonaro had in the past: presidents have fewer tools to build coalitions....
Search
