poverty, inequality and social policies in brazil: social productive keynesianism?
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Presentation by Senator Cristovam Buarque from Brazil on 27 April 2012 at IPC-IG. Cristovam Buarque has been a Senator for two consecutive terms (2003-2019) and a Professor at the University of Brasilia since 1979, where he was also Dean (1985-1989). He graduated in Mechanical Engineering at the Federal University of Pernambuco (1966) and earned a PhD in Economics from Sorbonne (1973). He worked as Advisor for the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) from 1973-1979. He has also presided the UN University for Peace Council and is a member of UNESCO’s Institute of Education, having published over ten books. During his mandate as Governor of the Brazilian Federal District (1995-1998), he was recognized by his commitment with social inclusion and as an administrator able to turn the ideas previously exposed in his books into laws. Among the several creative solutions conceived by the Professor and implemented by the Governor, the most renowned in Brazil and abroad is the Bolsa-Escola, a revolutionary approach for education and against poverty. He was Minister of Education in 2003. At the Senate he was Chairman of the Senate's External Relations Committee (2004), headed the Senate Human Rights Committee (2005-06), and was Chairman of the Education, Sports and Culture Committee (2007). Presently, Senator Buarque is Vice-Chairman of the Senate External Relations Committee and Chairman of the Special Subcommittee for the 2012 Summit Rio+20.TRANSCRIPT
SPK: a theory behind CCT
Cristovam Buarque Conference on New Approaches to Poverty and
Inequality Reduction in the Global South An Overview of Poverty, Inequality and Social Policies in Brazil
04/27/2012 – IPC-UNDP
The five global crises
Financial Economic
Ecological Social
Paradigmatic crisis
The five global crises Financial
The five global crises
Economic
The five global crises Ecological
The five global crises Social
The five global crises Paradigmatic
The paradigmatic crisis
Economic Growth Poverty reduction but global warming
The paradigmatic crisis
Financial Instability Social Crisis
Economic Recession Quest for Sustainable Development
The paradigmatic crisis
Environmental Control
Social Security and Pension Reform
Social Crisis
Economic Slowdown Cuts in Public Spending
The paradigmatic crisis
• Previous harmonic coexistence of four vectors
• Breakdown of balance with entrance of ecological dimension
Political democracy
Economic growth
Social welfare
Scientific & technological advancement
Ecological balance
The catastrophes ahead Inequality
Life expectancy = 86 years Life expectancy = 39 years
The catastrophes ahead Social Apartheid
The catastrophes ahead
Homo sapiens Homo
sapiens
Neo homo sapiens
Biological mutation
The catastrophes ahead Unemployment
The catastrophes ahead The need of walls
The catastrophes ahead Global warming
The catastrophes ahead Technical advancement without ethical
development
The catastrophes ahead Vulnerability
The catastrophes ahead Widespread migration
The catastrophes ahead Urban chaos
The catastrophes ahead Scarcity of natural resources
The catastrophes ahead
The Third-world World
The bad development
Depletion, pollution, waste, residues
Work
Population
GDP Nature
Production
Consumption
Ecological balance
New objectives
Consumption
Reduction of waste, depletion, pollution
Work
Population
Production
GDP Nature
A new proposal
Space of social exclusion avoided by social policies
Space of tolerated inequality defined by individual talent and
persistence - thanks to good education for all
Space of superfluous consumption prevented by rules
of environmental protection
Ecological limits
Social limits: SSN
Schooling effect: SAL
SAL: Social Ascension Ladder
SSN: Social Safety Net
a. New objectives • Good growth without ecological unbalance
• Degrowth with social well being
• Happiness without growth
• Free time with cultural practices
The New Development
b. New products: • Public and immaterial goods (culture,
education, health, security)
The New Development
b. New products: • Private and material goods for the basis of the social
pyramid
• High tech products
The New Development
Mass products
Exclusive products
c. Renewable resources
The New Development
d. Reduction of waste
The New Development
Traditional Keynesianism x Social Productive Keynesianism • Traditional Keynesianism expands the aggregate demand, using public funds to
employ manpower, even to produce “no-goods” that don't meet consumer needs: monuments, unnecessary infrastructure, weapons. The worker earns just enough to buy products that will boost the aggregate supply.
Traditional Keynesianism x Social Productive Keynesianism
• Social Productive Keynesianism proposes the use of public funds to finance employment in order to produce goods that will meet population needs and ecological balance.
New conception to fight poverty and promote economic growth Social productivism:
• From SSN: social-safety-net
• To SAL: social-ascension-ladder
• To pay poor people to produce what poor people need – mobilizing the poor
The SSN keeps the poor in the poverty line, without a door to a way out.
The SAL mobilizes the poor and offers them a way out of poverty.
Two different conceptions:
Cash transfers
• Unconditional Cash Transfers (Traditional Keynesianism) X Conditional Cash Transfers (Productive Keynesianism) • Social Safety nets (SSN) X Social Ascension Ladder (SAL)
Absolute poverty
No poverty
Social safety net
Social ascension ladder
Permanent poverty
Cash Transfer Programs
Can be unproductive or productive
• Unproductive: reduces some of the poverty burden, without conditionalities related to production and with no provision of adequate goods and services
• Productive: requires that beneficiaries produce goods and services to attend the poor’s needs
Cash Transfers Programs
Unproductive /
unconditional cash transfer programs
offer a minimum income
to relieve the poverty needs
by the purchase of private
goods at the market
Cash Transfers Programs
Social / conditional
productive cash transfer programs
offer an income to relief
private needs through the market and mobilizes the unemployed poor to produce and increase the offer of public goods and services to overcome social disparities
Social Productive Keynesianism – SPK
Bolsa-Escola – part of a strategy aimed at:
Social inclusion
Economic competitiveness
Alleviating poverty
Overcoming poverty
Efficiency
Inventiveness
Social Productive Keynesianism – SPK
Bolsa-Escola, the first Productive Conditional Cash Transfer program:
Payment of a stipend, in cash, requiring that poor families ensure that their children were attending school, with the following requirements:
• the per capita family income is under a pre-defined level close to the poverty line;
• all children of school age have to be enrolled in a public school;
• all of them must comply with a minimum of 90% school attendance. Failure causes suspension of the monthly payment, until all children of the specific family are regularly attending school.
The Bolsa-Escola History:
• Theoretically proposed in 1987
• Published as a book in 1994
• Implemented in Brasilia in 1995
Social Productive Keynesianism – SPK
The Bolsa-Escola History:
• Implemented at Federal level as of 2001 – over 4 million families benefited
• Implementation worldwide as of 1997: initially in Mexico, later in Ecuador, Argentina, Sao Tome and Principe, Mozambique, Tanzania, Chile, Bolivia, El Salvador, and Guatemala
• Reached in Brazil, until 2010, up to 12 million families, or 50 million people under the name of Bolsa Familia, with a reduction of the educational requirements
Social Productive Keynesianism – SPK
Social Productive Keynesianism – SPK
The impacts of Bolsa-Escola
Promotes local governmental
empowerment Increases
adult literacy
Enhances education quality
Drastically reduces drop out
Eradicates child labor
Defends human rights, especially children’s rights
Inhibits migration
Enhances family bonds
Empowers women
Brings poverty relief (increases income, brings
better food, health, housing)
Creates job and income growth
Promotes economic growth from the bottom
of the social pyramid
BOLSA-ESCOLA
Impacts on children’s life and education
Impacts on society and economy
Impacts on citizenship and solidarity
Poupança-Escola (School Savings Program)
• Program implemented in Brasilia in 1995, consists of depositing a certain amount of money for the students receiving the School Scholarship who are promoted to the next grade. • Up to half the amount deposited can be withdrawn when the student finishes fourth grade and enrolls in fifth grade. • Another withdrawal can only be made when the student finishes eighth grade and enrolls in the first year of secondary school. • Finally, the student can only withdraw the entire amount deposited if he or she finishes secondary school. • If the student quits school at any time, he or she loses the amount deposited.
Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) – the Social Incentives
Bolsa-Alfa (Literacy Scholarship)
Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) – the Social Incentives
Mala do Livro (Home Lecture Program)
Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) – the Social Incentives
Bolsa-Floresta (Forest Protection)
Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) – the Social Incentives
Universalization of water and sewage services
Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) – the Social Incentives
Recovery of rivers
Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) – the Social Incentives
Urbanization and revitalization of shantytowns: pay poor
people to improve their urban and housing
Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) – the Social Incentives
Micro-credit: offer poor people financial support for economic
production and income growth
Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) – the Social Incentives
Domestic Agro-industries: support
rural workers to build their own micro-industries
Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) – the Social Incentives
A new proposal – the Educationism
• A worldwide revolution in education and through education
• Education for All
• A school committed with the ecological and social balance
• A connected civilization
Global benefits
• Reducing migration
• World-scale increase in efficiency
• World-scale increase in demand
• Reducing conflicts, especially cultural conflict
Difficulties
Epistemological
Mental Political
Social
Juridical
Demographic
Technical
Economic
Difficulties
Ethical values
Social objectives
Economic rationality
Technical choice
Sense of ethical-modernity
Sense of technical-modernity
The concept revolution
The change in logic
• the poverty of Economics
• the cost of omission
• the feminization of social logic
• growth from the base of the social pyramid
The Educationism Global Social Marshall Plan for Education
• Requires additional US$200 per child = US$ 200 billion
• Equivalent to less than 0,5% (5/1000) of the world personal income
• Equivalent to 10% of the U.S. banking system rescue package (US$2 trillion) in the 2007/2008 crisis
• Nearly equivalent to what President Obama spent in education for American children (US$ 127 billion), as part of the economy rescue plan (US$ 819 billion)
http://twitter.com/Sen_Cristovam http://twitter.com/cbbrazilianview www.cristovam.org.br www.educacionista.org.br
Social Productive Cash Transfers to face the global crisis
The Educationism Some bibliography by the author
• Abolishing poverty: a proposal for the eradication of poverty in Brazil http://bit.ly/IpxdxB
• Bolsa-Escola: A poverty recovery plan for Africa – Bringing children first http://bit.ly/HzWLso
• Social incentives: a program to abolish poverty in Brazil http://bit.ly/HLcgfB
• The revolution of small things http://bit.ly/HAiWzn
• The progress of the idea of progress http://bit.ly/IiYgaw