Eficácia da gestão pública local: estudo das capacidades estatais dos micromunicípios no contexto do Programa Nacional de Alimentação Escolar

Abstract

Subnational governments, particularly local governments, have increasingly taken on a significant role in the allocation of responsibilities for public service delivery. Given the widely observed reality of the transfer and incorporation of a diverse set of responsibilities by municipal entities and the incremental increase in fiscal structure at the municipal level, the researcher's interest is piqued in understanding how aspects specific to public policy production contribute to the effectiveness of municipal government actions. This study is framed within the context of the National School Feeding Program (Programa Nacional de Alimentação Escolar - PNAE), a public policy aimed at promoting food security and nutrition with a long-standing presence in the Brazilian national landscape and one of the largest and most universal school feeding programs globally. The phenomenon under investigation intertwines the topics of state capabilities and public management performance. The research is guided by an initial question: how do state capabilities condition the effectiveness of public management in small municipalities, with a focus on meeting the minimum requirement of 30% of school meal item purchases from family farming within the scope of PNAE? The hypothesis in this thesis argues that the political and institutional dimensions are the components of state capabilities most crucial to the successful performance of public management in small municipalities. The objective of this thesis is, therefore, to comprehend how state capabilities generate the effectiveness of public management in small municipalities, with the legal goal prescribed in the PNAE law, which mandates the acquisition of a minimum of 30% of school meal items from family farming, serving as the horizon. The proposed specific objectives are as follows: i. identify a set of state and institutional resources available to local governments; ii. outline a general behavioral pattern for all Brazilian municipalities regarding state capabilities aspects; iii. compare the results of interactions within the set of state capabilities among different strata of local governments; iv. synthesize peculiarities regarding how state capabilities operate in small municipalities. For the purpose of defining the unit of analysis, this research is dedicated to understanding the determinants of public management effectiveness, observed through the prism of state capabilities, in the context of the realities faced by the smallest municipalities in the Brazilian federation (micro-municipalities with up to 10,188 inhabitants). Methodologically, this is a mixed-method study (quantitative and qualitative) of broad scope. Data from all 2,513 smallest Brazilian municipalities were extracted from the “Munic” (IBGE) and the National Fund for the Development of Education (FNDE) databases. To assess the univariate and multivariate influence of the variables included in the preliminary analytical model, the Generalized Equations Estimating method was used. The software used for the analyses was “R” (version 4.0.2). Results confirm the hypothesis that the political and institutional dimensions exert greater influence on the effectiveness of municipal public management in small municipalities.