Horizontal federal dispute for oil rents resources: the Brazilian oil royalties struggle case

• Grant number: 13/22471-5
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Post-Doctoral
• Start date: March 01, 2014
• End date: June 08, 2016
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Administration - Public Administration
• Principal Investigator: George Avelino Filho
• Grantee: Beni Trojbicz
• Host Institution: Escola de Administração de Empresas de São Paulo (EAESP). Fundação Getúlio Vargas (FGV). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Since 2010, there has been an important political dispute in Brazilian Congress, aiming to change oil rents regional distribution rules, that became known as "royalties dispute". It opposes oil producing and non-producing jurisdictions, generating a regional parliamentary organization in Congress and states governors mobilization, echoing political actions from the beginning of the current democratic era and from the "República Velha" (1889-1930). Current Brazilian federative theories feature party congressional organization as the general pattern, disregarding the state governors influence in the parliamentary organization. This project aims at understanding the process based on the influence of regional inequality over fiscal resources distribution in federative contexts. In that regard, the regional organization aligns constituency, parliamentarians, regional party leadership and national party leadership preferences, avoiding intra-party conflict and exempting party leaders to impose party discipline. This project results can contribute to understand other federative disputes among jurisdictions in Brazil, as the renegotiation of the State Participation Fund (FPE) and the "fiscal war". As well, it can contribute to illuminate a case that features oil rent regional redistribution.