Brazil: Is There an Order to Chaos?

Abstract

This chapter presents a discussion on the development of the Brazilian education system. In the introduction, we resume the local and regional contexts and their relation to the global scenario using a historical-temporal perspective, focusing on the peculiarities of our political and democratic profile, Brazilian educational public policies, economy and social system. We descriptively reconstructed the beginnings of formal education: missionary and colonial education, independence and post-independence expansion. We point out the objectives of education, its organization, administration, structure, operation and its interfaces with the policies on curriculum, evaluation and funding. The discussion of these policies shows their impacts on the education of teachers and students, as well as the relation between education and work in the context of an approach of cycles and the neoliberal perspective. Beyond this, under the perspective of contextual influences, we have identified and described how OECD contributed to incorporate the analysis of comparative development indexes through which it is possible to re-discuss education quality, equity and other aspects. The understanding of all concepts used was broadened by a reformulation, not only due to the effects of the pandemic but also by a profound political and economic crisis that points toward an unprecedented historic setback in the democratic context.

Citation

Aguilar, L.E., França, E.N. and Assis, A.E.S.Q. (2022), "Brazil: Is There an Order to Chaos?", Wolhuter, C.C. and Wiseman, A.W. (Ed.) World Education Patterns in the Global South: The Ebb of Global Forces and the Flow of Contextual Imperatives (International Perspectives on Education and Society, Vol. 43B), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 161-172. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1479-36792022000043B009