Policy Perspectives
Strategic Risk Management in the Policy-making Process
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Daria Maltseva
The paper is dedicated to the analysis of risk management as an essential tool supporting the policy-making process. Evidently policy-making takes place in conditions of uncertainty, flux, unpredictability, and variation. It means that the analysis of policy design and implementation requires clear understanding of a multi-agent political system affected by various internal and external risks. The policy-making approach and the underlying policy process need instruments that help to estimate and control risks, preventing their potential turning into destructive dangers for the political, economic, and social environments. So, strategic risk management plays a significant role in the decision-making process and cannot be ignored for deeper understanding of policy development aimed at avoiding common political disruptions, accelerating the development of political structure, and, most importantly, establishing consensus between state authorities and society.
Ineffectiveness of Policies to Overcome Poverty: What Is Behind It?
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Adriane Ferrarini Ferrarini
The period of popular governments in Brazil (2002-2015) was characterized by unprecedented investments in social policies to overcome poverty. Its main instrument, the Bolsa Familia, is the largest income transfer program in the world, internationally recognized and reapplied. However, inequality continues to rise and poverty rates rose again at the end of this period. Despite the economic crisis that plagues the country, it is possible to affirm the fragility of the social impact of the policies. This paper discusses the implementation of the policy and analyzes the reasons for its ineffectiveness. The results demonstrate limitations due, especially, to the lack of intersectorality between the social and economic area. However, this dissociation is not restricted to the technical dimension; it has roots in the country's development matrix which has remained unchanged. The fundamental measures of establishing inclusive economic development and generating decent economic opportunities for the millions of poor Brazilians who were assisted and professionally qualified did not happen. If unprecedented investments were made to the poorest, in infinitely greater proportion, they remained and remain in the hands of the economic and political elite, leading to questioning the legitimacy of the discourses and practice on overcoming poverty in unequal societies of the South.
