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.

1. 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

2. The five global crises
Financial Economic
Paradigmatic crisis
Ecological Social

3. The five global crises
Financial

4. The five global crises
Economic

5. The five global crises
Ecological

6. The five global crises
Social

7. The five global crises
Paradigmatic

8. The paradigmatic crisis
Economic Growth Poverty reduction
but global warming

9. The paradigmatic crisis
Economic Recession Quest for Sustainable
Development
Financial Instability Social Crisis

10. The paradigmatic crisis
Cuts in Public Spending
Economic Slowdown
Environmental Control
Social Security and Social Crisis
Pension Reform

11. The paradigmatic crisis
• Previous harmonic coexistence of four vectors
• Breakdown of balance with entrance of ecological dimension
Political Social
democracy welfare
Ecological
balance
Economic Scientific &
growth technological
advancement

12. The catastrophes ahead
Inequality
Life expectancy = 86 years Life expectancy = 39 years

13. The catastrophes ahead
Social Apartheid

14. The catastrophes ahead
Biological mutation
Neo homo
sapiens
Homo
Homo sapiens
sapiens

15. The catastrophes ahead
Unemployment

16. The catastrophes ahead
The need of walls

17. The catastrophes ahead
Global warming

18. The catastrophes ahead
Technical advancement without ethical
development

19. The catastrophes ahead
Vulnerability

20. The catastrophes ahead
Widespread migration

21. The catastrophes ahead
Urban chaos

22. The catastrophes ahead
Scarcity of natural resources

23. The catastrophes ahead
The Third-world World

24. The bad development
Production
Nature GDP
Depletion,
pollution,
waste,
residues
Work
Consumption
Population

25. New objectives
Ecological balance
Production
Nature GDP
Reduction of waste,
depletion,
pollution
Work Consumption
Population

26. A new proposal
Space of superfluous consumption
prevented by rules
of environmental protection
Ecological limits
Space of tolerated inequality
defined by individual talent and
persistence - thanks to good Schooling effect: SAL
education for all
Social limits: SSN
Space of social exclusion
avoided by social policies SAL: Social Ascension Ladder
SSN: Social Safety Net

27. The New Development
a. New objectives
• Good growth without ecological unbalance
• Degrowth with social well being
• Happiness without growth
• Free time with cultural practices

28. The New Development
b. New products:
• Public and immaterial goods (culture,
education, health, security)

29. The New Development
b. New products:
• Private and material goods for the basis of the social
pyramid
• High tech products
Exclusive products
Mass products

30. The New Development
c. Renewable resources

31. The New Development
d. Reduction of waste

32. 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.

33. 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.

34. 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.

35. Cash transfers
Two different conceptions:
• Unconditional Cash Transfers (Traditional Keynesianism) X Conditional
Cash Transfers (Productive Keynesianism)
• Social Safety nets (SSN) X Social Ascension Ladder (SAL)
No poverty
Social
Social ascension
Permanent poverty
safety ladder
Absolute poverty net

36. 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

37. 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

38. 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

39. Social Productive Keynesianism – SPK
Alleviating poverty
Social inclusion
Overcoming poverty
Bolsa-Escola – part of
a strategy aimed at:
Efficiency
Economic competitiveness
Inventiveness

40. 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.

41. Social Productive Keynesianism – SPK
The Bolsa-Escola History:
• Theoretically proposed in 1987
• Published as a book in 1994
• Implemented in Brasilia in 1995

42. 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

46. Social Productive Keynesianism – SPK
The impacts of Bolsa-Escola
Promotes
local governmental Defends human
Increases
empowerment rights, especially
adult literacy
children’s rights
Enhances
education quality Inhibits migration
Drastically
reduces Enhances
drop out
BOLSA-ESCOLA family bonds
Eradicates Empowers women
child labor
Promotes economic Brings poverty relief
growth from the bottom (increases income, brings
of the social pyramid better food, health, housing)
Creates job and
income growth
Impacts on children’s life and education
Impacts on society and economy
Impacts on citizenship and solidarity

47. Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) –
the Social Incentives
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.

48. Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) –
the Social Incentives
Bolsa-Alfa (Literacy Scholarship)

49. Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) –
the Social Incentives
Mala do Livro (Home Lecture Program)

50. Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) –
the Social Incentives
Bolsa-Floresta (Forest Protection)

51. Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) –
the Social Incentives
Universalization of water and sewage services

52. Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) –
the Social Incentives
Recovery of rivers

53. Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) –
the Social Incentives
Urbanization and revitalization of shantytowns: pay poor
people to improve their urban and housing

54. Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) –
the Social Incentives
Micro-credit: offer poor people financial support for economic
production and income growth

55. Social Productive Keynesianism (SPK) –
the Social Incentives
Domestic Agro-industries: support
rural workers to build their own
micro-industries

56. 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

57. Global benefits
• Reducing migration
• World-scale increase in efficiency
• World-scale increase in demand
• Reducing conflicts, especially cultural conflict

58. Difficulties
Mental Political
Epistemological Social
Technical Juridical
Economic Demographic

59. Difficulties
The concept revolution
Ethical Social Economic Technical
values objectives rationality choice
Sense of ethical-modernity
Sense of technical-modernity

60. 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

61. 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)

62. Social Productive Cash Transfers to face
the global crisis
http://twitter.com/Sen_Cristovam
http://twitter.com/cbbrazilianview
www.cristovam.org.br
www.educacionista.org.br

63. 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