The article has as its main objective to compare civil construction in Brazil relatively to the same industry in the United States and the European Union, that were used as benchmarking to Brazil, so it will be possible to find solutions that can contribute to minimize possible gaps that may exist. It is described as civil construction is very important to the Brazilian economy, although there are problems and challenges to be confronted. At the same time, the authors intend to open discussions about these problems. The authors do not intend to propose definitive solutions but to start the discussion about the problems and possible solutions. It is described, briefly, what is the status of civil construction in the European Union, its main problems and solutions that are being used to solve them. This is done in order to see what of these solutions can be applied to Brazil. The same is done relatively to the United States, having in mind that the same study structure used to Brazil and European Union was maintained, in order to help comparisons. So, the main objective is to establish a possibility to compare the situation of civil construction in Brazil, United States and European Union and verify what are the alternatives and solutions that are used there and that can be applied in Brazil.
Civil construction; buildings; modernization; benchmarking
