Abstract
This article analyses the process of the state modernization in Brazil, associating it with the concept of state capacity, in particular the professionalization of the federal bureaucracy in charge of conceiving and implementing public policies. The article concludes that, despite multiple mechanisms used by different governments and political regimes to recruit their bureaucracies, the federal Executive has always been capable of generating the capacity to implement the policies of its choice. Over the past two decades, however, the federal Executive has recruited its bureaucracy primarily through public sector entrance examinations. As result, Brazil today has a consolidated bureaucracy that is involved in overseeing rules, procedures and fiscal controls, but that is still incomplete in some areas of public policy. These new features of the federal bureaucracy suggest that certain characteristics of the Weberian bureaucracy have indeed been created but others are still awaiting institutionalization, which therefore affects the capacity of the state in implementing certain policies.
Keywords:
modernization of the state; state capacity; federal government; bureaucracy