Brazil Action Plan Review 2021-2023

This product consists of an IRM review of the Brazil (2021–2023) action planAction plans are at the core of a government’s participation in OGP. They are the product of a co-creation process in which government and civil society jointly develop commitments to open governmen.... The action plan is made up of 12 of commitments that the IRM has filtered and clustered into 11. This review emphasizes its analysis on the strength of the action plan to contribute to implementation and results. For the commitment-by-commitment data, see Annex 1. For details regarding the methodology and indicators used by the IRM for this Action Plan Review, see Section III: Methodology and IRM Indicators.

Brazil’s 2021–2023 OGP co-creation processCollaboration between government, civil society and other stakeholders (e.g., citizens, academics, private sector) is at the heart of the OGP process. Participating governments must ensure that a dive... was characterized by robust online participation, which resulted in the inclusionOGP participating governments are working to create governments that truly serve all people. Commitments in this area may address persons with disabilities, women and girls, lesbian, gay, bisexual, tr... More of commitments in new policy areas not addressed in past action plan cycles, such as animal welfare, agricultural value chains, and human rightsAn essential part of open government includes protecting the sacred freedoms and rights of all citizens, including the most vulnerable groups, and holding those who violate human rights accountable. T... protection. However, the action plan has an overall limited ambitionAccording to OGP’s Articles of Governance, OGP commitments should “stretch government practice beyond its current baseline with respect to key areas of open government.” Ambition captures the po..., affected by COVID-19 restrictions, budget limitations and the agreed recommendation to set the duration of the plan to one year because of the electionsImproving transparency in elections and maintaining the independence of electoral commissions is vital for promoting trust in the electoral system, preventing electoral fraud, and upholding the democr... More that were scheduled in October 2022. 

Brazil’s 2021–2023 OGP action plan is made up of 12 commitments addressing a wide range of policy areas and intended to be implemented in a shorter one-year timeline due to the elections which were expected to happen during the action plan cycle. It builds on commitments and themes from previous action plans to continue addressing government and civil society priorities. This is the case for Commitment 6 on Land Transparency (an ongoing priority in Brazil’s NAP), Commitment 8 on open science (a government priority in its open government agenda), and Commitment 12 on improving access to the legislative process; Commitments 1, 5, and 10 (which seek to improve access to information on environmental issues, a recurring theme from previous plans and present in stakeholder consultations); and improving the open-data ecosystem (which this plan applies to specific policy areas, prioritizing a citizen-centric data use approach, unlike previous plans).).^[1] At the same time, this action plan includes commitments on new policy areas relevant to the national context, like human rights and animal welfare, electoral transparency, and access to information in the health and fiscal sectors. The plan co-creation process purposedly set to achieve parity by incorporating the prioritized themes of civil society (commitments 1 to 5) and the federal government (6 to 10), while also seeking diversity by including themes of interest from other branches of government (11 and 12). These efforts were part of methodological improvements aimed at expanding scope and diversity[2].

All civil society representatives interviewed agreed that the CGU (Office of the Comptroller General) conducted a robust process of action plan development and that civil society had equal weight in the co-creation process^[3]. Every commitment, irrespective of stakeholders’ prioritization, had the chance to undergo final validation by both the government and civil society[4]. One important strength identified by a civil society representative was the engagement and the capacity of the CGU to run remote meetings during the pandemic period.^[5] These spaces were successfully used by civil society representatives to validate the commitments,^[6] which was important to increase the legitimacy of the plan and better reflect civil society organizations’ (CSOs’) interests and priorities.

The action plan’s development took place through an iterative consultation process.^[7] It was the first one that had to be entirely virtual, because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The plan’s development actively involved 141 individuals representing 79 institutions: 41 civil society organizations and 38 public bodies from the federal and subnational government, as well as representatives from the judicial and legislatives branches. Compared to the previous action plan, there was an increase in the number of people participating in the co-creation process (141 against 105) and slightly in the number of civil society organizations (41 against 39).^[8] There was a continuation of participation from legislative and judiciary bodies, each taken the lead on a commitment. However, despite the increase, especially through virtual spaces, the overall quality of the action plan did not improve. In some cases, the civil society highlighted that the final version of a commitment did not consider all the discussions of the working group, in favor of a more pragmatic stance justified by the budgetary constraints of participating agencies.^[9] The 5th Action Plan was therefore perceived by many civil society representatives as modest in terms of ambition. The budgetary constraints, carried over from the national budget legislation, were made explicit to participants from the start of the co-creation process. According to the CGU, they do not signal a lack of commitment by the public agencies involved but the reality and effects of limiting factors[10].

Finally, to mitigate risks related to the probable political changes with the upcoming general elections scheduled for the end of October 2022 and guided by general IRM recommendations on how to address challenges during political transitions,[11] the deadline for implementation of the commitments was set for December 2022 instead of 2023. This decision was made to avoid a potential implementation gap, as previously experienced during the execution of Brazil’s 4th Action Plan, which encountered challenges due to a change in administration midway through its implementation.^[12] While the decision to have a shorter plan duration and consider the election context was practical and consensus-based, it significantly constrained the plan’s ambition, as the stakeholders involved had to bring realistic goals to each commitment.^[13]

[1] CGU team (Rogério Vieira dos Reis, Bruno Barbosa Cerqueira Alves, Tamara Bakunis, Priscilla Ruas), interview with IRM, February 23, 2022.

[2] CGU team (Rogério Vieira dos Reis, Bruno Barbosa Cerqueira Alves, Tamara Bakunis, Priscilla Ruas), comments to APR given to IRM, December, 2022. And 5th National Plan methodology, available at https://www.gov.br/cgu/pt-br/governo-aberto/a-ogp/planos-de-acao/5o-plano-de-acao-brasileiro/metodologia-5o-plano-de-acao-nacional.pdf.

[3] One exception was in CommitmentOGP commitments are promises for reform co-created by governments and civil society and submitted as part of an action plan. Commitments typically include a description of the problem, concrete action... 5, where the government had a greater weight compared to civil society. Marina Atoji, project manager at Transparência Brasil, interview with IRM, March 14, 2022.

[4] CGU team (Rogério Vieira dos Reis, Bruno Barbosa Cerqueira Alves, Tamara Bakunis, Priscilla Ruas), comments to APR given to IRM, December, 2022.

[5] Ana Paula Valdiones, coordinator at Observatório do Código Florestal, interview with IRM, March 11, 2022.

[6] Valdiones, interview.

[7] The method was carried out based on a method similar to the previous one, with improvements aimed at broadening the scope and diversity of the participatory process. In addition to the public consultations aimed at choosing the themes, two new consultations were held for the first time. Before each stage of the workshops, consultations were held to receive input for the experts to work with in the co-creation workshops, with a view to broadening the participation of society. In each of these processes, the civil society working group supported the effort to publicize the public consultations.

[8] See Open Government Partnership, Fifth National Action Plan on Open Government, Office of the Comptroller General Secretary of Transparency and Prevention of Corruption, Transparency and Public Oversight Board, and General Coordination of Open Government and Transparency, 2021, https://www.opengovpartnership.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Brazil_Action-Plan_2021-2023_EN.pdf.

[9] Maria Vitória Ramos, director of Fiquem Sabendo, interview with IRM, March 9, 2022..

[10] CGU team (Rogério Vieira dos Reis, Bruno Barbosa Cerqueira Alves, Tamara Bakunis, Priscilla Ruas), comments to APR given to IRM, December, 2022.

[11] Gustavo Perez Ara and Denisse Miranda, “Open government reforms in times of political transitions: lessons from Latin America,” OGP, May 25, 2018, https://www.opengovpartnership.org/stories/open-government-reforms-in-times-of-political-transitions-lessons-from-latin-america/.

[12] Perez Ara and Miranda, “Open government reforms.”

[13] Marina Atoji, project manager at Transparência Brasil, interview with IRM, March 14, 2022. CGU team (Rogério Vieira dos Reis, Bruno Barbosa Cerqueira Alves, Tamara Bakunis, Priscilla Ruas), comments to APR given to IRM, December, 2022.