PUBLIC BUDGET GOVERNANCE: THE BRAZILIAN EXPERIENCE, OECD LESSONS, AND PATHWAYS TO IMPROVING PUBLIC EXPENDITURE QUALITY

Abstract

Public budgeting constitutes an essential instrument of state governance, planning, and the implementation of public policies, as it establishes the legal, financial, and administrative conditions through which governmental priorities are translated into actions capable of producing socially relevant outcomes. Its importance becomes even more evident in the context of scarce resources, growing social demands, and the need to reconcile the realization of rights, state capacity, and fiscal sustainability. This research adopts a qualitative, legal-dogmatic, and analytical-comparative approach, based on an examination of the 1988 Citizen Constitution, public finance legislation, national and international scholarship, case law, and relevant institutional documents. It also incorporates an analysis of the good budgetary governance practices developed by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and their potential adaptation to the Brazilian context. The study demonstrates that budgeting, legislative authorization, expenditure execution, and financial availability constitute distinct yet interdependent dimensions, whose proper coordination is essential to responsible fiscal management and the effective implementation of public policies. It further finds that the Fiscal Responsibility Law performs a preventive and regulatory function, while contemporary mechanisms such as performance assessment, value for money, fiscal risk management, and spending reviews can enhance the quality of allocative decisions. The analysis of OECD experience and the activities of Brazilian oversight institutions demonstrates that improving the Brazilian system does not depend on simply reproducing foreign models, but rather on adapting practices capable of strengthening planning, transparency, evaluation, efficiency, and institutional capacity. The study concludes that modernizing Brazilian budgetary governance requires moving beyond the conception of the budget as merely an authorization for expenditure and consolidating it as an instrument of republican decision-making oriented toward fiscal sustainability, public expenditure quality, and the effective generation of public value.