What do lawmakers understand by ‘public transparency’? A longitudinal study of Brazil’s legislative production

Abstract

This study aims to examine which conceptions of public transparency are present in bills of law introduced to the Brazilian House of Representatives. By combining content and document analysis to investigate 357 drafts proposed between 2003 and 2018, we scrutinize how often lawmakers propose transparency policies, what arguments and reasons they more recurrently use, the extent to which authoring proposals on public transparency is associated with their respective party ideologies, and the main characteristics of those bills passed into law. The findings reveal what we can be described as an ‘unproductive hyperactivity’ since the significant number of projects under consideration at the House usually adds little to existing transparency policies. In addition, the justifications underpinning many of the bills are marked by criticism toward political adversaries or evince the corporatist defense of lawmakers’ private interests – underlining the persistence of corruption and patrimonialism as characteristics of the Brazilian political culture.