Governments do a lot, every day, in many different areas, often appearing from the outside as a vast, unwieldy machine—full of parallel engines, loose ends, and the occasional rusty bolt.
A comparative perspective can help better identify where this machine runs smoothly, where it falters, and what needs fixing.This public management analysis, focused on the central government of Brazil, uses as a starting point the Blavatnik Index of Public Administration, launched in December 2024 by the Blavatnik School of Government at the University of Oxford. The Index is based on 82 data points from 17 separate data sources, including. statistical, assessment, and opinion data, from a series of multilateral institutions, academic projects, and non-government researchers.
To merit inclusion, data points had to fulfil four criteria:
• Be open access (with publicly available sources and methodologies)
• Actionable (measuring aspects that officials/ministers can act on)
• Quantifiable (represented numerically)
• Timely (updated after 2019)
The Index ended up with 16 items spread across four major domains. They capture both what governments do – and how they do it:
Strategy and leadership • Strategic capacity | Public policy • Policymaking |
National delivery | People and processes • Employee engagement • Diversity and inclusion • HR management • Procurement • Technology and workplaces |
Brazil performs relatively well in the Index, ranking 32nd (out of 120 countries) and leading in the upper-middle-income group (among 35 countries).
Brazil's overall performance is close to the global average, consistently ranking between 28th and 36th across the four major domains.
However, greater variation emerges in specific indicators, where Brazil's scores diverge more significantly. This contrast is particularly noticeable when compared to the average performance of countries in the Americas and the OECD.
Before we get started, it should be noticed that the Index relies exclusively on standardized datasets available across dozens of countries. While this ensures that numbers are comparable, it also means that many important aspects of government action are condensed into narrower data points.
Rather than providing an exhaustive assessment, the Index should be seen as a starting point — a tool to be supplemented with additional inputs to create a broader, more context-specific picture. Two distinctions are particularly relevant:
1. Central vs. Decentralised Governance – The Index primarily reflects data from central administrations, which may not capture the full picture in countries where governance is decentralised. This is especially true for Brazil, a federal system where states and municipalities have full autonomy, leading to significant variation in policy processes and outcomes.
2. A Snapshot in Time – The Index offers a moment-in-time view rather than a historical trend analysis. Distinguishing between short-term fluctuations—such as those caused by changes in administration—and longer-term structural trends is crucial for interpretation.
Next, we will highlight eight items in which:
• Brazil is in a relative standout or laggard position
• The Index data is particularly robust and illuminating for the Brazil case, whether examined individually or in combination.
Experts consulted in the relevant areas found the Index results unsurprising—a positive indication of their accuracy.
We will examine both structural and circumstantial factors influencing performance in these categories and identify key lessons and potential benchmarks for improvement, whether from within Brazil or internationally. A full results chart is provided at the end of the document.
Source: this item, named Openness and Communication in the Index, is assessed in the Index with a mix of: (a) government self-assessment (on open government and data portals, and digital participation methods) from the GovTech Maturity Index; (b) expert opinion from the Bertelsmann Transformation Index; (c) expert and public opinion from the Rule of Law Index. Seven measures are extracted to estimate three indicators: right to information; open government; and engagement and feedback.
Result: Brazil does relatively well, with a score of 0.66, placing it 30th place in the general ranking, 6th in the Americas and 3rd among upper-middle-income countries.
Brazil has a longstanding tradition of civil society engagement in government and performs well on transparency measures (more on that later) that are captured in this Index.
“Brazil is an international pioneer in the construction of participatory institutions—this is not just a simple add-on to their normal operations. From an institutional perspective, the country is very strong indeed, in part due to high financial and bureaucratic autonomy.”
