Fiscal policy in Dilma Rousseff’s first government:orthodoxy and regression

Abstract The years 2011-14 mark a slowing down of the Brazilian economy, despite the apparent maintenance of the developmentalist model that sustained growth and faced the international crisis over the period 2004-10. Since then, the interpretation that this situation showed the breakdown of the developmentalist model, especially in the fiscal area, has become dominant. The same expansion strategies of public spending and tax cuts that stimulated growth since 2004 no longer have leverage effects. This paper questions this widespread interpretation using a Keynesian approach of the fiscal policy during Dilma Rousseff’s government (2011-14). It concludes that it was apparently only expansionary, contributing in practice to the economic downturn. Therefore it is not a case of ineffectiveness but rather unsuitable conservative fiscal policy, unable to face the uncertainties of the 2011-14 period.