Dos caminhos de água aos caminhos de ferro: a construção da hegemonia de Natal através das vias de transporte (1820-1920)

At a time of changes on the territory during the 19th century, the political and socioeconomic elites of the province and later State of Rio Grande do Norte evolved a discourse in order to justify the permanence of Natal as a city holding a status of capital. In this work we analyze the means employed by the ruling classes to impose their wish to raise Natal to an outstanding position among the existing cities by intervening on the territory during a period of one hundred years (1820-1920). During that time, which was characterized by changing commercial flows and technological development, the elites interventions were essentially directed to the implementation of modes of transportation, especially the railway. We try to understand the reinforcement of Natal as a capital city not only in political and administrative terms, but mainly in a commercial and symbolic manner, through the discourse and interventions undertaken by the local administrative elites, who stimulated the creation of a set of relations on the territory that also imprinted visible marks in the capital s urban fabric. These interventions were based upon the establishment of an infrastructure for exporting the State s production, firstly through and despite the Potengi River, and later on by the construction of railways. Although the project of Natal s hegemony had been outlined before the establishment of the railway network, in both cases the ultimate objective was to reinforce and develop the capital city as a commercial urban center to the detriment of other cities

Cooperação e competição entre políticas no Brasil: os custos da governabilidade no presidencialismo de coalizão

Public policies have been studied in the various fields of humanities and social sciences, from different theoretical and technical aspects. However, there is still a lack of studies that incorporate the dimension that encompasses the political action and its interference in such actions, also recognizing the importance of the institutional setting of the Brazilian presidential model in implementing these policies. This fragmented and multiparty system has led to power heterogeneous sets of political parties. Thus, the ministerial offices, more than assisting the President´s government project, manage particularized agendas, which are party biased and have the influence of interest groups in hegemonic themes addressed by government agencies. When these agendas operate in sectoral and specialized policies, the friction level is apparently low. However, when this occurs in intersectoral actions, such as in regional development, there is evidence of strong signs of competition among government agencies, which in theory, should operate in an integrated manner. Although this is not a specific feature of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva´s government- the period to be studied- there was similar behavior in Fernando Henrique Cardoso´s presidency, one realizes that the expansion of coalition on behalf of governance is increasingly interfering in the outcome of intersectoral public policies, due to these multiple arguments in action. In order to understand these processes, this study focused on the Sustainable and Integrated Development Programme for Differentiated Meso-Regions (PROMESO), part of the National Policy for Regional Development (NPRD). The program provides interface with various government agencies and their public policies in a clear intersectoral design. The research sought to identify and analyze the relationships between government agencies and their programs with interest groups, whether political parties or other segments of civil society, highlighting the logic of favoritism, which poses in second place the integration of actions in the intersectoral policies. Therefore, besides the theoretical debate that incorporates several categories of political science, public administration, public policy, geography and economics, the study focused on secondary sources, using different government agencies databases in order to raise information. It was observed that the interference of partisan politics has been disastrous for some public policies. Thus, the research confirms that cooperative character is fragile within government agencies, often limited to official documents, and that there is indeed, a striking feature of competition, especially when it comes to transversalized policies