Mandatory Individual Amendments: a Change in the Pattern of Executive Dominance in the Brazilian Budgetary and Financial Cycle

Abstract

Until 2013, the Brazilian executive branch had control over the execution of all discretionary public spending. In that context, all Brazilian legislators could do was amend the budget proposal prepared by the government. This article analyzes whether EC 86/2015, known as the mandatory budget amendment EC, has reduced executive dominance over the financial cycle of individual budget amendments. To this end, we examine descriptively and inferentially the main changes proposed by EC 86/2015, as well as data about the individual amendments executed before and after the constitutional change. Our results indicate that executive dominance was reduced after the change in the budget execution rules: the amount paid and the number of executed individual amendments have increased, while the profile of legislators with executed amendments also changed: Being part of the government coalition became less important. This article contributes to legislative studies by exploring the empirical implications of this important constitutional change. From a theoretical point of view, our findings challenge the expectation that the executive uses amendment execution as a bargaining tool to secure legislative support in roll-call votes in the National Congress, especially in the post-EC 86/2015 period.