Quotas increase the number of blacks in the federal public service, but percentage stagnates under Bolsonaro

When the Law of Quotas for blacks in public tenders was adopted, in 2014, the number of whites entering the federal civil service dropped from 64%, in 2008, to 52%, while that of blacks and browns rose from 29% to 42% in the period.

Between 2009 and 2013, the number of blacks in federal cadres was slowly increasing, reaching its highest level in 2012 —32.3%—, but still well below the year in which the quotas were implemented.

The same percentage of 42% remained in the 2020 survey, six years after the quotas, although the number of authorized tenders has dropped (from 279, in 2014, to 7, in 2020) and, with it, the number of vacancies. The data are from an unpublished survey by República.org.

According to the IBGE (Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics), 55.7% of the population declared themselves black or brown between July and September of this year.

Public service in general, however, still does not mirror Brazilian society, says Cibele Franzese, professor and coordinator of the undergraduate public administration course at FGV/EAESP (São Paulo School of Business Administration at Fundação Getulio Vargas).

“Brazil has great racial inequality in all sectors, it is historical, and it goes back to the time of slavery”, says Cibele. For her, quotas are a form of reparation, because there would be no inclusion naturally, without the law.

“We need to have diversity in all spaces, but when we talk about a public service environment, employees will offer public policies to a more diverse population. Those who receive public service often do not feel represented”, says the FGV professor.

Anesthesiologist Mário Henrique Oliveira Santos, 33, joined the federal public service in 2020 through quotas and is currently a public employee of the Ebserh network, working at the Maternidade Escola Assis Chateaubriand, in Fortaleza, Ceará.

He grew up in a lower-middle-class family and studied in good colleges with scholarships thanks to his performance in mathematics Olympiads, until he entered medicine at a public university. But Santos claims that the country has been unequal since the times of slavery and, for this reason, quotas are essential to equalize opportunities.

“I didn’t see myself as black because I frequented white people’s spaces. Entering public service through quotas changed how I see myself today, a black man. Now, I like my color and value my culture. I live the dream of my ancestors 300 years ago , who maybe dreamed of living what I live and couldn’t”, says Santos.

The doctor claims that blacks and browns are still a minority in his work environment. “Of black anesthesiologists, there’s only me and another colleague in a staff of about 40 professionals [na mesma função]🇧🇷 Quotas provide a kind of discharge.”

Cibele, the FGV specialist, says that public tenders should be reformulated to increase equality by improving the form of recruitment and working to increase the quota for management positions.

Currently, in four strategic areas of the federal government (health, education, public security and social assistance), there are 19% of blacks in leadership positions, according to the survey of the Republic.

“They do not evaluate the vocation, commitment and experience. They analyze the concurseiro, who manages to dedicate himself exclusively to taking the test. This is not a reality for the majority of black candidates. That is why they need the quota”, says the specialist from FGV.

Tatiana Silva, employee of the technical career and planning in research at Ipea (Institute of Applied Economic Research), says that many concurseiros need to invest, in addition to time, money to pass in a contest of greater prestige and remuneration, generally more competitive.

“In the survey we carried out for the labor magistracy, the approved candidates reported spending over R$ 30,000 to participate in a single contest. wider”, says Tatiana.

Another factor that may have contributed to racial inequality was the reduction in the number of authorized contests —those that get the green light to take place after surveying the need for vacancies, and are foreseen in the budget. That’s what explains Maria Aparecida Chagas Ferreira, specialist in public policies and government management.

In the survey, she cites data from the Ministry of Economy that in 2014 279 federal public tenders were authorized, with 27,205 vacancies. In 2020, only 7 tenders were authorized, to provide 3,813 provisions in the Federal Executive Branch.

“If there is a reduction in tenders, consequently there is a reduction in black people entering the public service. There were cuts and no proposal in return”, he says.

Another comparison in the research by República.org shows that, in 20 years, the number of black civil servants who entered the federal civil service rose from 17% in 2000 to 43% in 2020. This represents an increase of 153% in the period.

In absolute data, of the 1,581 servants who entered in 2000, only 266 were black. This number gained more balance in 2014, the year of the Quota Law, when of the 36,365 hired in the federal civil service, 15,204 were black or brown.

In 2020, considering the reduction in public tenders and vacancies, 1,787 servers were hired, 777 of which were black.

But these numbers do not represent a breakthrough in practice, says Cibele. “The non-hiring policy is part of a fiscal adjustment by the [ministro da Economia] Paulo Guedes, that you would not hire civil servants and reduce the workforce based on pensions. Which I completely disagree with.”

The Ministry of Women, Family and Human Rights admits that “there is space” to improve the Quota Law, that it is important to increase diversity and enables improvement in the elaboration of public policies and in serving citizens.

Regarding the low presence of black women in management positions, the note states that there is a tendency towards inclusion and representation, “recognizing that there is still an under-representation, which would need to be reassessed within the ministries, concomitantly with the implementation of actions for change”.

The Ministry of Economy claims that there was no detriment in public service with the cut in public tenders, but rather an optimization of services. In a note, the folder explains that there was a readjustment in the functions performed by federal public servants, which resulted in the service of 140 million Brazilians who have an account on the gov.br website.

This process, continues the note, has placed servers that were previously in repetitive operational tasks in more strategic activities.