Conditional cash transfer and the monitoring of conditionalities: Aspects of implementation of Brazil's Bolsa Familia program in varied municipal contexts

This article aims to analyze the strategies developed by municipal managers of Brazil’s conditional cash transfer program “Bolsa Familia”, in monitoring families that fail to comply with the program’s conditionalities. The focus is on the uses and meanings of conditionalities within the context of local implementation of this national social policy. The argument developed here intends to question some key aspects present in the official view about the role of conditionalities in poverty alleviation strategies, such as: the role of conditionalities in breaking inter-generational poverty cicle; flagging for vulnerability and the need of extra care; and political legitimization of cash transfers to the poor. The article draws upon data collected in a research project conducted in seven municipalities in the state of Paraiba, Northeast Brazil. The research utilizes a combination of archival research methods, interviews and surveys, as well as a broad literature review. Preliminary research results suggest that although conditionalities play an important role in the national managing of the program, locally they have been used with the purpose of coping with municipalities’ own political instability and institutional fragilities, which may be playing against some key objectives of the program.