MEDIATORS AND TERRITORIAL DEVELOPMENT: Institutional arrangements and social networks in the region of Apodi and Caicó
Territorial Development; Social Networks; Institutions; Public Policies.
Especially after the economic crisis of 2008, public bodies, civil society and academia have no longer discussed the quantity of market and state in a society, but rather their quality in intervention. In general, surveys and evaluations have shown a great deal of progress at the federal level and in large urban centers, but still little production and advances have been made about small and medium-sized cities. This thesis aims to investigate the importance of the mediators, agents that, from development programs and projects, manage to articulate and construct institutional arrangements involving state, private and civil society sectors. The thesis hypothesis is that the result of public policy is directly related to the position of these mediators in the construction of institutional arrangements and in the political dynamics. In order to understand these subjects in different territories, but on similar institutional environments and on the action of the same territorial development policy, we will take two regions/territories of Rio Grande do Norte as a comparative basis: the Chapada do Apodi and the Western Seridó.This work was designed to investigate territorial developments from three levels of analysis: the historical context, the political and organizational dynamics and the relationships established over time between the main actors, thus applying quantitative and qualitative research techniques during the research. The thesis will seek to develop a framework of analysis that can be operationalized in other territories from these spaces.