Single System: a federative or subordinated mode for administration of the Single Social Assistance System

Abstract

This article analyzes some of the bases of the federative agreement that has supported Brazil’s Single Social Assistance System (SUAS) for the past 10 years. Based on an examination of two fundamental elements of this agreement: municipal population as a determinant of responsibilities of the municipalities within the system and, as a consequence, of what they must do; finance actions of the SUAS. The article addresses the distance between the tripartite conception of financing and care at the federal, state and municipal levels and that which is effectively practiced. The first topic was analyzed based on census data from 2010 gathered by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics. For the second, some results of a study conducted in 2013 and 2014 by the Nucleus of Studies and Research about Social Welfare and Social Assistance at the Pontifíca Universidade Católica de São Paulo in partnership with the National College of Municipal Social Assistance Administrators (CONGEMAS). The study reveals that there is little knowledge about and a lack of monitoring of municipal spending on public social assistance policy. It concludes that there is a need to review the federative pact guiding SUAS.