This article analyzes the process of expanded early childhood education (day care centers, preschools and literacy classes) that took place during the Geisel government, and their present day developments. It utilizes date collected, systematized and disseminated by the IBGE and SEEC/MEC, as well as national documents and those of intergovernmental organizations (UNICEF and UNESCO). Supported in the latest currents of educational Sociology and studies of gender and race relations, the text details new exclusionary processes created by policies to "democratize" early childhood education. It concludes by reflecting on the meaning of affirmative action and policies for everyone as strategies for making early childhood education more democratic.
