This paper reports and discusses the various instances and steps that gave life to the Brazilian Plan for Education (Plano Nacional de Educação ¾ PNE), eventually approved, with nine texts, by the president of Brazil, on January 9, 2001. Drawing a comparison between the initial proposal (elaborated in 1998 by educators, education professionals, students, parent teachers associations, among others, in national congresses on education) and the final text approved by the Parliament, the authors show how the immediate interests of the government, majority in Congress, ended up disfiguring the project that stemmed from society, and reduced it to a letter of intent. Based on this analysis, the authors conclude that the fight for a "real" PNE remains a priority, and requires the articulation of the social movements, a detailed knowledge of reality and the global dispute of proposals and projects.
State; Government; Society; Educational policies; Public education
