O INSA e o seu “não lugar” no semiárido brasileiro: rupturas, disputas e discursos científicos.

Abstract

This thesis aims to problematize how the relationships between science, politics, and institutional strategies are woven for the development of the Northeastern Semi-Arid region, assuming as a starting point the historical and political process that gave rise to the National Institute for the Semi-Arid (Insa), while seeking to understand the implementation of an institutional mandate that would allow regional development. Insa is an agency linked to the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovation (MCTI), based in the municipality of Campina Grande, in Paraíba, officially created in 2004 during the administration of President Luís Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), as the first Research Unit (UP) of MCTI in the Northeast. It was conceived in the context of the debate among different social actors about social and regional inequalities and their relation to science and technology policy in the country, and about the specific challenges of the semi-arid territory. In nearly two decades of existence, despite having gained importance and recognition, Insa currently occupies a non-place in the Brazilian Semi Arid. We understand Insa as a field of interests and disputes, and its constitution is part of a process involving power relations and conflicts. We adopt a qualitative research methodology, crossing data and evidence from semi-structured interviews with key informants, direct observation, documentary analysis, and records available on websites and social networks. The conclusion of the research exercise revealed that the creation and constitution of this Institute generated and still generate, at the same time, distrust and expectations in Brazilian society, particularly in part of the scientific community and the broad population of the Northeastern Semi-Arid, regarding its effective mandate and institutional mission. This is all a result of a procedural heritage crossed by a political-institutional movement of ruptures and continuities in its saying and doing STI in and for the semi-arid region, which reflect in its self-image; sometimes by the attempt to implement a development institution, sometimes by the effort to reorganize a mandate, consulted and demanded, essentially of articulation, sometimes by the direction of a mandate essentially of research. There are relevant elements of Insa's action that need to be collectively and critically reviewed in the light of the scientific field, so as not to allow the political field and the patrimonialist heritage to be the central elements that define the Institution.