<b>Alfa tuning Latin America project: the relationship between elaboration and implementation in participating brazilian universities

Abstract

This article discusses the implementation of the Alfa Tuning Latin America Project [Patal in Portuguese] in Brazil, as well as if – and in what way – its guidelines were incorporated into the context of the practice of participating universities. The theoretical reference of the article is based on the policy cycle (Bowe & Ball, 1992) and the socioeconomic context of the capitalist mode of production (Harvey, 2013), to understand the relationship between Patal and its contexts of influence, elaboration and practice. The methodology was based on the analysis of official documents and reports of Patal and on semi-structured interviews. The results showed that Patal is part of territorialization, deterritorialization and reterritorialization of higher education policies in the European Union, which surpasses national borders to meet market demands in the current scenario of multi-scalar governance. In Brazil, Patal was introduced outside the regulatory frameworks of the State, being agreed upon from political networks between teachers and universities, and the implementation of its proposals occurred in a punctual and discursive way, however Patal can influence national policies through adoption of concepts, diagnoses and methodologies, as well as to legitimize other policies.