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Viewed in retrospect, it is clear that the formation of political science in Brazil had three key features characterizing its early stages: (1) the discipline was a late arrival compared with the rest of Latin America; (2) it was only established on a professional basis after the inauguration of the authoritarian regime in 1964, and (3) its expansion accompanied the institutional development of post-graduate university centers.

A preliminary analysis of disciplinary institutionalization requires taking note of temporal variations in the creation of scientific associations. With regard to political science, the formation of scientific associations follows the trend towards greater specialization [31] and disciplinary autonomy, with a strict boundary line being drawn to distinguish it from other subject areas (Almond 1996; Goodin and Klingeman 1996; Dogan 1996; Goodin 2009). When this process is viewed from a comparative perspective, no temporal discrepancies are found when comparing political science associations with the traditional areas of the social sciences. In the United States, the foundation of the American Anthropological Association (1902), the American Political Science Association (1903) and the American Sociological Association (1905) occurred at almost the same time. In the case of France, although the country experienced a gradual decoupling of political science and sociology, (Favre and Legavre 1998; Grawitz and Leca 1985; Favre 1985), the Association Française de Science Politique [the French Association of Political science] was formed in 1949, before the foundation of the Societé Française de Sociologie [French Sociological Society ] (1962) or its replacement the Association Française de Sociologie, [the French Sociological Association] which was only formed in 2002. Although this was late when compared with the Argentinian Anthropological Society (1936) and the Argentinian Society of Political Analysis 1982, it is a long time before the Argentinian Association of Sociology in 2009 ¹. In the case of Chile, the Chilean Political Science Association has its origins in 1966 (suspended during the period of the authoritarian military regime, only to be restored in 1983) while the 6th Chiliean Congress of Sociology was held in 2014. On the question of international associations, there were simultaneous occurrences: both the International Political Science Association (IPSA), and the International Sociological Association (ISA) were founded in the same year, 1949.

From an examination of the chronological formation of Brazilian associations in neighboring disciplines, it can be seen that there is a temporal gap that separates the foundation of the scientific associations of sociology and anthropology on the one hand and the political sciences on the other – which confirms once again that there was a delay in creating the Brazilian Political Science Association [ABCP]. Although the Brazilian Society of Sociology was established in 1948, its first congress was only held 6 years later in 1954, while the foundation of the Brazilian Association of Anthropology dates back to 1955, after its first congress had been held two years earlier in 1953. However, it was only three decades later that the Brazilian Political Science Association appeared in 1986, and a further ten years passed before its first congress was held on the premises of Cândido Mendes University in 1996.

The delay in the deployment of political science in Brazil is corroborated noting the temporal gap that is found in Latin America, when the information on the dates for the origins of the scientific associations in the region, is collated (Freidenberg 2015; Marenco 2014):

Graphic 1: Year of creation of political science associations in Latin American countries

Source: Freidenberg 2015; Marenco 2014

[32] Graphic 2: Number of doctorates in Political Science and International Relations, Brazil Source: CAPES

The setting up of the Department of Political Science at the Federal University of Minas Gerais, in 1966, and three years later, the first post-graduate studies programs at the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG) and the University Research Institute of Rio de Janeiro (IUPERJ) ushered in a new era for treating this subject-area in a professional way in Brazil. Following this, a Master´s course was set up at Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS) (1973). A year after, this Master´s course was accompanied by the first PhD degree course in Political science in the country, at the University of São Paulo and there was a further Master´s course at Unicamp. However, the pattern of post-graduate courses grew very gradually and the second doctoral course at the University Research Institute of Rio de Janeiro (IUPERJ) was only introduced in 1980. It was another 16 years before a third PhD course was created at Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul UFRGS, in 1996. Thus thirty years after the “inauguration” of post-graduate studies in political science, there were only three programs with training at a degree level. In the Master´s courses, the pace was no different and the threshold of ten courses was only breached in 1994; in the whole of the decade that followed, only four new Master´s courses were added to those already running, while the number of PhD courses doubled from three to six.

The post-graduate system and the setting up of centers devoted to the preparation of Master´s and Doctorate courses in political science were essential for spreading this subject through the country at a professional level. The employability of the PhD students who were prepared in the main centers of post-graduate studies in Brazil, is evidence of the recognition of the high standard of these professional graduates in political science in Brazil. Data from the Center for Strategic Research and Management, based on a) the titration data of CAPES (Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel) and b) data on employment and income supplied by the Minister of Labor, make it possible to estimate the proportion of doctoral students employed on 31st December, 2014, in the same year of their graduation.

In showing evidence that the employability of doctoral students was at a high rate, it is worth noting that 71 % of the doctoral students completing a degree course in 2014, were employed in the same year that they graduated. With regard to the National Classification of Economic Activities (CNAE) of employers´ organizations, 75.9 % of doctors in political science and international relations were employed in educational activities and 8.3 % in public administration. With regard to the Brazilian classification of occupations, an equivalent amount of 15.7 % of Master´s degree students and 12.9 % of Doctors in political science occupied positions as ”senior members of public authorities, managers of public services and directors of business organizations”.

[33] Graphic 3: Official rate of employment of PHDs, Political Science and International Relations/ CAPES on 31^st December, 2014, in accordance with the titration process – Year of Certified Degree Source: Center for Strategic Studies and Management (CGEE), Brazil

How should the presence of qualified teachers abroad be explained? According to Altman (2012), the capacity to recruit teachers with PhDs obtained from institutions with an international reputation, particularly from North America, is a factor that must be taken into account when devising a scheme for ranking the political science departments in Latin America. In other words, the presence per se of graduates from abroad should represent an academic capital that makes it possible to distinguish one institution from another, both between, and within, different Latin American countries. Without ignoring the benefits that training in the principal centers of excellence can provide, they may show a tendency to bias, which is shown in the occurrence of a preliminary stage of institutional consolidation. A large number of academic degrees obtained abroad were evident in the political science programs found in Brazil before the 1990s and also, until more recently, in the case of Argentina, Chile and Uruguay which mainly shows the sharp reduction in the offer of doctoral programs in these countries. By contrast, it is expected that the extension of the programs – especially if they are linked to paramaters of rising standards – will after a few years be followed by a situation where it is more common for teachers and researchers to be recruited for either their own or other post-graduate programs in the same country.

The system of post-graduate studies in Brazil was formed through a combination of activities requiring certification, assessment and financial backing, which are carried out by a Federal Agency called CAPES (Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel). CAPES was established in 1951, as a “National Campaign for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel”, and as a part of a ¨developmentalist¨ plan during the second government of Getúlio Vargas (1950–54). The rationalization and ´professionalization´ of the public administration and the need for specialist professional training to meet the requirements of the growing industrialization in the country, led to the setting up of a federal agency responsible for the improvement of personnel. Its first measures were to contract visiting foreign teachers, set up cultural exchange schemes and encourage cooperation between Brazilian and international universities, student grant schemes and the promotion of scientific events. Following the seizure of power by the military authorities in 1964, CAPES ceased to be attached to the Presidency of the Republic and became a part of the hierarchical structure of the Ministry of Education. Another peculiar feature of [34] the Brazilian situation is that the various procedures for monitoring and maintaining the sytem of post-graduate studies are combined within a single agency. CAPES is responsible for: (1) accrediting educational institutions with the legal powers to award Master´s and PhD degrees; (2) carrying out a periodic assessment of the students´ performance to ensure they comply with the minimum requirements of quality and achieve standards of excellence at an international level and, (3) financing a significant part of the system by providing scholarships and meeting the costs incurred by the accredited post-graduate programs. CAPES has undertaken the assessment of post-graduate studies in Brazil since 1976. The scores range from 1 to 7, 3 being the minimum score required for opening or maintaining a course or program, and 6 or 7 being used as a benchmark for institutions seeking to achieve a performance equivalent to that of renowned international centers.

The core of the assessment carried out within the system for post-graduate studies in Brazil can be separated into three key areas: (i) scientific output as a proxy for academic quality and the skills required for research (ii) the training of Master´s and in particular, PhD degree students and (iii) acquiring an international perspective in each program.

The influence of this institutional assessment (conducted by CAPES) of the development of political science in Brazil, has been witnessed in terms of i) a rise in scientific output, ii) the direction it has taken and iii) the concentration on publishing articles in prestigious periodicals and journals. These publications have been a key factor in the progressive improvement made by Brazil in the Combat Points (CP) and the Ranking Index (RI) in the international rankings for the subject. Running parallel with this, a comparison of the performance indicators of each institution that offers Master´s and PhD courses in political science in Brazil and the scores obtained in this academic assessment, reveal a close statistical correlation, which is evidence of the consistency obtained by this institutional adjudication.

The information displayed by the SCImago Journal & Country Rank allows the evolutionary pattern of political science in Brazil to be viewed from another angle². The data are obtained from the Scopus database which gathers information about publications in scientific periodicals in all areas of knowledge and ranks the periodicals in terms of the volume of output, the SJR impact factor, number of citations and H-index. The records of SCImago make it possible to compare journals, countries and areas of knowledge by measuring the intellectual output and its effects on the international scientific community.

Alongside the expansion of the area, recently there has been a significant consolidation in the indicators for measuring academic standards, which suggests that growth and quality are not mutually exclusive. Until 2004, political science in Brazil was behind Argentina, Chile and Mexico in the indexed publications of the AL. Since 2006, Brazil has strengthened its leadership position in political science in Latin America³. The sharp rise in the scientific output of political science and international in Brazil can be attrributed to a wide range of factors, such as i) the expansion of the post-graduate system, ii) the establishment of assessment procedures and the QUALIS system of CAPES and iii) the internationalizing of the main periodicals in the area.

At the same time, it can be argued that the expansion of highly qualified scientific output is closely correlated with the broadening of the number of PhD courses available, as well as the number of enrolments and academic degrees in the area. The graphic below shows the link between the number of PhD students per annum and the registration of scientific documents on the SCImago index for each year. On the basis of R², it can be estimated that in about 85 % of the cases of the growth of the number of enrolments in the CP & RI doctoral courses, there was an annual variation of scientific output in the area:

[35] Graphic 4: The relation between the number of PhD students per annum and CP & IR scientific output in Brazil (1996–2016) Source: SCImago and CAPES