ABSTRACT
Bolsa Família (Family Stipend) is a Brazilian conditional cash transfer program established in 2003–2004, which provides noncontributory targeted cash assistance to poor and extremely poor households on the condition that recipient families make human capital investments toward the education and health of their children. Although the central government is ultimately responsible for the program's administration, municipalities, states (to a lesser extent), and the federal savings bank also play crucial roles in its implementation. Moreover, together with Mexico's Oportunidades (formerly PROGRESA) program, it has now been modeled in many other developing countries around the world, particularly in the Latin American region. Given the importance of this program in Brazil and around the world over the last decade, this entry provides a brief overview of the rules of participation in the program, the institutional roles of each level of government in administering and implementing the program, and a summary of key impact evaluations of the program. It concludes with a discussion of some of the program's ongoing challenges and a brief discussion of the importance of the next decade for the program's legacy.
