Regulação e universalização da prestação dos serviços de abastecimento de água

Abstract

We discuss the role of regulation and in particular the regulatory agencies as a strategic institution, with the capacity to stimulate the promotion of universal public services, specifically in this study, of water supply public service in Brazil. For this purpose, we present some conceptual aspects of universal service and how this concept was modified, so to properly deal with the challenges of universality to water supply public services in Brazil. In a second moment, we make a brief explanation of the regulatory function in the context of public services and in which ways, in specific, the regulation done by agencies can indirectly promote the universalization of the services. The analysis is performed based especially in Federal Law n. 11.445/2007, which outlines the general directives of public sanitation services.