The Public and the Private in Odebrecht’s Vocabulary

It was announced in Congress that a “criminal society” formed by construction companies was in charge of public sector decisions, directing bids and overcharging expenses in order to divert resources to political campaigns. Despite the similarities with Carwash operation, the year was 1993, when Odebrecht was luckier in weathering scandals. This paper asks what are the ways that enabled a particular pattern of state-firm relations from emerging by looking at one of the country’s largest private companies. It uses historical and judicial documents as sources to identify organizational knowledge as the main explanatory variable for the behavior of executives when interacting with state officials. This contribution scrutinizes a determinant for systemic corruption in a developmental state that is informal, durable and useful from the stand-point of corporations.