Political Attention and the Use of Expertise in Policymaking

I am a postdoctoral researcher at the Center for Politics and Economics of the Public Sector (CEPESP), São Paulo School of Business Administration (FGV EAESP), Fundação Getulio Vargas, Brazil. My research is supported by the São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP).

Research Agenda

My research examines how governments allocate attention to public problems, search for information, and mobilize expertise to formulate policy responses. Situated at the intersection of public policy, political science, and public administration, my work investigates how political and institutional conditions shape agenda-setting, information processing, and policy change, with a particular focus on Latin America.

A central concern of my research is the relationship between political attention and the use of information in policymaking. My doctoral research examined how state capacity shapes the dynamics of political agendas in Brazil. Building on this foundation, I have investigated how governments search for evidence, respond to shifts in political attention, and develop policy responses under conditions of uncertainty and crisis.

My current research extends these questions to policy advisory systems and regulatory governance, examining how governments organize expert advice and how bureaucratic discretion, institutional reputation, and political pressures shape advisory authority. I also investigate how regulatory agencies communicate with political and public audiences, connecting the study of expert advice with broader questions about the circulation and use of information in policymaking.

My research draws primarily on comparative evidence from Argentina and Brazil, addressing public health, pharmaceutical regulation, and environmental policy. Methodologically, I combine comparative policy analysis with quantitative and qualitative research, including computational social science and automated text analysis.

Academic Background

I hold a Ph.D. in Political Science from the Université de Montréal, Canada, an MSc in Political Science from Universidad Torcuato Di Tella, Argentina, and a BA in Communication Sciences from Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina.

I have held visiting research positions at Sciences Po Paris, Centre for European Studies and Comparative Politics (CEE), and the Institut Barcelona d'Estudis Internacionals (IBEI).

Selected Publications

Costa, M. A., & Forlini, L. (2026). How do middle-income states select vaccine partners? Projected capacity across sectors in Argentina. Journal of Public Policy, 1–21. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0143814X26101342

Costa, M. A., Bortz, G., & Seijo, G. (2026). Reconfiguring policy advisory systems under crisis: The role of bureaucratic discretion and reputation in Argentina and Brazil. Policy Design & Practice, 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1080/25741292.2026.2675755

Costa, M. A., & Montpetit, É. (2026). Health policy capacity and reliance on expert advice in comparative perspective: COVID-19 responses across Brazilian states. Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis: Research and Practice, 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1080/13876988.2025.2595492

Lemor, A. C., Costa, M. A., Beaulieu-Guay, L. R., & Montpetit, É. (2025). Why did the influence of experts erode during the COVID-19 pandemic? Policy & Politics, 1–20. https://doi.org/10.1332/03055736Y2024D000000064

Beaulieu-Guay, L. R., Costa, M. A., & Montpetit, É. (2023). Policy change and information search: A test of the politics of information using regulatory data. Policy Sciences, 56(2), 377–418. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11077-023-09497-3

Selected Conference Presentations

2026 — Comparative Agendas Project Conference, Paris, France.
Talking to Whom, When and How? De Facto Independence and Regulatory Communication in Latin America.

2026 — International Workshop on Public Policy, Ottawa, Canada.
How Organizational Design Shapes Evidentiary Quality in Brazil and Argentina.

2026 — Asociación Latinoamericana de Ciencia Política (ALACIP), Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Reconfiguring Policy Advisory Systems under Crisis: The Role of Bureaucratic Discretion and Reputation in Argentina and Brazil.

2025 — International Public Policy Association Conference (IPPA), Chiang Mai, Thailand.
The Making of Pharmaceutical Business Power in Crisis: State-Led Selection and Vaccine Politics in Argentina.

2025 — International Political Science Association World Congress (IPSA), Seoul, South Korea.
Health Policy Capacity and Public Opinion in Shaping States' Policy Agendas during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Brazil.

2023 — Latin American Studies Association (LASA), Vancouver, Canada.
Media Attention and the Speed of Public Policy in the Environmental Crisis in Brazil.

Research Methods

Comparative policy analysis; quantitative and qualitative methods; computational social science; automated text analysis; statistical analysis; and political communication research.

Languages

Spanish (native); English (C1); French (C1); Portuguese (C1).