The founding goal is stated in two halves by the people who built it: democratizing the state through popular participation, and the inversion of priorities towards the periphery (Fedozzi 2009; Raul Pont, 2022 interview; the City's 1990 strategy paper quoted by Magalhães 2023). Baiocchi (1999) lists the four principles of the Workers' Party programme as popular participation, transparent governance, democratizing the state and a new political culture. The material face is works in poor neighbourhoods, but the aim named by founders and evaluators is a change in how budget decisions are made, hence Cultural-level. The City's current page states it more modestly: the population decides directly on works and services the administration will execute. Founders also describe it as a school of citizenship, a generational aim that the documents treat as a by-product rather than the stated goal.