[lbo-talk] Brazil

[Michael McIntyre]

JK's plans for a developmental state had exhausted themselves by the
Goulart years (1961-1964).  Those years were characterized by weaker
growth and higher inflation.  When Castelo Branco came to power after
the 1964 coup, he implemented orthodox fiscal and monetary measures
with advice from US economists (but mostly from Berkeley rather than
Chicago, graças a deus).  When the hardliners ousted Castelo Branco's
faction of the military regime from the top seats of power, they
implemented a much more heterodox policy that emphasized state-led
industrialization and widespread indexing of salaries, bank accounts,
etc. to inflation, which they were quite willing to tolerate in double
digits (though not triple).  Evans' discussion of this alliance
between state, domestic, and international capital - which he calls
the tripé - formed the base of support for the Brazilian miracle,
whose heyday was quite short (1969-74).  The owl of Evans flew at
midnight, so he mistakenly identified an eclipsed model as the basis
of a permanent model of associated-dependent development in Brazil; he
was right about the past, but not the future (just like Malthus).  The
era of heavy borrowing and increasing inflation came after 1974, but
it wasn't until 1982 that the model collapsed completely.
Inconveniently for believers in a developmental state, the era when
state-led industrialization in Brazil had the greatest success was
also the era of the harshest political repression.

On Thu, Oct 1, 2009 at 10:48 AM, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
>
> On Oct 1, 2009, at 11:37 AM, Michael McIntyre wrote:
>
>> Not even close to accurate.  Take a look at Peter Evans, Dependent
>> Development, to get a sense of the generals' developmental model.
>
> Could you give us a hint?
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