Historical sources of Brazilian underdevelopment

BARROS, ALEXANDRE RANDS

doi:10.1590/0101-31571996-0855

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Articles • Brazil. J. Polit. Econ. 16 (2) • Apr-Jun 1996 • https://doi.org/10.1590/0101-31571996-0855 linkcopy

Historical sources of Brazilian underdevelopment

Fontes históricas do subdesenvolvimento brasileiro

Authorship SCIMAGO INSTITUTIONS RANKINGS

In this work, it is shown that Brazil has already entered the past century behind the developed countries. The three main views to explain this fact are reviewed and a fourth, based on recent theoretical developments, is presented. This view explains the backwardness of the Brazilian economy due to the composition of its social classes, their historical roots and their interrelations.

KEYWORDS:
Underdevelopment; economic history of Brazil; economic growth

	1820	1850	1900	1950	1987
Australia	1255.60	2517.10	3532.50	5931.10	12892.80
USA	1050.70	1671.20	3757.10	8610.50	17339.50
England	1353.20	1820.30	3539.30	5650.80	12659.20
France	1070.80	1442.90	2421.50	4148.80	13048.70
Germany	578.50	623.60	1265.10	3338.90	13171.60
Belgium	1031.80	1440.70	2910.70	4227.70	11898.90
Denmark	1032.50	1433.00	2447.00	5224.10	13394.00
Sweden	946.60	1020.00	2026.30	5331.30	14340.60
Brazil	136.20	243.90	330.20	1112.50	4128.70

	1820-50	1850-1900	1900-50	1950-87	1850-1987	1820-1987
Australia	2.30	0.70	1.00	2.10	1.20	1.40
USA	1.60	1.60	1.70	1.90	1.70	1.70
England	1.00	1.30	0.90	2.20	1.40	1.30
France	1.00	1.00	1.10	3.10	1.60	1.50
Germany	0.30	1.40	2.00	3.80	2.30	1.90
Belgium	1.10	1.40	0.70	2.80	1.60	1.50
Denmark	1.10	1.10	1.50	2.60	1.60	1.50
Sweden	0.20	1.40	2.00	2.70	1.90	1.60
Brazil	2.00	0.60	2.50	3.60	2.10	2.10

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[TFN1] Sources:Maddison (1991) and IBGE (1990).

[TFN2] Note: Statistics for developed countries are a straightforward combination of data in Maddison (1991) for GDP in US dollars corrected for PPP, population and GDP indexes. Brazilian data for 1900-1987 are from IBGE (1990), combining the data for real GDP and population figures. The PPP level of GDP was calculated from real GDP and the World Bank (1992) estimates of per capita GDP with ICP correction for 1985. The growth of the quantity index for imports was used between 1850 and 1900, and the growth of the value of imports (deflated by the UK consumer price index) for 1820 and 1850 was used as a proxy for GDP growth between these two years. See text for a discussion of the shortcomings of this proxy.