What is it about?
The crisis of recent Brazilian capitalism is complex and has multiple dimensions. We show, from a trajectory analysis, how Brazil moved from a coordinated and regulated modality of capitalism (2003-2016), which implemented innovative public policies of social inclusion, for a variety of capitalism based on radical fiscal austerity, contempt democratic institutions and in the corrosion of the social protection network (health, education, assistance and social security).
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Why is it important?
The research is innovative because it shows, from an approach of comparative capitalism, how successful Brazil's political responses to the 2008 international financial crisis, of fundamentally exogenous origin and the result of the deregulation of the US financial market. The state intervention of developmental governments (2003-2016) carried out a strategy anchored in economic growth with the establishment of a domestic market of mass consumption, income distribution and social inclusion. On the other hand, by the end of 2014, the emergence of the endogenous crisis marked the deceleration of GDP growth rates, Petrobras' monumental corruption scandal, the fall in revenues, the orthodox shift in macroeconomic policy followed by the largest recession in republican history , the disruption of the supportive political-business coalition, the loss of the Executive's capacity for governability, and the subsequent democratic rupture that brought Michel Temer to the Presidency of the Republic. The parliamentary government deepens the fiscal adjustment initiated by Dilma Rousseff, accelerating unemployment, the precariousness of labor relations, the dismantling of the institutional framework of social protection and the constitutionalisation of perennial fiscal austerity.
Perspectives
This article was written with Renato Raul Boschi, one of Brazil's leading specialists in the field of political economy of development and a profound scholar of State/Business relations for more than 40 years, which I had the great honor to have as a tutor during the master’s and doctorate at IESP/UERJ. We hope that this article will enable the nobler readers a comprehensive view of the trajectory of Brazilian capitalist development in dialoguing with the pro-market reforms (1990-2002), developmental governments (2003-2016), which inserted the social question in the public policy agenda and the multiple reasons for its decline. Finally, this research investigates the democratic rupture responsible for the emergence of Michel Temer's parliamentary government, which imposed a radical and perennial fiscal austerity policy that has been reversing social achievements and rapidly dismantling the institutional framework of social protection in Brazil. Above all, we analyze the phases of intermittence between development projects more centered in the State; on the one hand, and on the market; on the other hand. The current market project manifests itself in its ultraliberal version, devoid of appreciation for democracy and neglects popular demands for public policies in an extremely unequal country like Brazil. All this in the name of the interests of the financial market, increasingly structured and politically organized.
CARLOS EDUARDO SANTOS PINHO
Instituto Nacional de Ciência e Tecnologia em Políticas Públicas, Estratégias e desenvolvimento (INCT/PPED)
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Crisis and austerity: the recent trajectory of capitalist development in Brazil, Contemporary Politics, December 2018, Taylor & Francis,
DOI: 10.1080/13569775.2018.1555783.
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Resources
Democracia atrofiada x mercado financeiro hipertrofiado
Article published in Le Monde Diplomatique Brasil
Authoritarian Governments and the Corrosion of the Social Protection Network in Brazil
What are the impacts of the austerity reforms on the social protection network and the legacy of Social Security, enshrined in the 1988 Constitution of Brazil? The hypothesis of this article is that Brazil’s recent political economy demonstrates the antinomy between financial capitalism and representative mass democracy, which results in the corrosion of social protection policies and the regulation of capital/labor relations. The political economy is immunized against democratic grassroots pressure in a clear dispute over public funds and the growing commodification and deregulation of lucrative private activities in the social protection arena. This movement is favored by the existence of a political and electoral system that perpetuates the various conservative elites in a reactionary coalition that hinders the progress achieved in the expansion of citizenship and economic, cultural and social rights. Through national and international studies, as well as the analysis of political measures, we seek to justify this hypothesis.
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