Fernando Alcoforado*
This article aims to present the factors responsible for Brazil’s failure to build its political, economic and social progress throughout history and to point out what to do to reverse this situation. In its trajectory throughout the history of more than 500 years, Brazil has been accumulating problems that were not solved in the colonial period and during the Empire and the Republic, among which the main one being its independence that was never effectively achieved because, after the colonization of Portugal, the country remained dependent on the world market and, also, under the rule of British imperialism from 1810 until 1929 and the United States after the Second World War until the present moment. Only from 1930 to 1945, during the Getúlio Vargas government, there was no foreign interference in Brazil because the great capitalist powers were busy trying to overcome the great economic depression that started in 1929 and, soon after, they became involved in the 2nd World War until 1945. In addition to not having conquered the status of a truly independent country, Brazil established a Republic that was proclaimed in Brazil in 1889, which has always favored the interests of the powerful and in its 131 years of existence it has only presented democratic characteristics for only 50 years, that is, from 1946 to 1964 and from 1988 to the present. In the 131 years of the Republic, Brazil has had 81 years of authoritarian government in its existence. In the 520 years of Brazil’s existence, the Brazilian people lived 470 years under the tyranny of the Portuguese colonizer, of absolutism during the Empire and authoritarian regimes during the Republic.
During the colonial period from 1500 to 1822, Portugal did not take any initiative to develop the University in Brazil, unlike Spain, France and England in colonial America, which were concerned with the development of the culture of their colonies, where numerous universities were implanted since 1538. Only after 300 years, with the arrival of the Portuguese Royal Family to Brazil, in 1808, due to the occupation of Portugal by the Napoleonic troops, did the first cultural initiatives in Brazil occur, with the creation of Faculties such as, in 1808 , the Faculty of Surgery of Bahia in Salvador and the Faculty of Medicine of Rio de Janeiro, thus contributing to the cultural backwardness of the country with negative impacts on its development. In 1810, D. João VI, king of Portugal, signed an agreement that granted favorable tariffs to British products. From then on, it accentuated the economic dependence of Portugal and Brazil in relation to the United Kingdom, compromising the development of the future Brazilian nation. During the colonial period, there was repression against several revolts that took place in Brazil aiming at its separation from Portugal, such as the Inconfidência Mineira of 1789 and the Conjuration of Bahia in 1798.
With the return of D. João VI to Portugal in 1821, his son, D. Pedro I, replaces him as Emperor and decides, on September 7, 1822, to proclaim the Independence of Brazil in relation to Portugal with the main objective of maintaining the territorial unit of Brazil and avoid its fractionation in several countries such as that which occurred in the Spanish colonies. D. Pedro I maintained the unity of the territory of Brazil, pleasing the interests of the groups that dominated the colony. The proclaimed Independence of Brazil in 1822 differed from the experience of other Latin American countries because it did not present the characteristics of a typical national-liberating revolutionary process because it was aborted by the episode of the transmigration of the Portuguese royal family to Brazil, when the colony welcomed the structure and the cadres of the Portuguese metropolitan state in 1808. The Independence of Brazil was not an achievement of the Brazilian people, but granted by Portugal and paid to this country that colonized it for 322 years.
Revolutionary nativism, under the influence of the ideals of liberalism and the great revolutions of the late 18th century, gave way in Brazil to the logic of change, preserving, however, the privileges that still prevail today. Brazil’s independence was also an “independence without revolution” because there were no changes in the nation’s economic base. The State that was born from the Independence of Brazil maintains the abominable latifundium and intensifies the no less accursed slavery, making it the support of the economic structures inherited from the Colony. D. Pedro I authorized huge expenses with the Cisplatina War that occurred from 1825 to 1828, between Brazil and Argentina, for the possession of the Cisplatina Province, present-day Uruguay. The money spent in the fighting made the Brazilian economy very financially unbalanced, already in trouble due to payment to Portugal for the recognition of Brazil’s Independence. The unfavorable outcome for Brazil with the Cisplatin War that wished Uruguay to remain integrated into the Brazilian Empire worsened the political crisis in the country and was one more reason for Brazilians’ dissatisfaction with Emperor D. Pedro I, who abdicated the throne on April 7, 1831 after the murder of journalist Libero Badaró, a great critic of the Brazilian Empire, which made the Emperor’s political support precarious.
During the Empire with D. Pedro II (1831-1889), who succeeded D. Pedro I, the stable framework of the government must be attributed to the new situation that the Brazilian economy experienced with the increase in coffee consumption in the foreign market, which transformed coffee farming into the fundamental support of the economy of Brazil. With D. Pedro II in power, there were several localized uprisings, such as Cabanagem (Pará), Balaiada (Maranhão), Revolt dos Malês and Sabinada (Bahia), and War of Farrapos (Rio Grande do Sul / Santa Catarina) without threatening those in power. With D. Pedro II, Brazil became involved in war against Paraguay, which was the largest international armed conflict that occurred between the years 1864 and 1870 in South America. Paraguay was an independent and unique development model in the Prata basin that England disliked that, in order to subject Paraguay to English capitalism, it manipulated Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay so that they would war and destroy Paraguay’s economic model. Against the Paraguayan government, Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay signed a military agreement called the Triple Alliance that defeated Paraguay after more than five years of struggles during which they practiced a massacre of their population that some historians consider that there was a genocide.
With regard to Brazil, the Paraguayan war cost thousands of lives and greatly affected the economy, requiring several loans from England to maintain the country’s financial balance. England did not participate directly in the war, but it was the only country to profit from it, because it expanded its markets and Brazil increased its debt to the United Kingdom, increasing its dependence on British imperialism. Reaching its peak between 1850 and 1870, the imperial regime later declined as several events unfolded. The end of the slave trade and slavery, the introduction of immigrant labor and clashes with the military and religious were fundamental issues that shook the monarchy. The first blunt blow against D. Pedro II took place in 1888, when Princess Isabel authorized the release of all slaves by British imposition. From then on, the government lost the support of the large landowners, the last pillar that supported the existence of imperial power. In the following year, the worsens of relations between the Army, which was strengthened by the Paraguayan War, and the Empire was sufficient for a military coup to overthrow the Monarchy and proclaim the Republic in Brazil.
The end of the Empire in 1889, with the Proclamation of the Republic in Brazil, did not result from the struggle of the Brazilian people, but from a coup d’état sponsored by the Army with the support of the economic oligarchies that dominated the country at the end of the 19th century. With the Proclamation of the Republic, what happened with the Independence of Brazil was repeated, which did not result from the struggle of the Brazilian people, but from the will of the Portuguese monarchy. The Republic born of a coup d’etat maintains the agrarian-export economic model that privileges the interests of oligarchies since 1500 with the execrable latifundio inherited from the colonial period. Deplorable, too, was the country’s subordination to England since 1810 after the arrival of the royal family. British domination from 1810 to 1929 and the agrarian-export model, which was structured on the basis of the latifundium and slave labor during the colonial period and the Empire, constituted a gigantic obstacle to the development of Brazil with reflexes until today.
The Republic, which lasted from 1889 to 1930, and was called the Old Republic, or First Republic, had two moments: the Republic of the Sword and the Oligarchic Republic. The Republic of the Sword (1889 to 1894) covers the governments of marshals Deodoro da Fonseca and Floriano Peixoto when the Constitution was granted that would guide institutional actions during the Old Republic. This period was marked by economic crises, such as Encilhamento, and conflicts such as the Federalist Revolution and the Armada Revolt. The Oligarchic Republic (1895 to 1929) was marked by the political control exercised over the federal government by the São Paulo coffee oligarchy and by the rural elite in Minas Gerais, in the well-known “coffee with milk policy”. It was during this period that coronelismo developed more strongly, guaranteeing regional political power to the various local elites in the country. This period also marks the rise and fall of the economic power of farmers in São Paulo, which was based on the production of coffee for export. During this period there were several social conflicts such as the Canudos War, the Vaccine Revolt, the Chibata Revolt, the Contestado War, Tenentism, Prestes Column and Cangaço. The world economic crisis of 1929 that deeply affected the Brazilian coffee production and the political crisis resulting from the fraudulent election of the successor of then President Washington Luís resulted in the so-called Revolution of 1930 and the rise to power of Getúlio Vargas that led to the fall of the Old Republic, ending an unfortunate period in the history of Brazil when the agrarian-export model prevailed, which was structured based on the latifundium since 1500 and there was the country’s subordination to England since the Empire from 1810.
The first attempt to promote national emancipation with the economic development of Brazil not dependent on the world market, not subordinated to international capital and the great capitalist powers was initiated by President Getúlio Vargas, who assumed power with the so-called 1930 revolution with the end of Old Republic, giving the government a populist policy and nationalist from 1930 to 1945 in which some of the popular demands were satisfied, as is the case of the social laws introduced by the government that still exist today that represented “concessions” to the subordinate social strata, in addition to contributing to the advance of capitalism in Brazil to meet the demands of the national bourgeoisie. From 1930 to 1945, there was no foreign interference in Brazil on the part of the great powers because they were committed to overcoming the world economic depression from 1929 and involved in the 2nd World War from 1939 to 1945. On October 29, 1945, under pressure from the United States government, military invaded the Palácio do Catete, in Rio de Janeiro, and forced the resignation of President Vargas. When Getúlio Vargas returned to power in 1950 through the electoral route, there was an attempt to maintain the populist and nationalist policy that was aborted by being the target of the American government and its internal allies, who wanted him out of power and led to his suicide in 1954, having his attitude represented, also, the final act of the first ruler of Brazil that guided his action in defense of national sovereignty.
The second attempt to promote national emancipation with the economic development of Brazil not dependent on the world market, not subordinated to international capital and the great capitalist powers was taken by President João Goulart, who was a disciple of Getúlio Vargas, when, in 1961, he tried to initiate the same policy populist and nationalist in implementing the so-called Base Reforms that brought together initiatives aimed at banking, fiscal, urban, administrative, agrarian and university reforms. It also included offering the right to vote to the illiterate and to the subordinate ranks of the Armed Forces. President João Goulart’s measures also sought greater participation by the State in economic matters, regulating foreign investment in Brazil. Among the changes intended by the basic reforms was, in the first place, land reform. The objective was to enable thousands of rural workers to have access to land in the hands of the latifundio. The new profit remittance law sought to reduce the extremely high rate of profits that large foreign companies sent from Brazil to their headquarters. By adopting a populist and nationalist policy, João Goulart was ousted from power in 1964 under the pretext that he intended to communize Brazil. The 1964 coup d’état that overthrew the João Goulart government was a counter-revolution because it was a conservative reaction to the possibility of an effective and radical transformation of Brazil from “below” during the João Goulart government.
The rulers who succeeded Getúlio Vargas and João Goulart adopted policies that compromised Brazil’s future by increasing its political, economic and technological dependence on international capital and, above all, on the United States. The Eurico Dutra government (1946-1950) that succeeded the government of Getúlio Vargas in 1946 made Brazil subordinate to the United States whose alliance with the American government had repercussions on political actions of an authoritarian nature at the domestic level by placing the Communist Party in illegality, cassation mandates of parliamentarians of this party and exonerating civil servants belonging to the same party, in addition to breaking diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union. The Juscelino Kubitschek government that succeeded the Vargas government after 1964 centralized development in São Paulo, contributing decisively to widening the existing regional inequalities in Brazil, the denationalization of the national economy was deepened with foreign capital taking charge of Brazil’s industrialization process and the national industry being relegated to its own luck when suffering competition from outside groups. The Brazilian industrialization that had advanced under the leadership of the Brazilian company during the Vargas government is overtaken by foreign capital, which is gradually taking the control of the most dynamic branches of the Brazilian economy.
The military rulers who came to power with the coup d’état in 1964 succeeding the government of João Goulart, implemented a dictatorship that lasted 21 years (1964 to 1985) which, in addition to dismantling the democratic institutions existing in the country, canceled mandates of parliamentarians from opposition and led to the death of hundreds of left-wing militants, maintained the economic policy of the Juscelino Kubitschek government of subordination of the Brazilian economy to international capital. The model of capitalist development dependent on technology and foreign capital inaugurated by the Juscelino Kubitschek government in 1955, which reached its peak in the 1970s, ran out in the early 1980s and nothing has been done in this decade to restructure the Brazilian economy on new bases. The 1980s and 1990s marked the longest and most serious crisis in Brazil in its history, only surpassed by the current crisis that broke out in 2014. This unfortunate situation became more serious since 1990 when the neoliberal model of subordination of the country to international capital was adopted increasing their economic vulnerabilities during the Fernando Collor, Itamar Franco, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, Lula da Silva, Dilma Rousseff and Michel Temer governments that deepened further with the Jair Bolsonaro government, which took power in 2019, because, in addition to representing a threat of dismantling democratic institutions with its neo-fascist government policy, of worsening social conditions for the population, of compromising the population’s health with its inaction in the fight against the new Coronavirus and of increasing degradation of the country’s environment, is radicalizing even more in the adoption of the neoliberal economic model that is leading the country to greater subordination to international capital and particularly the United States, and the bankruptcy of the Brazilian economy aggravated by the pandemic of the new Coronavirus.
From the above, it can be said that Brazil had its political, economic and social progress aborted throughout history, counting on the collaboration of the country’s various rulers during the colonial period, the Empire and the Republic with the exception of the governments Getúlio Vargas and João Goulart that tried to promote national emancipation from obstacles to its development. This trajectory of Brazil throughout history resulted from the subordinate attitude of its ruling classes and its leaders towards international capital and the great world powers. Le progrès politique, économique et social n’a pas eu lieu au Brésil car il a été le dernier pays au monde à mettre fin à l’esclavage au XIXe siècle, il n’a pas mené de réforme agraire avec le maintien de la structure agraire basée sur le latifundium qui continue d’exister et se modernise aujourd’hui avec le secteur agroalimentaire, il y a eu un retard dans la création d’universités qui n’a eu lieu qu’au 18ème siècle, l’industrialisation a été introduite très tard 200 ans après la 1ère révolution industrielle en Angleterre et est menacée d’un revers en raison de la désindustrialisation accélérée en cours à l’ère contemporaine. De plus, les transformations survenues dans l’histoire du Brésil, telles que l’indépendance et la République, ne résultaient pas de mouvements de bas en haut, impliquant la population dans son ensemble. Le processus de développement économique et social au Brésil à travers l’histoire (colonie, empire, république) était basé sur la conciliation «d’en haut» entre ceux au pouvoir, ne cachant jamais l’intention explicite de rester marginalisé ou réprimé, hors du champ des décisions , les classes et les couches sociales «inférieures» pour assurer le maintien des privilèges des classes sociales dominantes.
To reverse this situation and ensure Brazil’s political, economic and social progress,, it is necessary that future governments and economically dominant classes abandon their subordinate attitude throughout history in relation to international capital and the great world powers, mobilizing the entire Brazilian population for conquest of national independence, breaking with economic and technological dependence to achieve effective political independence. Economic dependence will be overcome if there is a great effort by future governments, economically dominant classes and all the Brazilian people in order to increase public and private savings in the country to prevent the country from having to depend on the attraction of foreign investment capital and / or financing from international banks, if agrarian reform is carried out to end the latifundium, especially the unproductive, if the public and free education system from early childhood education to higher education is strengthened to train the country’s human resources, reverse the deindustrialization in course since the 1980s with the expansion of the Brazilian industry aimed at serving the domestic and foreign markets and is carried out the expansion the economic (energy, transport and communications) and social (education, health, popular housing and basic sanitation) infrastructure to support the development. Technological dependence will be overcome if there is a great effort by future governments, economically dominant classes and the entire Brazilian people to make significant public and private investments in knowledge resources by carrying out scientific and technological research in Brazil in universities, research centers and companies national public and private companies aiming to reduce or eliminate the country’s expenses with technology transfer. In addition to the achievement of national independence, a truly democratic republic must be built in Brazil from a political, economic and social point of view with the implementation of the State of Social Welfare along the lines of that practiced in Scandinavian countries (Sweden, Denmark, Norway , Finland and Iceland) which are the countries with the most advanced political, economic and social progress in the world, according to the UN, adapted to the Brazilian reality as we recommend in our book “The invention of a new Brazil”, published by Editora CRV de Curitiba. It is in the hands of current and future generations of Brazilians to reverse the unfortunate situation in which the country finds itself, building a future for Brazil different from the trajectory of its deplorable past to contribute to the redemption of the Brazilian nation and people.
* Fernando Alcoforado, 80, awarded the medal of Engineering Merit of the CONFEA / CREA System, member of the Bahia Academy of Education, engineer and doctor in Territorial Planning and Regional Development by the University of Barcelona, university professor and consultant in the areas of strategic planning, business planning, regional planning and planning of energy systems, is author of the books Globalização (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 1997), De Collor a FHC- O Brasil e a Nova (Des)ordem Mundial (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 1998), Um Projeto para o Brasil (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 2000), Os condicionantes do desenvolvimento do Estado da Bahia (Tese de doutorado. Universidade de Barcelona,http://www.tesisenred.net/handle/10803/1944, 2003), Globalização e Desenvolvimento (Editora Nobel, São Paulo, 2006), Bahia- Desenvolvimento do Século XVI ao Século XX e Objetivos Estratégicos na Era Contemporânea (EGBA, Salvador, 2008), The Necessary Conditions of the Economic and Social Development- The Case of the State of Bahia (VDM Verlag Dr. Müller Aktiengesellschaft & Co. KG, Saarbrücken, Germany, 2010), Aquecimento Global e Catástrofe Planetária (Viena- Editora e Gráfica, Santa Cruz do Rio Pardo, São Paulo, 2010), Amazônia Sustentável- Para o progresso do Brasil e combate ao aquecimento global (Viena- Editora e Gráfica, Santa Cruz do Rio Pardo, São Paulo, 2011), Os Fatores Condicionantes do Desenvolvimento Econômico e Social (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2012), Energia no Mundo e no Brasil- Energia e Mudança Climática Catastrófica no Século XXI (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2015), As Grandes Revoluções Científicas, Econômicas e Sociais que Mudaram o Mundo (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2016), A Invenção de um novo Brasil (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2017), Esquerda x Direita e a sua convergência (Associação Baiana de Imprensa, Salvador, 2018, em co-autoria) and Como inventar o futuro para mudar o mundo (Editora CRV, Curitiba, 2019).
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