CONTEMPORARY POLITICS

https://doi.org/10.1080/13569775.2018.1555783

Crisis and austerity: the recent trajectory of capitalist

development in Brazil
Renato Raul Boschia and Carlos Eduardo Santos Pinhob
a
Postgraduate Program in Political Science (IESP/UERJ) and National Institute of Science and Technology in
Public Policies, Strategies and Development (INCT/PPED), Rio de Janeiro, Brasil; bNational Institute of Science
and Technology in Public Policies, Strategies and Development (INCT/PPED), Rio de Janeiro, Brasil

ABSTRACT KEYWORDS
In the methodological framework of comparative capitalism (CC) of Crisis; austerity policies;
this special edition, the article analyzes theoretically and empirically, varieties of capitalism;
in the scope of economic globalisation, the recent trajectory of parliamentary coup; Brazil
Brazilian capitalist development. The objective is to emphasise the
crisis of the variety of coordinated and state-regulated capitalism
(2003–2016) and its subsequent metamorphosis into a variety of
ultraliberal and undemocratic capitalism (2016 in progress), which
has been dissolving the social protection and public policy
network. The central issue that this article proposes to answer is
how this transition was carried out, in view of the government’s
successful response to the systemic financial crisis of exogenous
origin that emerged in 2008, and the political inability to face the
endogenous crisis that erupted in 2014. The meaning of this last
liberal/radical modality of capitalism is the fact that it conducted
by the Michel Temer’s government, which came to power by
means of a parliamentary coup disguised by democratic legality,
and which was welcomed by the Judiciary, the Congress, the
press and the wealthy classes. The conservative coalition of
parliamentary government deepened the fiscal adjustment
initiated by Dilma Rousseff at the 2015 threshold, deteriorated the
living conditions of the poor and accentuated the scope of
financial capitalism despite the pressures of a mass based
democracy.

1. Introduction
Beginning in 2003, the progressive coalition that came to power in Brazil revitalised the
state and bureaucratic capacities of strategic planning for development, carrying out a
variety of state-regulated capitalism to promote economic growth in line with the policies
of redistribution of income and social incorporation. Within the contingencies imposed by
financial globalisation, the center-left government reconciled orthodox macroeconomic
policies (fiscal austerity, inflation targets, floating exchange rate) with the legacy of the
National-Developmental and Interventionist State instituted in the Vargas Era (1930–
1945/1951–1954) (Boschi, 2010, 2011, 2014; Boschi & Gaitán, 2008a, 2008b, 2012; Pinho,
2016).

CONTACT Carlos Eduardo Santos Pinho cpinho19@gmail.com

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