An Economist’s Political View of Democratisation in Brazil

The current economic and social crisis in Brazil cannot be dissociated from the legacies of the military period (1964–84). The ‘miraculous’ economic performance of the late 1960s and early 1970s and the debtcum-growth strategy of the late 1970s did have trickle-down effects. In these two decades, and especially in the 1970s, the level of poverty fell and all income groups benefited from economic growth. However, the military governments showed little regard for distributive policies. This is true not only of income distribution, which was strongly affected by the wage policies of the period, but also of the structure of social expenditure, subsidies and transfers, which were quite regressive.