When Brazil was modern: the State before the crisis of the State

Abstract

This article proposes and develops an analytical scheme based on historicalneo-institutionalism to explain the genesis of State capacities through exclusivelypolitical variables. Taking the case of the exponential growth of State powerduring the Brazilian “Estado Novo” regime (1937-1945) as my problem, I seek toreflect on the empirical determinants and, as deriving from them, the theoreticalcriteria that are responsible for accounting for three simultaneous occurrences:decision-making centralization at the head of the Federal Executive, influence offormal government institutions on processes of recruitment and selection of politicalpersonnel and unequal sharing of decision-making power among differentelite groups. These three processes lie at the base of the building of State authorityover society (“sovereignty”) and of the nationalization of structures of domination.They function as a pre-condition for shifting models of economic developmentduring the first half of the 20th century. Through comparisons, thesevariables may enable us to think about the opposite movement that characterizesthe late 20th century, in which – given the crisis of the “national- developmentalistState” – there is a resulting erosion of State capacities and constitution ofa new economic dependence.