The Politics of Capitalist Transformation

The Politics of Capitalist Transformation is the only book-length study of the highly protectionist Brazilian informatics policy from its origins in the early 1970s to the collapse of the market reserve in the early 1990s and its impact in subsequent decades.Jeff Seward provides a sophisticated political analysis of how state activists constructed high levels of state autonomy to try to shift Brazil to a new variety of capitalism by eclipsing the multinational companies (especially IBM) that dominated the Brazilian computer sector and replacing them with local companies with 100 percent Brazilian technology and ownership. This ambitious policy required repeated shifts of political strategy and policymaking institutions to respond to a constantly changing economic and political environment as Brazil made a dramatic transition from military dictatorship to democracy.The innovative framework to analyze state autonomy and the sophisticated political analysis of the policymaking process will be of interest to scholars and students of Brazilian and Latin American political economy, varieties of capitalism theory, state theory, democratic transition theory, and high technology policymaking in developing countries.

Autorentext

Jeff Seward is an associate professor in the Department of Politics and Government at Pacific University. His research interests include comparative politics (with a special emphasis on Brazil and Latin America), political philosophy, political economy, and politics in literature and film.

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Table of Contents * Glossary of Terms and Acronyms

Acknowledgements

• Chapter 1: Bringing Politics Back in

Chapter 2: The Strategic Universe and Brazilian State Autonomy: The Context of the Brazilian Informatics Policy

Chapter 3: The Trajectory of Brazilian State Autonomy I: COBRA and CAPRE in the Military Dictatorship, 1971-1979

Chapter 4: The Trajectory of Brazilian State Autonomy II: SEI and the National Security Council in the Transition to Democracy, 1979-1984

Chapter 5: The Trajectory of Brazilian State Autonomy III: SEI, CONIN, and the Ministry of Science and Technology: Consolidating Institutions in the New Democracy, 1985-1987

Chapter 6: The Trajectory of Brazilian State Autonomy IV: The Decline and Fall of the Market Reserve, 1987-1992

Chapter 7: Mapping the Topography of State Autonomy, 1971-1992

Chapter 8: Conclusion: Explaining the Autonomy of The Brazilian State CAPRE and SEI, 1971-1992 * Index *