What are the institutional relationships between the colonial past of the Brazilian economy and the development of its financial system?

Abstract

Based on the keynesian and cepalinian/furtadian theoretical framework, we investigate the institutional relations between the Brazilian colonial past and the development of its financial system until the 1960s. The underlying hypothesis is that there is a connection between a financial system deficient in providing investment funds and the economically peripheral Brazilian condition. This was subordinate to Portuguese European institutions, despite being immersed in the accumulation process of mercantile capitalism. This changed in the transition from the primary-export model to one geared to domestic demand. The industrialization process put pressure on a financial system unable to meet the growing demand for credit, which increased the need instruments and mechanisms for financing the investment. However, as the financial system developed, financial institutions profited not despite the “dysfunctionalities” imposed by the peripheral Brazilian economic condition, but through them. It is concluded that such institutional relations were the legacy of the colonial past left to the contemporary financial system.