Free standard shipping on all orders
  • Visa
  • Master Card
  • American Express
  • Apple Pay
  • Google Pay
  • JCB

Economic Growth, Inequality and Crony Capitalism: The Case of Brazil book cover

1st Edition

Economic Growth, Inequality and Crony Capitalism The Case of Brazil

By Danilo Rocha Limoeiro Copyright 2020
222 Pages 38 B/W Illustrations
by Routledge

222 Pages 38 B/W Illustrations
by Routledge

222 Pages 38 B/W Illustrations
by Routledge
Also available as eBook on:
Researchers in international development have long argued that the high costs of doing business harms prosperity in developing countries, a claim that invites the question of why governments impose these costs and why societies fail to enact reforms reducing them. This book seeks to answer the question by looking at the case of Brazil, a large and highly unequal economy riddled with state-imposed... Read more

List of figures

List of tables

Preface

1 Cronyism, growth and inequality

Ricardo’s predicament and the argument in short

Contribution: understanding Ricardo’s predicament

Roadmap: a central puzzle and its explanation

Capitalism, regulation, Left and Right: a brief reflection

2 Crony capitalism actors, continuity and change

Crony capitalism in Brazil

Business

Politicians

Bureaucrats

Formalizing the argument

Change

3 Industry leaders and political engagement

Are industry leaders more politically engaged?

Testing the hypothesis in Brazil

Estimation

Conclusion

4 The politics of taxation in Brazil

Disjoint layering and the tax system

Subnational taxation and tax breaks

Tariff policies

Conclusion

5 Pharmaceuticals

Functions and distortions of bureaucracies

The pharmaceutical industry in Brazil

The cases of São Paulo and Goiás

Anvisa: welcomed but unloved

Why not fight back against regulatory distortion?

6 Agriculture

Blurred lines

The agricultural boom in Brazil

Demand for Pareto optimal reforms

The bootstrap sector?

The political clout of agribusiness

7 Conclusion

Future research

Bibliography

Index

Biography

Danilo Rocha Limoeiro holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from MIT and a Master’s degree with distinction from Oxford University. Currently, he is the co-founder of Turivius, a company dedicated to helping developing countries decrease bureaucracy through technology.

"That Brazil is notoriously one of the hardest countries in the world to do business is often decried but largely unexplained. Combining a sophisticated theoretical approach with careful case studies of tax policies and the pharmaceutical and agricultural sectors, this innovative work shines a spotlight on the political equilibrium that sustains high transaction costs: politicians enjoy leverage over economic actors, who do not collectively resist because well-connected businesses benefit from a regulatory regime that raises the barriers to entry for new entrepreneurs. This book should be of broad interest to students of the political economy of emerging market economies." — Frances Hagopian, Harvard University

"Observers in Brazil have long lamented both the excessive regulation by the public sector and the overweening power of big business in the private sector. This deeply researched book finally puts them together, under sustained scrutiny, to show how they are mutually reinforcing. Far from being a fervent advocate of free markets, big business in fact benefits from, and politically supports, the detailed rules and regulations that give big business a leg up and keep potential competitors out. Scholars of market reform and business power, in Brazil and elsewhere, will want to read this innovative and troubling book." — Ben Ross Schneider, MIT

Add to Cart