THE ARMED PROPHETS: GEOPOLITICS AND MILITARY THOUGHT IN THE ORIGINS OF BRAZILIAN DEVELOPMENTALISM

Abstract

The belicist approach and the global power theory argue that geopolitics, war and preparation to war were important drivers of state formation and economic development of the great powers. The objective of this article is to presente new elements that allow for the exploration of the impact of interstate rivalry and geopolitics on the processes of political centralization and industrialization that characterize Brazil’s Developmental Era between the 1930s and 1970s. In this period, there was a huge political protagonism by the Armed Forces. However, in the political and economic literature on this historical phase, and in the studies on Brazilian economic thought and military political action, the interstate and geopolitical element is largely absent. We present then data from empirical research done in the editions of Defesa Nacional Review published between 1913 and 1930. This data points to the existence of a thought associated to the military elites of the developmental era, and that articulates regional geopolitical threat to the defense of political centralization and industrialization, orientations that correspond therefore to the latter historical developments. We argue that the new data indicate the viability of a new research agenda that incorporates the military elites and geopolitics as central elements in the understanding of the Brazilian developmentalism.