Vol. 30 No. 2 (2010): Apr-Jun / 2010


Vol. 30 No. 2 (2010)

Apr-Jun / 2010
Published April 1, 2010

Article


Are we all Keynesians?
Marc Lavoie
Brazilian Journal of Political Economy

This essay asks whether we are all becoming Keynesians again. It offers some thoughts about the impact of the financial crisis on macroeconomic theory and Keynesian theory, and on post-Keynesian theory in particular. It is argued that the crisis does have obvious effects on how Keynesianism is being perceived by decision makers, and that some effects are also observed on academia. However, there are forces within the economics profession and the population at large which are resistant to this second coming of the Keynesian revolution.

JEL classification: B4; B5.


China: stability and economic growth
Marcelo José Braga Nonnenberg
Brazilian Journal of Political Economy

A China apresentou um fabuloso crescimento desde 1978, ao mesmo tempo em que manteve a inflação estável. Quais os fatores responsáveis pelo sucesso da economia chinesa e até que ponto a política macroeconômica colaborou? Obviamente, diversos fatores foram responsáveis por esse crescimento apesar de nenhum deles, isoladamente, poder ser apontado como o principal. O artigo também indaga se será possível à China manter um ritmo semelhante de crescimento ou irá passar em breve por uma forte desaceleração, a exemplo do que já aconteceu com outros países asiáticos. Sugere-se que ela ainda poderá manter um vigoroso crescimento, bastante próximo à média observada nas 3 últimas décadas.

JEL Classification: F43; O11; O53.


De-Industrialization: concept, causes, effects and the Brazilian case.
José Luis Oreiro, Carmem A. Feijó
Brazilian Journal of Political Economy

 This article aims to do a theoretical discussion about the term “de-industrialization” and its relationship with other concepts as “primarization” of exports and “Dutch disease”. After that we will analyze the possible causes and effects of “de-industrialization”. Finally, we analyze the Brazilian case, with a special attention over the economic literature about this issue.

JEL Classification: L6; O14; O54.


Economic growth and foreign liquidity in Brazil after 1970
Fabrício de Assis C. Vieira, Márcio Holland
Brazilian Journal of Political Economy

This paper assesses the relationship between the capital account and the Brazilian economic growth according to balance-of-payments constraint approach. The Thirlwall (1979)’s simple rule is extended to take into consideration capital account and several empirical evidence using time series analysis are shown. Conversely to the simple rule when fitted rates of balance-of-payment equilibrium economic growth average bellow the observed ones, fitted rates of growth using the rule extended to international liquidity are consistently greater than the observed ones. It is fair to conclude that, first, the Brazilian economy grows better during abundant international liquidity and, second, the economy sub utilizes such advantage growing far less than it could grow.

JEL Classification: E32; O16; C32.


Weber and Schumpeter: the economic action of the entrepreneur.
Ana Cristina Braga Martes
Brazilian Journal of Political Economy

Is there any specificity to be raised in the relations established between entrepreneurs and institutions? Recently, the term entrepreneurship is being widely employed. Enterprising is not anymore a restricted activity to the private sector, but also the Third Sector and the Public Administration. It does not only circumscribe the space of innovation, but also of the adapting changes. In this sense, such elastic concept runs the risk to lose consistency. It seems to be appropriate, therefore, to rescue the meaning that many authors, considered classic in Social Sciences, had attributed to the subject, to show that, although deep socioeconomic transformations occurred since Schumpeter wrote the Theory of the Economic Development, is still necessary to emphasize a basic dimension of the enterprising action: resistance and institutional conflict.

JEL Classification: A14.


Marshall and the critics to the classical political economy
Laura Valladão de Mattos
Brazilian Journal of Political Economy

This paper analyzes the period of transition between the Millian orthodoxy and the Marshallian orthodoxy with special emphasis on the influence of the economic debates of the 1870’s and 1880’s in the genesis of Marshall’s conceptions. It is argued that in these decades Political Economy was questioned in three different fronts: by the theoretical critics, by the adepts of the historical method, and by the humanists. It is also argued that Marshall answered these criticisms, sometimes by accepting and incorporating them, sometimes by rejecting them, and in doing so he was able to construct a new disciplinary consensus – that gave the foundations to the practice of the next generation of economists.

Jel Classification: B1; B12; B13.


Tariff Discrimination on Brazils soluble coffee: an economic analysis
Marislei Nishijima, Sylvia Macchione Saes
Brazilian Journal of Political Economy

This article evaluates the impacts of the imposition of tariffs on the Brazilian soluble coffee mainly by European countries as of the 1990s. More particularly, it verifies whether the imposition of discriminatory trade tariffs by the European Union and of non-discriminatory ones by some Eastern European countries reflects on the international demand for this commodity. For this purpose, dynamic models of global demand for Brazilian soluble coffee were estimated for the 1995-2003 period using data from the International Coffee Organization. Findings suggest that existing tariffs significantly account for the reduction of Brazilian share of soluble in the world market.

JEL Classification: C01;C51; L16.


Inflation persistence and new Keynesian Phillips curves for Brazil
Fernando de Aquino Fonseca Neto
Brazilian Journal of Political Economy

In this paper is shown that sustainable inflation persistence has theoretical support not only due price indexation, but also because of micro-foundations based on assumptions of Simon’s bounded rationality and because of persistent mark-up shocks. the new keynesian phillips curve, estimated for brazil for the period 2000/2008, and the partial coefficients of determination for moving sub-periods of 36 months identifies inflation persistence as the main determinant of inflation, with the capacity gap presenting larger importance only in the end of the sample period. Inflation persistence requires harder monetary policy when neither accommodation is acceptable nor complementary policies in order to reduce it, such as the minimization of indexation mechanisms and control of the market power, are adopted.

JEL Classification: E31; D82; D84; E12.


Economic growth stimulated by natural resources a note on the Botswana experience
Daniela Corrêa, Gilberto Tadeu Lima
Brazilian Journal of Political Economy

Botswana was the fastest growing economy in the world in the 1966-1989 period. Even though the discovery and exploitation of large diamond reserves had played an essential role in such an impressive performance, favorable economic, political and institutional conditions allowed the use of the resulting large export revenues as a lever for economic growth, though not for development. 

JEL Classification: O11; O13; O55.


The theory of the perspective and the changes of preference in the mainstream a Lakatosean prospect
Bruno Berger, Huáscar Fialho Pessali
Brazilian Journal of Political Economy

For many decades over the 20th Century, the mainstream of economics adopted a normative and axiomatic theory of individual behavior in which maximizing procedures were carried out by rationally unbounded agents. This status has been challenged on many grounds and alternative views from fields like psychology have found a way into the core of economics research frontier. Prospect theory, developed by psychologists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky since the 1970s, has provided a more empirical, inductive and descriptive theory of decision making. It has made significant inroads into mainstream microeconomics, shaking the habits of some of its practitioners. This paper first takes stock of its main developments and then uses a Lakatosian framework to draw out its negative and positive heuristics. In what follows, its heuristics are compared to those of traditional rational decision-making theories. The differences between them are highlighted, pointing to changes in the mainstream of the profession and to new opportunities for research.

JEL Classification: D01; B41.