How the full opening of the capital account to highly liquid financial markets led Latin America to two and a half cycles of ‘mania, panic and crash’

Latin America has recently experienced three cycles of capital inflows, the first two ending in major financial crises. The first took place between 1973 and the 1982 ‘debt-crisis’. The second took place between the 1989 ‘Brady bonds’ agreement (and the beginning of the economic reforms and financial liberalisation that followed) and the Argentinian 2001/2002 crisis, and ended up with four major crises (as well as the 1997 one in East Asia) — Mexico (1994), Brazil (1999), and two in Argentina (1995 and 2001/2). Finally, the third inflow-cycle began in 2003 as soon as international financial markets felt reassured by the surprisingly neo-liberal orientation of President Lula’s government; this cycle intensified in 2004 with the beginning of a (purely speculative) commodity price-boom, and actually strengthened after a brief interlude following the 2008 global financial crash — and at the time of writing (mid-2011) this cycle is still unfolding, although already showing considerable signs of distress. The main aim of this paper is to analyse the financial crises resulting from this second cycle (both in LA and in East Asia) from the perspective of Keynesian/ Minskyian/ Kindlebergian financial economics. I will attempt to show that no matter how diversely these newly financially liberalised Developing Countries tried to deal with the absorption problem created by the subsequent surges of inflow (and they did follow different routes), they invariably ended up in a major crisis. As a result (and despite the insistence of mainstream analysis), these financial crises took place mostly due to factors that were intrinsic (or inherent) to the workings of over-liquid and under-regulated financial markets — and as such, they were both fully deserved and fairly predictable. Furthermore, these crises point not just to major market failures, but to a systemic market failure: evidence suggests that these crises were the spontaneous outcome of actions by utility-maximising agents, freely operating in friendly (light-touched) regulated, over-liquid financial markets. That is, these crises are clear examples that financial markets can be driven by buyers who take little notice of underlying values — investors have incentives to interpret information in a biased fashion in a systematic way. ‘Fat tails’ also occurred because under these circumstances there is a high likelihood of self-made disastrous events. In other words, markets are not always right — indeed, in the case of financial markets they can be seriously wrong as a whole. Also, as the recent collapse of ‘MF Global’ indicates, the capacity of ‘utility-maximising’ agents operating in unregulated and over-liquid financial market to learn from previous mistakes seems rather limited.

The economics of wage-led recovery: analysis and policy recommendations

The financial crisis and Great Recession have been followed by a jobs shortage crisis that most forecasts predict will persist for years given current policies. This paper argues for a wage-led recovery and growth program which is the only way to remedy the deep causes of the crisis and escape the jobs crisis. Such a program is the polar opposite of the current policy orthodoxy, showing how much is at stake. Winning the argument for wage-led recovery will require winning the war of ideas about economics that has its roots going back to Keynes’ challenge of classical macroeconomics in the 1920s and 1930s. That will involve showing how the financial crisis and Great Recession were the ultimate result of three decades of neoliberal policy, which produced wage stagnation by severing the wage productivity growth link and made asset price inflation and debt the engine of demand growth in place of wages; showing how wage-led policy resolves the current problem of global demand shortage without pricing out labor; and developing a detailed set of policy proposals that flow from these understandings. The essence of a wage-led policy approach is to rebuild the link between wages and productivity growth, combined with expansionary macroeconomic policy that fills the current demand shortfall so as to push the economy on to a recovery path. Both sets of measures are necessary. Expansionary macro policy (i.e. fiscal stimulus and easy monetary policy) without rebuilding the wage mechanism will not produce sustainable recovery and may end in fiscal crisis. Rebuilding the wage mechanism without expansionary macro policy is likely to leave the economy stuck in the orbit of stagnation.

Ajuste estrutural e educação superior no Brasil: princípios negados

SILVA, Hiran Francisco Oliveira Lopes da. A juste estruturale educação superior no Brasil: princípios negados. 206 f., 2007. Tese (Doutorado em Educação) - Universidade Federal da Paraiba, João Pessoa, 2007.

Controle social do espaço público: uma análise do conselho turístico pólo costa das dunas

The managing Conselho of public politics constitute one of the main experiences of democracy in Brazil contemporary representing a conquest for construction of a democratic institutionalism. The historical newness consists of the intensification and the institutionalization of the dialogue between government and society - in public and plural canals - as condition for an allocation more efficient joust and of the public resources. In this context the present study it objectified to understand from readings of the performance of represented group of bencheses the dynamics of functioning of the Tourist Conselho Pólo Costa das Dunas while space of participation and social control. The bibliographical research contemplated diverse sources in order to compile knowledge of credential authors in the quarrel of inherent subjects to the civil society and the public sphere to the construction of the citizenship to the conception formation and dynamics of the social control through Conselho of public politics. A qualitative perspective the case study was adopted as research method and for attainment of the data interviews with the members of the Conselho had been carried through beyond consultation the referring documents the dynamics of functioning of the Conselho. The profiles capacities and limitations of the members of the Conselho had been identified constitution social and dynamic organization of functioning of the Conselho and the readings of the members of the Conselho concerning the power to decide instances and participation. The results had shown that the allotment of being able in the Conselho does not occur of equal form. The functions of coordination of the activities of the Conselho are assumed by the representatives of the public agencies. Level of qualification of council members also if presents as difficulty to development of activities of Conselho since the majority of the interviewed ones disclosed unreliability and unfamiliarity when thematic specific that runs away from its organizacional reality they are boarded in the assemblies. Of this form the Conselho if presents more as half of institutional legitimation of what half of characterization of the creation of a public sphere properly said. Finally he could himself be concluded that a democratic culture inexists that inside crosses practical the institutional ones of the Conselho thus limiting the possibility to reach the effective social control of the public politics of tourism in the Rio Grande do Norte

O processo de urbanização de Mossorò: dos processos históricos à estrutura urbana atual

The general objective of this academic work is to analyze the relationship between the territorial division and the urban expansion process of Mossoró city, understood here as the production and occupation of space. The urban expansion in Mossoró, since its formation as settlement in 1772 until current days, identifies with the Brazilian urbanization process whose growth is determined by the capitalist development. Thus, the expansion was determined by several economical specializations imposed by the territorial division of work which occurs at an interregional level, and, sometimes at an international level. Then, each specialization determined a moment of the urban expansion of the city, as follows: a) The cattle farmer specialization, between 1772 and 1857, when the urban expansion was shy, is summarized to a commercial square that received goods from Aracati aiming to cover a wide rural area; b) The commercial emporium specialization, between 1857 and 1930, when the urban expansion took an important impulse with the concentration of public and private capitals; c) The salt industry and the agricultural-industrial exporter specialization inside a state of development policy, between 1930 and 1970, when the urban expansion, joined to the settlement of the working class in the urban soil, developed along an important axis -the railway; d) The render of services specialization inside a state of intervention policy, between 1970 and 1990, when the urban expansion was characterized by the accelerated growth rhythm, by the reuse of some spaces, and by space segregation of demanding people; e) The render of services policy inside a neoliberal state policy, since 1990 until current days, when the urban expansion reduced its rhythm abruptly, when only small alterations occurred in the existing spaces. It focused on social policies and on several slums eradication programs. Finally, the territorial structure is deeply articulated with others, no territorial, but economical, social and political, which happens at a national, regional and local rate. Only within a historical and conceptual panorama, it was possible to explain the urban expansion in Mossoró from its formation in 1772 until current days. Therefore, this work is a several discipline analysis of the urbanization process existing in Mossoró

Proteja e proteje sua carreira: revista você S/A e o mercado de discursos administrativos

The present work aims at investigating the role of Você S/A magazine within the área of administrative discourses. The idea is to investigate the constituting variances in such market, presenting its working logics and its historical pathway that promoted its structure as we nowadays know. Furthermore, thought must be put into considering how the constituting agents of this market legitimize such practice. The understanding of this whole context will allow the explanation of the role of Você S/A magazine in this market and how the magazine is related to other area agents. The work is justified by casting light over a phenomena much neglected by the academy, which is the business press and the dissemination of social stock of knowledge developed from the new administrative discourses. The methodology used was the content analysis on published articles by the magazine, being preceded by the historical backtracking of the structuring of the investigated market. The research took into consideration the following results: the business press, in general, and the Você S/A in particular, presented themselves to be just one more tool for readers to increase their social stock of knowledge, as to be inserted into contemporary organizations. An enormous public arena in which the people interested in the diffusion of certain managing packages may spread such practices and earn economic capital with them

Educação para a cidadania e ensino superior

El presente trabajo discute la Educación para la Ciudadanía en la Educación Superior, destacando los desafíos y las potencialidades de la Universidade do Estado do Rio Grande do Norte (UERN); que organiza su acción política y pedagógica conforme a las exigencias de la actual política educacional para este nivel de educación. Analiza la relación de ésta con la Educación Básica a partir del estudio del Proyecto Pedagógico del Curso de Ciencias Sociales discutiendo la educación para la ciudadanía y la formación ciudadana de los futuros profesores de la educación básica en consonancia con la LDB 9.394/96, con las Directrices Curriculares Nacionales para los cursos de Docencia y además para programas y políticas de orientación para la educación superior que resultaron de la conquistas de los movimientos sociales y que son propuestos por medio de las siguientes secretarías: Secretaria de Educação Continuada, Alfabetização e Diversidade (SECAD) y Secretaria de Educação Superior (SESu). La reflexión incluye el estudio de tales temáticas en el eje de temas emergentes que organizan el debate educacional, sobretodo en América Latina, y los desafíos de las universidades que actúan en el contexto de la periferia en la desconstrucción del dominio simbólico del colonialismo cultural y la construcción de la globalización alternativa y contra hegemónica a la globalización neoliberal. El estudio evidencia que la idea de ciudadanía en la sociabilización contemporánea presenta una ambigüedad política consecuente de los procesos de globalización creciente siendo necesario que la perspectiva de la educación para la ciudadanía adoptada en la formación de los profesionales de a educación sea re politizada a partir de la noción de ciudadanía colectiva y multicultural apoyada en los principios de democracia y justicia social, construida en las interfaces de la educación escolar y prácticas educativas en lo entorno social, y en los espacios políticos de organización y movilización colectiva en torno de las conquistas por los derechos civiles, sociales, políticos y culturales, y la inclusión de temas y valores emergentes en la educación que interligados e interdependientes, garanticen su efectividad

Da proteção à precarização um estudo do fenômeno jurídico trabalhista no contexto das transformações do capitalismo

This research aims to investigate the effectiveness of the legal labor phenomenon in contemporary capitalism as rectifier element of the contradictions between capital and labor. From the analysis of legislative developments - state and business - and court decisions related to the category of freight transport is expected to determine the protectionist stiffness proclaimed by the institutional structure of labor in Brazil, considered by the hegemonic discourse as political-economic factor that prevents growth. It is intended to unravel the relationships between political and civil society, studying the internal contradictions and ideological influence among these spaces, with theoretical support in Marx and Gramsci. The function of this research is to test the premise that the protectionist discourse is a rational action of capitalism and the organic intellectuals of political society in order to achieve hegemony and hide the real contradictions between capital and labor, in addition to also assist in the discussion on deregulation and easing in Brazil. The analysis points to the confirmation of our premise, since the evolution of the legal phenomenon in the transport sector was charging toward the neoliberal project

Sociedade civil no espaço de atuação com juventude: uma cartografia social

This report has as its objective the setting up of a social cartography, mapping and characterizing non-governmental organizations working with adolescents and young people (OSC) in the western districts of the city of Natal. Characteristics such as the profile, themes and principal activities, how the organizations fit into the public sector and their participation in social networks are observed. Thus common differences and similarities which serve as a means of indentification, take as reference the symbolic cartography of Boaventura of Sousa Santos. Since there are relatively few studies relating to civil society of Rio Grande do Norte and in particular, Natal, the starting point was the setting up of a database allowing for a general overview. Hence a panorama of the organizations could be observed: where they are located, when they were formed how they operate and their relationships with other sectors (the state, the market and civil society) in addition to basic facts and location. The principal lines of enquiry were a) the OSC which operate with the public comprising adolescents and young people and b) the OSC operating or having branches in four suburbs on the periphery of the western administrative region of the city (Felipe Camarão, Bom Pastor, Cidade Nova and Guararapes).The present report has identified the impacts of ongoing social transformation caused by the process of globalization ,by the various currently contested political projects which are as follows: the project of neoliberal globalized capitalism(hegemonic)and the project of social emancipation (contra-hegemonic),how these are seen from the local viewpoint and how they influence the profiles and operation of the cartographic organizations. The area of the OSC is a heterogenous one with political, cultural and ideological strains, characterized by its infiltration, its local/global and multicultural dimensions. As civil organizations are fundamental in the processes of transformation within society, and following the idea of social emancipation referred to by Boaventura Santos, the enquiry classified the organizations according to the afore-mentioned characteristics, establishing eight types of associations. These different types and their respective characteristics were analysed from a related perspective using the mechanisms of symbolic cartography: scale, projection and symbolisation. The theoretical references underpinning this research arise from the debate on civil society which becomes redefined as a result of the dispute involving the two afore-mentioned political projects. These demand the theoretical application of the comprehension of heterogeneity in its diversity and complexity together with the idea of social emancipation.The main authors consulted were Boaventura de Sousa Santos, Antonio Gramsci, through the texts translated by Marco Aurelio Nogueira; Carlos Nelson Coutinho and Alberto Rivera ,who supported the construction of the types of associations identified by the local reality.Finally this research enabled an understanding of the current form of social action happening in the Space of the Four Neighbourhoods (Espaço dos 4 Bairros) and how the distinct profiles analysed together with the ares of operation of the organizations define their emancipatory potencials within the following two poles: regulation/adaptation and emancipation/transformation