Elephant limps, but jaguar stumbles: Unpacking the divergence of state capitalism in Brazil and India through theories of capitalist diversity

Abstract

While growth in India stayed relatively stable over the last decade, Brazil fell into deep recession and a fundamental political and economic crisis. Why did these two countries, despite their similarities, diverge so massively within only 10 years? Through a paired comparison, this article probes two alternative approaches to capitalist diversity to explain the divergence among two rising economic powers and ‘state capitalisms’. It finds that through the lens of a firm-centred supply-side approach, one largely sees institutional stability in both economies, while a focus on the demand side and respective growth models makes visible fundamental destabilization in Brazil. The fragility of domestic demand, the vulnerability of global economic integration and the erosion of key social coalitions, we contend, are key to unpack the divergence between Brazil and India. This study thereby not only sheds a new light on emerging market capitalism but also discusses further possibilities for the analysis of state capitalism within comparative political economy.

Global Capitalism and the Underdevelopment of African Political Economy: Where Will Our Help Come From?

“…Rather, each nation state indigenously fights its way out through genuine nation building based on local content production, consumption, savings, investment, exchange, technological, human capital development and scientific inventions, to grow and sustain their local economy, domestic and foreign policies that provide level playing field for all and sundry. Alami and Dixon (2019), Andrea, Christian and Daniel (2021) reaffirmed that state capitalism through the formation and development of strong state owned enterprises is beginning to provide leeway upon which countries navigate the economic hegemony of global capitalism, especially through alignment with indigenous firms (Alvin 2021). So the solution is local, not from abroad (Europe and America).…”

In search of developmental capitalism institutions:

“…A spate of pioneering research has made efforts at employing the growth model perspective to explain recent patterns of growth in emerging countries (Nölke et al, 2021;Schedelik et al, 2020). This paper, however, aims to explore the suitability of the growth model perspective to explain long term sustained growth and development.…”