The Implementation of the Consensus: Itamaraty, the Ministry of Economics and Brazilian Liberalization

This article concerns the Brazilian trade policy during the governments of Jose Sarney (1985-1990), Fernando Collor de Mello (1990-1992) and Itamar Franco (1992-1994), studying how, throughout this period, Brazil stopped trying to derogate the GATT principles of progressive liberalization and nondiscrimination and began to incorporate them in the elaboration of the trade policy under the responsibility of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the government's ministries of economy. I seek to explain the convergence of policies between those distinct State bureaucracies through the gradual occupation of the decisory instances by groups with convergent conceptions of the foreign trade functionality on the promotion of economic development, which contributed to the evolution of the Brazilian stance at GATT Uruguay Round and to the reform of the imports regime. To support this hypothesis, I have tried to verify the relationship between the evolution of the economic thought of groups responsible for the formulation of the commercial policy and the redefinition of policies in this area. Adapted from the source document.