ABSTRACT
Brazilian industrialization since the 1930s can be taken as an example of what is described as the Import-Substitution Strategy, widely followed in Latin America. In other respects, however, Brazil can hardly be considered typical of the region. Brazil was politically dependent upon Portugal until it became a sovereign state, then economically dependent, upon Britain and then upon the United States. Brazil became important to world history when the area was discovered and colonized by the Portuguese conquerors during the sixteenth century. At that time Portugal was a small country in decline; Brazil was a vast and varied territory sparsely populated by loosely-structured 'Indian' communities. British domination of Brazil's finances continued while the City of London remained in the ascendant, that is to say until the First World War. The First World War had contradictory effects on Brazil and there are disagreements among historians of the period as to their nature.
