ABSTRACT
The 1990s was the decade of neoliberalism in Brazil. Public sectors once
considered strategic were privatized, social programs were cut back or
withdrawn, trade regulations were slashed, and the economy was opened to
foreign investment and imports. These policies, euphemistically referred to
as international ‘‘market integration’’ (Cardoso 1995, 1999; see also Ali-
monda 2000), were defended within Brazil and without as necessary to
counteract the massive public debt that had accumulated during previous
decades of rapid state-led growth (Bresser Pereira 1996; de Onis 2000; Goertzel 1999).
