ABSTRACT

This entry discusses the thought of the Brazilian social scientist and political activist Ruy Mauro Marini. Marini was an organic intellectual of the Latin American left between the 1960s and the 1990s. From the political standpoint, he participated in and led different revolutionary groups, especially in Brazil and Chile. These activities – during a time of spreading military coups and violent right-wing dictatorships in Latin America – led him to successive exiles. From the theoretical standpoint, he was a pioneer in the so-called (Marxist) dependency theory. His contributions sought to identify specificities of dependent capitalism, by articulating different categories such as international value transfers (unequal exchange), super-exploitation of labor and subimperialism.