I found this timeline where Brazil is wealthier, and the historian said that slave owning elites try to prevent industry to prevent the rise of a capitalist based elite. but why not start industry (after slavery is abolished) and become the new capitalist elite? Also he says that Brazil wouldn't have been a major geo-political player in the 20th century because of it's population. but in this timeline Brazil industrializes earlier, which would mean it would have had the agricultural revolution earlier, which would mean it's population would be much bigger by 1914
A wealthier brazil
- Thread starter MayBeCryptid
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chestanewmitz
Banned
Why risk when profits are guaranteed already? Keep in mind that the number of voters decreased when the empire ended and the republic started, because the criteria to be able to vote went from income to literacy. These landowners are brutish petty warlords, no time to understand the intrincacies of macroeconomics when they're busy losing their money in gambling and whoring, or oppressing the poor folk around them.
I'm not so well-informed on Brazilian history, but isn't that basically what happened? The most powerful agricultural elites monopolized power often to the detriment of their own country and potential wealth and when Brazil did begin industrializing the elites continued to monopolize the wealth and hamper the government.
Exactly, the landowning elite basically remained the most powerful one even with industrialization. A good POD to reduce or even end this is successful land reform in Brazil, you could have slavery ending earlier too. For example, the Lei Feijó would reduce the slave trade and later end it but it was never implemented or enforced. The Land Law of 1855 solidified the power of the landowning elite for another example of something that you could change. Even no land law would help.
Maybe Brazil gains independence as a Republic, or Pedro I isn't a jackass, or a funny idea would be if Empress Leopoldina took charge instead of him; independent of the reason, Brazil could be more stable in the 1830s and 1840s, do a better job at cracking down on the slave trade and abolish slavery by the 1850s.
I think even a continuation of OTL's Empire might do that. But yea land reform is sorely needed.
One way this happens is with Dom Pedro II resisting the coup attempt, and after dealing with the traitors, he makes a huge agrarian reinforcement to end once and for all the power of the large agricultural elites. This will allow him to confiscate the traitors' money and pay the life initiation (it was an idea to give each ex-slave family a piece of land and money for them to start a new life). Couple this with the probable execution of the positivist military (republicans that believed that the best form of republic was one led by a military dictator) and the country has a great chance of becoming a new country.
Or if the assassination attempt against Pedro II succeds which greatly weakens the republican movement and guarantees Isabel will become Empress without as much opposition as expected
chestanewmitz
Banned
They won't ever do that, their business model depends on the slave trade, ''turnover rates'' are very high, to say the least. (Fuck that feels dirty to say)
And the forces driving abolitionism (the brits) are only forcing the issue in brazil to try and get access to the amazon and plate basins, and the famed passage between them.
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Yes, this will likely cause serious reprisals against important Republican parties and figures. Maybe killing the idealogy for decades.
chestanewmitz
Banned
Riots and lynchings, definitely.
The poor in most of brazil most definitely have ancien regime mentalities by now.
I REALLY doubt it, the Empire was really not that much better. My main critic of the Republic is how little it broke off from the Empire if anything. The Empire overall would probably have a better 1890s purelly due to avoiding Floriano, the Federalist revolution and the Encilhamentos, but structurally/long term i don't think enough would change.
My idea revolves around Brazil being more stable, so that the OTL efforts of reducing the slave trade are actually worth anything yknow? Maybe with the right person at the right time - idk butterflies, my mind goes to "Under the Southern Cross" - we could see an energetic abolitionist campaign, even then i feel like at best it could speed up abolition by 10 to 20 years, spitballing.
It depends on how the next 30 years go, honestly. I have always maintained that Brazil if it kept the monarchy would have a similar 20th century to Greece, Italy, or Portugal, and but come out on the other end of the 20th century probably developed more than OTL simply because of institutional continuity and stability which might help economic development.
Really it depends on how the 20th century goes, because I think if the Empire survives past 1889, I think by 1920-1930 Brazil will be much better than OTL with less chaos and corruption, and more international recognition and stable government. But shit could still hit the fan if the 20th century sucks, but it would be less likely to suck ITTL.
chestanewmitz
Banned
I'd love to see that!
As i said in another thread,we could see the brotherhoods of the mercês and rosário dos pretos acting as nodes for the movement, but the upper middle class anglicized folks need to get over their own prejudices for that to happen.
But 20 years earlier? The elites depend on slavery way too much for that to happen with no popular revolt.
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No, the empire is not the perfect government or anything like that. But it was less corrupt and far more stable. The republic was in chaos especially due to its leadership which was made up of agrarian elites with little economic knowledge outside of agricultural production. Republicans always wanted Brazil to be something other than Brazil, so they kept imitating American, French and other countries' practices without thinking about the country's contest. This caused the country's biggest economic crisis up to that point. The crisis was caused by the use of an economic tactic based on the North American banking system, Rui Barbosa (minister of economics of the republic) established a monetary policy focused on the free issuance of monetary credits, which did not work out.
The implantation of the Republic in Brazil on November 15, 1889 was not popular, as it was not the result of a revolutionary process with the active participation of the population, nor did it expand political representation in the country. It was the time when Brazil was governed exclusively by the military and, therefore, had a centralizing and authoritarian character. In addition to expelling the royal family from Brazil, the Provisional Government removed the then “presidents” of the provinces (which came to be called states) from their positions. Several representatives of the last monarchical government were arrested because there was fear of a resumption of the monarchy with the help of the Navy and politicians who occupied prominent positions during the Brazilian Empire. Even the army was divided. That's not counting two giant armed uprisings.
The only positive that I think the republic had was the separation between Church and State and the naturalization of all foreigners who lived here.
chestanewmitz
Banned
These were the elites since the colonial times, up until today. The same agrarian elites that were senators, representatives, judges or high ranking civil servants in the empire. That idea that the empire was less corrupt is a dream made up by monarchists and got famous for reasons that will fall into current politics. the people that ran the show were the same before and after the empire.
Also, the idea of whitening brazil started well before the republic, José Bonifácio said that in the comstitutional assembly of 1822, to think that there was any nativist streak in the monarchy is ridiculous, they were hapsburgs for christ's sake.
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The proclamation was a coup d'état by a slave-owning minority allied with large landowners, the military, and segments of the Church. With Marechal Deodoro da Fonseca being deceived by his own wife, circumventing medical recommendations and getting out of bed - where he had spent the early hours of that feverish November 15th - to proclaim the Brazilian Republic. At the time, the military complained about the pay, frozen for years, the reduction in staff after the war and the lack of modernization of equipment, among other issues. It was too much for a class that saw itself as the savior of the country. In 1889, the republicans convinced Deodoro that the then President of the Council of Ministers of Pedro II, the Viscount of Ouro Preto, had issued an arrest warrant against him. It wasn't true, but it was enough for Deodoro to gather a small battalion and march through Rio de Janeiro demanding the deposition of the entire ministry. Deodoro, then, learned that the new Chief Minister would be Gaspar Silveira Martins, his foe – the two had fought over the love of the same woman in their youth, and became rivals for the rest of their lives. The fact is that this led Deodoro, who until then had not seen Brazil without a monarchy, to overthrow Pedro II and institute a provisional government. The Republic was proclaimed. Thanks to a romantic rivalry.
the monarchy as well as the republic can be corrupt or not. After all, they are forms of government. The first reign was corrupt as well as the first republic. The weakening of the monarchical regime was due to several factors in that period. Dom Pedro II was at odds with the Catholic Church and the military. The Emperor also did not have the support of the agrarian elite, who wanted more members in political power. In addition, there was a broad strengthening of the republican movement in the cities of the Southeast, which caused great pressure for profound changes to occur in our country.
Saying that the empire at its end had the same corruption as the first republic seems to me more like a way to equate all governments as a way to hide the fact of how mediocre the first republic was. With several members of the movement regretting the coup. While I am not a monarquist, the empire had become far superior to the first republic.
Right and where did I say that the whitening of the nation is something done exclusively by the republic?
Whitening is something that really starts to have strength in 1870, when there is a big discussion about how to modernize the country. Transforming it into a white country was one of the factors considered important. With one of the biggest supporters being the doctor João Batista de Lacerda,