The Portuguese United Kingdom stays together.

Here's an interesting scenario, what if the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil, and the Algarves had stayed together? I think the easiest way for this to happen is if the capital stays in Rio and the government draws on Brazil's manpower reserves to build a fleet, sail across the Atlantic, and put down any potential rebellion in Portugal. You would also need a national assembly tilted more towards Brazil and less inclined to try and breakup Brazil. As time went on this would also inevitably lead to Portugal's other colonies either being elevated to Kingdom status or breaking away in the latter half of the 20th century. I think, especially if the colonies like Angola and Mozambique became kingdoms, that this could potentially turn the United Kingdom into a superpower at some point in the 20th century.
 
The changes that needed to be made for that to work could really work early on during the colonization of Brazil, IMO, and even then the butterfly effect would ensure that the result would probably be different. By the time you get to OTL you're already too late.
 
I think the Braganzas should be given credit for seeing that in the future the important realm in their empire would be Brazil, and in doing something pretty bold in moving the capital to address it. No other colonial power tried something like this. Imagine the effect of just a royal visit by a Hanoverian monarch to the American colonies, for example.

Yes, it would have been more effective if they had moved towards this policy earlier. Even better would have been doing more to see to the education of at least the Brazilian elite, so they could employ more Brazilian and fewer Portuguese administrators when the relocation happened.

There may have been some realistic options to handle the whole thing better, but I'm no expert. They could have appointed a member of the royal family to be the royal representative in Portugal, giving the Portuguese confidence that a member of the royal family was on site to represent Portuguese interests. Brazil could have been set up as a kingdom without attempting to unite other institutions, in the matter of England and Scotland under the Stuarts, or with the limited co-ordination that existed between Austria and Hungary after 1867, not that these went exactly well, these projects are difficult to pull off.

One intriguing idea is to transfer the African colonies to Brazil, to make it clear to the Portuguese that if they upset the apple-cart they would wind up losing their entire colonial empire.

Just basing the royal family in Salvador might have helped, to cut few days off of communications with Lisbon.
 

Oceano

Banned
AFAIK Brazilian Independence was a necessity not a desire. OTL most people were content with the status quo, but the Cortes Liberais upset the applecart.
 
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