Brazil

Final thoughts on Rio Olympics

Bruno Gonçalves Rosi Current Events, Liberty, Philosophy , , , , , , , , ,

Rio Olympics are over, and it seems to me, they are leaving a great impression. Despite all the problems the city and the country faced in recent years, not to mention the fact that Brazil is still a developing country, all ends well for Summer Olympics 2016.

One final comment I would like to make about the events once again relates to Brazilian athletes: Brazil scored an unprecedented 19 in the medal table (7 golds, 6 silvers and 6 bronzes), establishing a new record for itself. Among Brazilian medalists were people like Martine Grael, who won gold in Sailing, 49er FX Women. Martine is the daughter of twice Olympic gold medalist in sailing Torben Grael. Her brother Marco and uncle Lars also sailed in the Olympics. We also had people like Isaquias Queiroz dos Santos, who won Silver in Canoe Sprint, Men’s Canoe Single 1000m, Bronze in Canoe Sprint, Men’s Canoe Single 200m, and again Silver in Canoe Sprint, Men’s Canoe Double 1000m, becoming the first Brazilian athlete to ever win three medals in a single edition of the Olympic Games.

Isaquias was born in a very poor region of Brazil, and has been through great adversity before becoming an Olympic medalist: as a child he poured boiling water on himself and spent a month in hospital recovering; at the age of 5 he was kidnapped and offered up for adoption before being rescued by his mother; at the age of 10 he fell out of a tree and lost a kidney. In his teenage years he severed the top third off his left ring finger. He started training in a social project supported by Brazilian Federal government.

I am pretty sure that this picture happens with athletes and medalists from other countries: on one hand we have medalists like Martine, coming from a well-to-do environment and with a family of athletes who introduced her to the sport. On the other hand we have medalists like Isaquias, who had to face great hardships but was helped by social programs to become an Olympic athlete. Considering that, should the government create more programs to develop more people like Isaquias? Should the government prevent the privileges of people like Martine? Questions like these may sound preposterous to many, but they actually reflect much of the political discussion we have today: should the government help kids from poor families with education, healthcare and other things in order to create a head start? Should the government overtax the rich (and their heritage) in order to create more equality? In other words, what we have here is a discussion of equality versus freedom. In order to talk about that we have to understand what is equality and what is freedom.

There are many senses in which Isaquias and Martine will never be equals: they were born in different places, to different families. They had different life stories. There is a sense in which no two individuals are equal: each one of us is in each one way unique. And that makes us all special in each one way. Of course, when talking about equality most people are thinking about equality of outcome. But they forget (or ignore) that in order to have this kind of equality you need to ignore all the differences between individuals – the very same thing that makes us all unique and special – or to use government force to take from one and give to another. So, unless you are willing to ignore all the differences that make us all unique or to use force against non aggressors, you have to accept at least some income inequality as part of life. The classical liberal answer to that is that we need to be equal before the law: a great part of the liberal project in previous centuries was basically to abolish privileges (private laws) and to make all equally responsible before government. That is an equality we can all have. And we should.

The second point is freedom. Freedom from what? Or to do what? There are at least two kinds of freedom discussed in the context of the liberal revolutions in the 18th and 19th centuries. One is related to John Locke and the Founding Fathers, the other to Jean-Jacques Rousseau. In the Declaration of Independence Thomas Jefferson wrote that “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” The discussion about this phrase can go really long, but I want to emphasize simply that in Jefferson’s view you have the freedom to pursue your own understanding of happiness. I may completely disagree with what you are choosing for your life, but at the same time I am not to force you in any way to change your choices. I am not to force upon you my brand of happiness, not matter how much I am sure I have the correct one.

Rousseau’s version of freedom is very different: as he famously stated, “whoever refuses to obey the general will shall be compelled to do so by the whole of society, which means nothing more or less than that he will be forced to be free.” In other words, if you are a minority (and especially if you are an individual, the smallest minority possible) people can force upon you their brand of happiness. That is one reason why Rousseau is called “the philosopher of vanity”: he refuses to accept that people see life in a different way from his own. Rousseau’s vision of freedom is connected to his troubled relation with Christianity – where indeed you need to have a relationship with God through Jesus to become free. But the catch is that in Christianity God never forces you. Rousseau’s god is very different, and as such, Rousseaunism is just a Christian heresy.

To conclude, in order to create more income equality you have to destroy the classical liberal version of freedom – or to change to another version that inevitably leads to totalitarianism. As Milton Friedman said, “A society that puts equality — in the sense of equality of outcome — ahead of freedom will end up with neither equality nor freedom. The use of force to achieve equality will destroy freedom, and the force, introduced for good purposes, will end up in the hands of people who use it to promote their own interests.” I just hope we can have more people like Isaquias and Martine, who achieve great goals, sometimes with the help of friends and family, sometimes in completely unpredictable ways.

Still thinking about the Olympics

Bruno Gonçalves Rosi Current Events, Economics , , ,

Rio Olympics are close to the end, and so far it has been a wonderful time for Brazilian athletes: the country is scoring 15 total in the medal table, quite high in its historical record. Brazil’s first Olympic medal in 2016 was won by Felipe Wu right in the first day of competition: silver in Shooting, 10m Air Pistol Men. Wu was followed by Rafaela Lopes Silva, who won gold in Judo, Women -57 kg, and then by Mayra Aguiar, who won bronze, also in Judo, Women -78 kg. Rafael Silva won another bronze for Brazil in Judo, Men +100 kg, and then Arthur Mariano won still another bronze, this time in Gymnastics Artistic, Men’s Floor Exercise. Diego Hypolito won silver in the same competition. On the tenth day of competition Poliana Okimoto won Bronze in Marathon Swimming, Women’s 10km and Arthur Zanetti won Silver in Gymnastics Artistic, Men’s Rings. The next day, Thiago Braz da Silva surprised everyone by beating favorite French Renaud Lanillenie and winning gold in Athletics, Men’s Pole Vault.

In the last few days other athletes followed the ones mentioned in this opening paragraph, but I limit the text to them for a reason: one highlight of these first 9 Brazilian medalists is that, with the exception of Hypolito, all of them are in the military, and some of my friends on what is considered “the right” in the Brazilian political spectrum are using this information to poke (in good spirit) my friends on the left. On the other hand, my friends on the left highlight that many of the Brazilian medalists also have in common coming from very poor backgrounds, and finding in government social programs the chance to become professional athletes. I want to be careful to say that both are wrong and I want to explain why (I hope I will still have some friends after this). Basically both ignore the concept of opportunity cost.

The concept of opportunity cost postulates that spending in one direction means not spending in another. In other words, that every choice comes with the cost of forgoing the next best alternative. It was developed in all but name by 19th century French economist Frédéric Bastiat in the parable of the broken window (also known as the broken window fallacy or glazier’s fallacy) that appeared in his 1850 essay Ce qu’on voit et ce qu’on ne voit pas (That Which Is Seen and That Which Is Not Seen). The parable goes somewhat like this: a boy breaks a window. The window owner gets upset, but someone tries to comfort him by saying that this will give the window manufacturer the opportunity to work. In the end, the economy wins. Bastiat shows that this is a fallacy: the money spent in a new window could have been spent in another way, say, with new shoes. The world would have new shoes and still have a window, but now the world has a new window and no shoes. Bastiat proceeds to show the law of unintended consequences, or how our actions can affect the economy in ways that are “unseen” or ignored, and also to apply the concept to several areas of public policy. Two of these happen to be military expenditure and “Theatres, Fine Arts.”

Concerning military expenditure, Bastiat argues that spending money in order to defend the country against foreign aggressors can be a good investment, but that any money that goes beyond this necessity would have been better spent in other way. This argument goes against Bastiat’s contemporaries who argued that money spent on the military had the benefit of creating jobs, even if defense was not a real necessity. Bastiat’s conclusion is that if the money was left with the taxpayer, this person would find ways to spend that would create more and better jobs. Applying to current events, if Brazil is spending money in the military in order to protect its borders, this is a good investment. If instead it is spending money in the military in order to get Olympic medals, the money should be spent elsewhere.

Bastiat lived before modern Olympic Games, so he has nothing directly to say public spending in this kind of event, but I guess that what he says about “Theatres, Fine Arts” also applies here. Some of his contemporaries defended that the government should invest in Theatres and Fine Arts, because these things are good in themselves, created jobs, and so on. Bastiat was once more against what he saw as excessive public spending. This time his answer exposed him to the logical fallacy of the straw man, or misrepresenting one’s argument in order to make it easier to attack: his critics accused him of not caring about Theatres and Fine Arts. But if we examine the evidences carefully, that is not the case at all: to say that the government should not invest in Theatres and Fine Arts is not to say that nobody should invest in it. It is just to say who is supposed to make the investment, the government of individuals. I am not equalizing Theatres and Fine Arts with sports, but I believe the lesson applies in this field as well: to say that the government should not invest in sports is totally different from saying that nobody should invest in it.

In conclusion, it seems that public investment in the military and social programs is helping Brazil to win medals in this Olympics. But we can ask ourselves where would that money have gone had this investment not been made. Based on Bastiat, I believe that if the money spending was left for the individuals, Brazil would have better military, more Olympic medals, and less necessity of social programs, not to mention better jobs, and a better overall economy. Perhaps after this Olympic Games my friends both on the left and on the right can feel like investing more in sports. Or maybe they will realize they prefer to spend on something else.

Some thoughts on the Olympic Games and cosmopolitanism

Bruno Gonçalves Rosi Current Events, Liberty , , , , , , ,

Right now my city, Rio de Janeiro, is hosting the Summer Olympic Games. It is in many ways a great moment, and it is especially good to see people from so many parts of the world together in relative harmony. In other words, a good example of cosmopolitanism. The cosmopolitanism in the city today reminds me of the attempts of multilateralism that marked Brazilian (and world) foreign policy in previous governments, but that now seem to fade away. The two terms, cosmopolitanism and multilateralism, are not exactly synonyms, but are closely related: multilateral policies should work in bringing peoples together in a more cosmopolitan world. Concerning that, I think of a multilateralism that does not work in bringing people together through cosmopolitanism, and one that can work in that way.

When the Cold War was over, multiple theories were presented to explain what would happen to a world without the tension between two superpowers. Some suggested that the US would reign as a lone superpower; others that it would embrace some form of benign hegemony, in a New World Order. Others still believed that US power was in decline, and that the World would see more multilateralism in the 21st century. This last view was especially dear in Brazil, but as the 21st century progresses, it does not seem to hold as much water anymore.

One great example of multilateralism substituting American hegemony was the integration of Western Europe, but that does not seem to be the case anymore. It is true that beginning shortly after WWII European countries experienced growing levels of regional integration, culminating with the European Union and the Euro in the 1990s. But even then, economists warned politicians and the general public that such a level of integration was not possible, at least not without a central government in Europe. Successive economic crises, Brexit, and the harsh questioning of immigration policies show today that economists were right back then.

Another example of multilateralism celebrated in the 1990s was the growing importance of the UN. Successive humanitarian missions and interventions in several countries suggested that that UN could now surpass the dawn that marked the relationship between USA and USSR in the previous period. Optimism went so far as to discuss themes such as the ‘obligation to intervene’, substituting previous understandings of state sovereignty. But as the years go by, cases like Haiti, Rwanda, Sudan, and many others show that the optimism was at best too high.

Finally and more recently, Brazil and other underdeveloped and developing countries focused greatly on South-South Cooperation, trying to substitute the more standard paradigm of North-South Foreign Aid. This materialized in initiatives such as UNASUR and BRICS. Although presented as a new development, that was actually very reminiscent of The Non-Aligned Movement, The Group of 77, and other initiatives from the 1960s and 1970s. Now, as Brazil, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, Turkey, China, Russia, and several other countries face growing levels of economic and political hardship, attempts to “overcome American hegemony” seem but preposterous.

New forms in multilateralism in Europe, the Global South, and even the World (in the UN) did not work because they are not really democratic, as they claim to be. Behind a rhetoric of democracy, empowerment of the poor, and so on, they are just new forms of mercantilism: political elites trying to control the economy, not just at the national level, but the international one as well. The point was never to actually bring people together, but to maintain the status quo by avoiding real competition.

The multilateralism that can bring about cosmopolitanism, and that somewhat shows in the Summer Olympic Games in Rio, is one characterized by spontaneous order. People do come together: that is the natural ways of things. The desire to trade spontaneously brings different peoples closer to one another, and as they are closer they realize how much they have in common, and also what can be learnt from the differences. It is not always a peaceful dealing, but the more people are educated to tolerate the differences and to benefit from them, the more cosmopolitan they become.

A top down approach to cosmopolitanism is just a deformed clone of the real thing. Even if some results appear, they always seem to fall somewhere in the uncanny valley, and anyway, the results do not last very long. A bottom up cosmopolitanism is the real thing, and if only elites let it be, it can grow stronger, bring more wealth, and even a little more peace to the world.

Brazilian Elections 2014: Results and Problems

Lucas G. Freire Politics , ,

I’ve recently posted on the Brazilian Presidential Elections of 2014. Brazilians also voted for State Senate, National Senate and Congress and State Governor.

The top most voted candidates in the Presidential Elections make the cut to the second round (unless the top candidate dominates by a considerably wide margin).

Labour Party incumbent Dilma Rousseff was the most voted candidate with 41% of the votes. Social-Democrat Aécio Neves will challenge her in the second round – he got 34% of the votes, whereas Marina Silva of the Socialist Party was the choice of 21% of the voters.

This comes as a big surprise, since Neves and Silva were technically tied after the final poll before the elections. Because of the power that polls have to potentially influence the vote, rumours are that Aécio had been faring much better, but that the polling methodology had been compromised.

A technical issue with the electronic vote machines has been denounced by several voters in different parts of the country. Some people complained they couldn’t choose Neves as their candidate, because the machines wouldn’t allow it. A police report was issued in at least one incident related to faulty machines, which allegedly shifted votes in favour of the incumbent candidate. A simple internet search reveals stories of people who tried to set the machines on fire, among other isolated episodes.

Former footballer and US 1994 World Cup champion Romário is also making the headlines. Romário has been a Congressman for some time. He has adopted a pragmatic anti-corruption approach during his term. This time, he ran for the Senate. With more than 5 million votes, Romário is the most voted Senator in the history of the state of Rio de Janeiro.

Neves and Rousseff will have only a few weeks to carry on their campaigns and debates before the final decision.

Brazilian Elections 2014: Preview

Lucas G. Freire Current Events, Politics , ,

Tomorrow, when Brazilians vote for President, the most likely outcome is that we’ll know the names of two candidates that made the cut for the second round of elections. And the incumbent Dilma Rousseff is likely to be one of them.

The candidates

Labour Party candidate and current President Rousseff is leading the polls, but in everyday conversation she’s arguably the least popular candidate. There’s nothing fresh in her platform, and it’s safe to assume a second Rousseff term would look pretty much the same as the first term: unimpressive.

Environmentalist Marina Silva, of the Socialist Party, has surprisingly defended a centrist and pragmatic economic agenda, a slight shift to the right, if compared to Rousseff’s platform. Amongst other things, Silva would push for the autonomy of Brazil’s Central Bank, along the lines of the Fed in the US.

Aécio Neves, a Social-Democrat, has a similar centrist agenda, but clothed in small-government rhetoric – again, out of pragmatism and in pursuit of more efficiency, and not necessarily out of principle. Pundits have analysed Neves’ debate performance and he seems to come across as the most well-prepared candidate in the field.

Compulsory Democracy

We’re to expect a large turnout, due to a peculiar arrangement in Brazilian law: voting is compulsory to all citizens, residents and non-residents alike, over the age of 18, with few exceptions.

In order to vote, it’s necessary to show a voter’s ‘permit.’ If a citizen fails to turn up to vote, that permit number will have a negative record. Citizens who can’t make it in time will have a deadline to turn up in electoral court to justify why they didn’t vote. If there’s a good reason, they get a stamp and a document clearing their voters ‘record’. If the absence isn’t ‘justified,’ then a fine is due.

Votes are cast electronically. Each voter will use a cabin with a machine where a candidate number must be entered. In case the number is incorrect, it’s possible to correct the vote. In case the number hasn’t been assigned to any candidate, the vote is ‘nullified’. Citizens also have the right to a blank vote. The transparency of this system has ben questioned on several occasions, not least because of the risk of tampering with the machines.

Final Sprint

Marina Silva’s campaign was a great surprise, since her party’s nominee died in a plane crash. She quickly rose in popularity and took the second place in the polls. Critics pointed out that Silva was one of the founders of the Labour Party – President Rousseff’s party, and then defected to the Green Party and later joined the Socialist Party, where she currently is. A key objection to her campaign was the similarity between her ideological background and that of the President’s.

Speaking of background, Aécio Neves’ family story was another factor emerging in this campaign. Neves was an unlikely nominee initially, because most of his party’s base and its inner circle are concentrated in São Paulo, whereas Neves made his political career in the neighbouring state of Minas Gerais. Neves’ grandfather was the first President elected after the end of military rule in Brazil (1985), but he died tragically before being sworn in. Since then, the name Neves has been associated to the many political ironies of Brazilian history.

For a few weeks, Silva sat comfortably in the second position. However, after a series of TV debates, it became clear that President Rousseff was struggling to get her points across, and that Neves was well-prepared and well-advised. The incumbent lost some points in the polls while Neves came to a surprising rise in the final sprint, overtaking Silva in the second place.

The common outcome of Brazilian presidential elections is a smaller question mark – from a pool of five or more candidates, the top most voted are generally selected for a second round, to take place a few weeks later. This is likely to happen again, but it’s hard to predict who will get the ticket to challenge Rousseff.

Around the Web

Brandon Christensen Current Events, Links , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
  1. The first Gulf War in 1991 was the US’s opening Iraqi mistake
  2. The art history of an unknown Korea
  3. Damon Root sums up Obama’s disappointing year with the Supreme Court
  4. Brazil: Cinema’s most radical battleground
  5. How to have law without legislation
  6. If Scotland Goes: First the empire disappeared. Now Britain itself could crumble. Scottish independence would have global implications

Around the Web

Brandon Christensen Current Events, Links , , , , , , , , ,
  1. An excellent piece by Matt Steinglass in the Economist on John Kerry’s failure in regards to the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
  2. I know Dr Shikida linked to this earlier, but I think it’s worth highlighting again. A university professor at a law school in Brazil was recently assaulted by students for his political views, and Dr Shikida points out that today’s professor-assaulters are tomorrow’s journalist-killers. Disturbing, and in Portuguese.
  3. In response to Dr van de Haar’s explosive and much-welcomed introductory post on the myth of the Commercial Peace, here is a good introductory pdf by MIT’s PR Goldstone on the strengths and weaknesses of the theory.
  4. E Wayne Merry: Why is Moscow now pursuing an economic Eurasian Union? In brief, the Russian derzhava is turning inward on itself, in part for domestic reasons but more broadly because of its inability to compete (on different indices) with the European West, the Chinese East, or the Islamic South.
  5. John Allen Gay: Kirchick: “The Putin regime can tell Ukrainians, ‘you wanna protect Orthodox Christianity, you stay with Moscow.’ And he’s using this all throughout the former Soviet space. So this is a geostrategic issue for him.” Would Western pressure for gay rights in Russia improve their lot, or just turn domestic gays into traitors? I’m pretty sure I know the answer to this one…
  6. How many people does it take to colonize another star system?

A very illuminating comment over on Reddit.com

Adam Magoon Current Events, Liberty , , , , , , , ,

User “Three_Letter_Agency” put the current NSA issue in very clear focus today with the following:

We know the NSA and their UK buddy GHCQ can:

  • Collect the domestic meta-data of both parties in a phone-call. Source[1]
  • Set up fake internet cafes to steal data. Source[2]
  • Has intercepted the phone calls of at least 35 world leaders, including allies such as German Chancellor Angela Merkel. Source[3]
  • Can tap into the underwater fiber-optic cables that carry a majority of the world’s internet traffic. Source[4]
  • Tracks communications within media institutions such as Al Jazeera. Source[5]
  • Has ‘bugged’ the United Nations headquarters. Source[6]
  • Has set up a financial database to track international banking and credit card transactions. Source[7]
  • Collects and stores over 200 million domestic and foreign text messages each day. Source[8]
  • Collects and has real-time access to browsing history, email, and social media activity. To gain access, an analyst simply needs to fill out an on-screen form with a broad justification for the search that is not reviewed by any court or NSA personnel. Source[9]

“I, sitting at my desk, could wiretap anyone, from you or your accountant, to a federal judge or even the president, if I had a personal email”. – Edward Snowden

  • Creates maps of the social networks of United States citizens. Source[10]
  • Has access to smartphone app data. Source[11]
  • Uses spies in embassies to collect data, often by setting up ‘listening stations’ on the roofs of buildings.Source[12]
  • Uses fake LinkedIn profiles and other doctored web pages to secretly install surveillance software in unwitting companies and individuals. Source[13]
  • Tracks reservations at upscale hotels. Source[14]
  • Has intercepted the talking-points of world leaders before meetings with Barack Obama. Source[15]
  • Can crack encryption codes on cellphones. Source[16]
  • Has implanted software on over 100,000 computers worldwide allowing them to hack data without internet connection, using radio waves. Source[17]
  • Has access to computers through fake wireless connections. Source[18]
  • Monitors communications in online games such as World of Warcraft. Source[19]
  • Intercepts shipping deliveries and install back-door devices allowing access. Source[20]
  • Has direct access to the data centers of Google, Yahoo and other major companies. Source[21]
  • Covertly and overtly infiltrate United States and foreign IT industries to weaken or gain access to encryption, often by collaborating with software companies and internet service providers themselves. They are also, according to an internal document, “responsible for identifying, recruiting and running covert agents in the global telecommunications industry.” Source[22]
  • The use of “honey traps”, luring targets into compromising positions using sex. Source[23]
  • The sharing of raw intelligence data with Israel. Only official U.S. communications are affected, and there are no legal limits on the use of the data from Israel. Source[24]
  • Spies on porn habits of activists to discredit them. Source[25]

Possibly the most shocking revelation was made on February 24, 2014. Internal documents show that the security state is attempting to manipulate and control online discourse with “extreme tactics of deception and reputation-destruction.” The documents revealed a top-secret unit known as the Joint Threat Research Intelligence Unit, or JTRIG. Two of the core self-identified purposes of JTRIG are to inject all sorts of false material onto the internet in an effort to discredit a target, and to use social sciences such as psychology to manipulate online discourse and activism in order to generate a desirable outcome. The unit posts false information on the internet and falsely attributes it to someone else, pretend to be a ‘victim’ of a target they want to discredit, and posts negative information on various forums. In some instances, to discredit a target, JTRIG sends out ‘false flag’ emails to family and friends.

A revealing slide from the JTRIG presentation.[26]  

Read the whole JTRIG presentation by Greenwald, just do it. Here[27]

Now, consider the words of former NSA employee turned whistleblower Russ Tice:

“Okay. They went after–and I know this because I had my hands literally on the paperwork for these sort of things–they went after high-ranking military officers; they went after members of Congress, both Senate and the House, especially on the intelligence committees and on the armed services committees and some of the–and judicial.

But they went after other ones, too. They went after lawyers and law firms. All kinds of–heaps of lawyers and law firms. They went after judges. One of the judges is now sitting on the Supreme Court that I had his wiretap information in my hand. Two are former FISA court judges. They went after State Department officials.

They went after people in the executive service that were part of the White House–their own people. They went after antiwar groups. They went after U.S. international–U.S. companies that that do international business, you know, business around the world. They went after U.S. banking firms and financial firms that do international business. They went after NGOs that–like the Red Cross, people like that that go overseas and do humanitarian work. They went after a few antiwar civil rights groups.

So, you know, don’t tell me that there’s no abuse, because I’ve had this stuff in my hand and looked at it. And in some cases, I literally was involved in the technology that was going after this stuff. And you know, when I said to [former MSNBC show host Keith] Olbermann, I said, my particular thing is high tech and you know, what’s going on is the other thing, which is the dragnet. The dragnet is what Mark Klein is talking about, the terrestrial dragnet. Well my specialty is outer space. I deal with satellites, and everything that goes in and out of space. I did my spying via space. So that’s how I found out about this… And remember we talked about that before, that I was worried that the intelligence community now has sway over what is going on.

Now here’s the big one. I haven’t given you any names. This was is summer of 2004. One of the papers that I held in my hand was to wiretap a bunch of numbers associated with, with a 40-something-year-old wannabe senator from Illinois. You wouldn’t happen to know where that guy lives right now, would you? It’s a big white house in Washington, DC. That’s who they went after. And that’s the president of the United States now.” Russ Tice, NSA Whistleblower

Chilling.

Pesos, medidas e as instituições

Claudio Shikida Books, Economics , , , , , , , , , , ,

Douglas Allen, em seu ótimo, The Institutional Revolution, defende a tese de que uma revolução institucional teria precedido a famosa revolução industrial. Texto importante, é que, para mim, já é candidato a livro-texto básico de qualquer bom curso de História Econômica.

Como sempre, senti falta de alguma coisa mais, digamos, tropical, no livro. Bom, mas como é que vou cobrar isto de um livro que não se propõe a contar a história das instituições em Portugal? Não posso. Isto é mais uma deixa para os pesquisadores brasileiros. Dica de amigo, quem sabe, para alguém que deseje fazer uma dissertação de mestrado sobre o tema.

Mas eu sou uma pessoa perigosamente curiosa. Fiquei intrigado com a questão dos pesos e medidas. No argumento do autor, a questão dos pesos e medidas, ou melhor, a questão da padronização de pesos e medidas, está diretamente relacionada com a mensuração de produtos, o que gera uma importante alteração nos custos de se trocar mercadorias (ou seja, nos custos de transação). Afinal, nada mais óbvio do que achar mais interessante comprar um quilo de abacate sem levar para casa meio quilo do mesmo.

No caso do Brasil colonial, então, pensei, deveria ser como em Portugal. Para checar isto, consultei este documento. Vejamos alguns trechos:

No que se refere às unidades de medidas adotadas ao longo do período colonial, o quadro não difere, como é natural, daquele oferecido por Portugal. A vara, a canada e o almude constituíam as medidas de uso mais comum, ainda que seu valor pudesse variar de região para região. Os produtos importados traziam consigo suas próprias medidas e, quanto mais geograficamente restrita uma atividade econômica, mais específico era o sistema de medidas utilizado. (…)

Vale dizer: nada muito diferente do restante da Europa.

Assim, a primeira menção expressa à atividade metrológica, em documentos coloniais, refere-se precisamente à fiscalização do funcionamento de mercados locais. Como em Portugal, o funcionário colonial mais diretamente envolvido com a fiscalização de pesos e medidas era o almotacé, mencionado pelas Ordenações Manuelinas e Filipinas e previsto pela organização do município de São Vicente, em 1532. Em número de dois, eleitos mensalmente pela Câmara Municipal, os almotacés tinham como atribuição básica manter o bom funcionamento dos mercados e do abastecimento de gêneros, além de fiscalizar obras e manter a limpeza da cidade. Como parte de suas responsabilidades, deveriam verificar mensalmente, com o escrivão da almotaçaria, os pesos e as medidas. Tal disposição estimulava, dada a dispersão e a diversidade dos municípios, a multiplicação dos padrões de medidas.

Veja só a importância do ofício. Alguém imaginaria que carregar uma régua ou uma fita métrica, hoje em dia, seria uma profissão digna de tanta importância? Bem, numa época em que o governo descobre que medir ajuda a maximizar sua receita, nada mais natural, não? Até eleição para o cargo havia.

No caso dos gêneros estancados ou submetidos a controles mais rígidos, a Coroa cuidava da melhor organização das atividades metrológicas. O estabelecimento do monopólio do tabaco, por exemplo, levou à criação, em 1702, do Juiz da Balança do Tabaco, nas alfândegas de Salvador e Recife. No caso das minas, o regimento do Intendente do Ouro, de 26 de setembro de 1735, mencionava expressamente sua obrigação de manter as balanças e marcos da Intendência aferidos, pesando o ouro corretamente, sem prejuízo das partes nem da Fazenda Real, atribuição expressamente mantida no regimento de 1751.

Como se percebe, a questão institucional é indissociável da questão econômica. Veja aí o depoimento do próprio autor: tem monopólio? Quem é o “dono” do monopólio? A Coroa. Reza o dito popular – e a teoria econômica – que “o olho do dono engorda o cavalo” – e não é diferente neste caso.

Pois bem, falta-nos – alô, colegas de História Econômica! – um estudo mais detalhado do papel dos almotacés (ou me falta mais pesquisa e leitura, vai saber…), não falta? Vou procurar meu exemplar de Fiscais e Meirinhos para rejuvenescer, digamos assim, meu interesse pelo tema.

Novamente, percebemos que a História Econômica não precisa nos dar sono.

“Could we build a bridge between Austrian Economics and New Institutional Economics? – A Pre-History of Soft Budget Constraint”

Brandon Christensen Economics , , , ,

This is the title of a paper by Claudio Shikida. Here’s the abstract:

The concept of soft budget constraint is recent in economic analysis. It has become increasingly important in economic theory, for its role as a system of incentives. However, soft budget constraint plays also an important role in the history of economic thought, where it can be traced back until Mises’s writings on economic calculation and property rights, both derived from the debate of the economic calculation in socialist regimes. In this sense, soft budget constraint can be viewed as a bridge between Austrian Economics and New Institutional Economics. Since Mises, like other Austrian economists, is virtually ignored in Brazilian courses of Economic Thought, this article intends to show his importance as a forerunner of the concept of soft budget constraint, and will try to link these two theoretical views of economic systems.

You can read the whole thing here. Any thoughts?