Dados is one of the most widely-read social sciences journals in Latin America. Created in 1966, it publishes innovative works, originating from academic research, by Brazilian and foreign authors. Edited by IESP-UERJ, it aims to reconcile scientific rigor and academic excellence with an emphasis on public debate based on the analysis of substantive issues of society and politics.
Dados vol. 46 n. 2 Rio de Janeiro 2003
Abstract
Raymundo Faoro, deceased in 2003, was one of the pioneers in the use of Max Weber's sociology for interpreting the formation of the Brazilian political system. In Os Donos do Poder (The Owners of Power), first published in 1958, Faoro launched the thesis that ever since its colonial period Brazil has always been dominated by a ''bureaucratic stratum'' with its origins in the peculiar characteristics of the Portuguese state, thus contradicting the previously dominant view that Brazil had experienced a feudal past dominated by traditional rural power. He thus opened the way for the Brazilian political system to be studied and interpreted in terms of its own political and institutional variables and no longer merely in terms of class interests and conflicts. However, according to Faoro, this domination by the bureaucratic stratum was a perennial, immutable characteristic of Brazil, a view that ended up limiting his analyses, even as he became an activist against all forms of Brazilian authoritarianism.
Keywords: Raymundo Faoro, bureaucratic stratum, Os Donos do Poder
DOI: 10.1590/S0011-52582003000200001
The current relevance of Raymundo Faoro's work
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