From Periphery to Core? Mapping a History of Post-Keynesian Economics in Brazil

Abstract

ABSTRACT Brazil is known for its openness towards heterodoxy in economics. The country has a tradition of fostering the dissemination of structuralism and Marxism since the 1950s, as well as other heterodox approaches since the late 1980s, including post-Keynesianism. Nonetheless, much of Brazil's post-Keynesian intellectual history is yet to be formalised. This article maps the genealogy and social organisation of post-Keynesianism in Brazil through a mixed-methods study. We explore how post-Keynesian economics has been referred to in the history of economics literature, as well as offering a mapping exercise to understand how post-Keynesian economists have organised themselves in economics departments in Brazil, and through publishing in leading post-Keynesian international outlets. First, we address an intellectual genealogy of post-Keynesians in Brazil via CV analysis. Second, we provide a bibliometric analysis of co-citation networks through articles written by Brazilian researchers published in post-Keynesian journals to capture emerging themes and citation patterns. Our conclusions point to: (1) the importance of academic genealogies and postgraduate supervision in creating a local inbreeding of post-Keynesians in several Brazilian economics departments; and (2) how the Brazilian post-Keynesian community builds and expands its theoretical framework in heterogeneous ways, notably in themes related to development and dependency.