QUANDO A ESTRUTURA PRODUTIVA LIMITA O DESENVOLVIMENTO

Fabricio Jose Missio
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Fabricio Jose Missio: Cedeplar/UFMG

No 694, Textos para Discussão Cedeplar-UFMG from Cedeplar, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais

Abstract: Why do some countries experience sustained economic growth and remain distant from the technological frontier? This article argues that underdevelopment should not be understood simply as historical backwardness or insufficient growth, but rather as the outcome of a specialized, heterogeneous productive structure dependent on external technological progress. Drawing on the Latin American structuralist tradition, the paper shows how the uneven diffusion of technology in the international system conditions distinct patterns of productive insertion. In peripheral economies, industrialization may occur in an incomplete form, preserving external dynamic centers and limiting the domestic generation of innovation. The central argument is that when the productive base does not undergo deep and articulated transformation, economic growth tends to reproduce external vulnerability, internal heterogeneity, and limited technological convergence.

Keywords: Structural change; Productive structure; Underdevelopment; Incomplete industrialization; Centre–periphery (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F63 O11 O14 O33 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 21 pages
Date: 2026-03
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