Brazilian Miracle

James Petras argues the short-lived economic miracle in Brazil was based on: a) violent illegitimate seizure of political power by the military; b) the institutionalization of violence through an extensive and intensive system of military-police controls throughout civil society; c) the systematic use of terror to contain popular discontent, to disarticulate mass organizations and to destroy guerrilla resistance; d) the elaboration of the National Security ideology to justify the State's "permanent state of war" against autonomous class or nationalist movements.

According to Elio Gaspari, in his book A Ditadura Escancarada: "The Brazilian Miracle and the Years of Lead occurred simultaneously.

After the 1964 coup d'état, the Brazilian military was more concerned with political control and left economic policy to a group of entrusted technocrats, led by Delfim Netto.

Steel mills, petrochemical factories, hydroelectric power plants, and nuclear reactors were built by the large state-owned companies Eletrobras and Petrobras.

However, the 1973 oil crisis made the military government increasingly borrow from international lenders, and the debt became unmanageable.