Estimação do índice agregado de dependência econômica

Abstract

The theory of dependence emerged in the mid-1960s to understand the underdevelopment of Latin American countries. Based on this theory, this dissertation aims to contribute to a methodological construction that allows the concrete analysis of economic situations in peripheral countries such as Latin American countries. Therefore, after rescuing the theoretical bases of dependence, such as Imperialism and Cepal, and taking the theory from its main approaches, the research presents the proposal of measuring the dependence of some countries in Latin America and the United States, in the period from 1990 to 2014. In order to achieve the proposed objective, the adopted methodology consists in the construction of an index that measures the degree of dependence of the economies of the mentioned group of countries. The results showed that Chile is the country with the highest degree of dependence, among the group of countries analyzed, followed by Colombia and Brazil. Moreover, in periods marked by the adoption of neoliberal policies, dependence on peripheral countries increased. This result suggests that neoliberal prescriptions may have deepened dependence on foreign investment in these countries. The United States index corroborates the theory of dependency, as it is a central country and has lower levels of dependence when compared to a peripheral country.