This book argues that Latin America has a distinctive, enduring form of hierarchical capitalism characterized by multinational corporations, diversified business groups, low skills, and segmented labor markets. Over time, institutional complementarities knit features of corporate governance and labor markets together and thus contributed to institutional resiliency. Political systems generally favored elites and insiders who further reinforced existing institutions and complementarities. Hierarchical capitalism has not promoted rising productivity, good jobs, or equitable development, and the efficacy of development strategies to promote these outcomes depends on tackling negative institutional complementarities. This book is intended to open a new debate on the nature of capitalism in Latin America and link that discussion to related research on comparative capitalism in other parts of the world.
Ben Ross Schneider is Ford International Professor of Political Science at MIT. He taught previously at Princeton University and Northwestern University. Schneider's teaching and research interests fall within the fields of comparative politics, political economy and Latin American politics. His books include Politics within the State: Elite Bureaucrats and Industrial Policy in Authoritarian Brazil (1991), Business and the State in Developing Countries (1997), Reinventing Leviathan: The Politics of Administrative Reform in Developing Countries (2003) and Business Politics and the State in Twentieth-Century Latin America (Cambridge, 2004).