Recent industrial policy in Argentina, Brazil and Mexico: a comparative approach

JUAN EDUARDO SANTARCANGELO; FERNANDO PORTA; DANIEL SCHTEINGART

Bandung

Conferencia; 14th Globelics International Conference; 2016

Globelics

Latin America has experienced a significant transformation in recent years. Despite some of the countries had major economic and social crisis at the end of the twentieth century, between 2003 and 2008 the region has experienced its most remarkable expansionary period since the 1970s (Abeles et. al. 2013). This path to a large extent was possible due to high commodity prices and extraordinary international financing conditions. Although this process was not homogeneous, in recent years a reversal of some international trends and the lower efficiency or lack of appropriate economic policies have recently caused slowing growth processes (and in some cases even stagnation). Industrial policy combined traditional instruments to promote investment with other tools directed towards fostering innovation and technological modernization. At the same time, still using instruments and horizontal programs, in many countries there was a greater emphasis on the implementation of targeted and selective policies and to articulate the various instruments into a more general framework of productive development planning. Thus, in some countries predominant IPs of recent years has tended to differ from the definitions that prevailed during the 1990s.The aim of this paper is to analyse the evolution of recent industrial policies (IPs) and their outcomes in three Latin American countries: Argentina, Brazil and Mexico. To do this, we will focus on the objectives and tools of IPs since 2003, their differences vis-a-vis those followed in the 1990s, and their changes throughout the period 2003-2015. We will also study the similarities and differences in national approaches depending on the macroeconomic cycles and the dynamic of the balance of payments and the specialization profiles.