North–South: Poland and Brazil in Turmoil

Brazil and Poland are the countries presented as having best sailed through the 2008 global crisis. Clearly anti-cyclical policies work: instead of austerity measures, both countries maintained strong public investment, decentralized social policies and vigorous access to credit. More recently, however, our countries are facing the strong winds of financial globalization, with growing restrictions to the capacity of maintaining national economic policies. Comparing two very different countries is certainly challenging, but it does shed light on how the present global economic background affects us all. More recently, the economic and social progress in both countries has been suffering political disruption, particularly in Brazil, and we are suffering similar ideological cleavage with deep social divide also found in other countries. The present paper aims at shedding some light on this strange interaction of sound policies, global interests and disruptive politics.