The Social and Economic Integration of Portuguese Immigrants in Brazil in the Late Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries

Abstract

Like most of the peripheral countries of Europe in the nineteenth century, Portugal experienced population growth, agricultural expansion and even serious industrial development. By mid-century, in fact, it compared reasonably well in basic economic indices with most comparable late industrialising European countries. Although Portugal continued to develop in the second half of the century, its economy did not grow as rapidly as the rest of Europe and by the end of the century it had fallen seriously behind, becoming one of the poorest societies on the continent. This relative backwardness had several causes. Severe problems of land distribution affected the ability of national agriculture to modernise rapidly, especially in the densely populated north where minifundia land holdings predominated. Portugal's important wine industry was modernised but in only one sector and this sector could not expand its international markets.