The Industrialists, the State, and the Issues of Worker Training and Social Services in Brazil, 1930-50
U T NTIL recently, most historians and social scientists writing about twentieth-century Brazil have attributed programs for social r eform and concomitant social control to the state, particularly the regime that came to power with the "revolution of 1930" under the leadership of Getulio Vargas. The corporatist vision of Vargas and his closest advisors has been credited with producing the social reforms (in the form of legislation) and mechanisms for labor control (in the form of government-sponsored unions) that laid the groundwork for rapid industrialization with minimal social disruption. Though many students of the Vargas period characterize these reforms as ultimately benefiting the employers, not the workers, according to most historical accounts the industrialists themselves played either a peripheral or retrogressive role in the process. Lacking a more sophisticated or forward-looking project for reform and control, the industrialists allegedly clung to the notion that "the social question is a question for the police," and bitterly opposed the labor reforms instituted by the Vargas regime.' There is both historical evidence and a variety of theoretical positions that encourage this interpretation of the industrialists' role (or the lack thereof), especially with regard to those manufacturers based in Brazil's