CORRALES, Javier

Os Estados de reformas defasadas e a questão da desvalorização : a reação da venezuela aos choques exógenos de 1997-98 - São Paulo : Editora 34, jul./set. 2001

Having just completed its second consecutive "lost decade", the Venezuela case confirms that there are no short cuts to sound political economic management in the era of high capital mobility and securitized capital flows. The maintenance of a muddling-through exchange rate strategy has triunphed, at least for the time being, and enabled an elite executive-level coalition to prevail in pursuing a less than optimal macroeconomic policy. The author argues that Venezuela has avoided a full-blown Mexican or Brazilian-style devaluation by virtue of the Central Bank's ability to effectively manage the exchange rate. However, this has been the only pocket of modernization, as policymakers throughout the rest of the state bureaucracy have rejected the kinds of market reforms that will be necessary to reverse the coutry's highly mediocre perormance. While high oil prices since 1999 have afforded politicians and policymakers the "luxury" of being a reform laggard, Venezuelan leaders seem determined to learn the hard way that international trends could again swing against them on a moment's notice