Dois ensaios sobre progresso técnico e meio ambiente

Abstract

This dissertation presents two essays on the relationship between technical change and the natural environment. In the first essay, we discuss the view of technical progress to four representatives of Classical Political Economy: William Petty, Adam Smith, David Ricardo and Karl Marx. This essay analyzes the form they approach the technical progress, characterized by the increasing adoption of machinery in the production process, adding up the view of each author regarding land and natural resources in the growth of nations. While the technical progress concept evolves from the first to the last author, nature’s view is distinct. Petty and Marx define the natural environment as a part of a natural law and as a part of human essence, respectively. Smith and Ricardo reduce natural environment to an input, making it the main economic growth limiter for the latter. In the second essay, we analyze the technical progress and the production of good and bad outputs in Brazilian economy in the 1970-2008 period. We adopt a study system of production and technical progress based on a classical-Marxian perspective, in which the work, capital and energy input combination generates a good output, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), and a bad output, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. We divide Brazilian economic growth in four phases, according to the development strategy adopted in each period: 1970-1980, 1980-1989, 1989-2003 and 2003-2008. The predominant pattern of technical progress was Marx-biased and energy-saving. In GDP growth years, the bad output also increased.