Accumulation & Innovation: historical trends in a newly industrialized capitalist economy (1850-1960)

This work focuses on the experience of a Brazilian cassava starch agro-industry in developing its technological capabilities since 1917, when it was first established. Its main purpose is to explore how the process of technological progress which occurred along with that industrialization, especially regarding the starch industry, has been determined by the following variables: I) the pattern of capital accumulation, II) the capability of the related technical base to both the promotion or absorption of technological changes, and III) firms' strategies towards innovation.