Toward an economic history of Brazil's commodity chains

This introductory chapter revisits the ideas of Immanuel Wallerstein and Terence K. Hopkins regarding historical capitalism and commodity chain analyses, which serve as the theoretical and methodological foundations that the authors of the book’s 11 chapters engage with, either directly or indirectly. It not only summarizes the book’s structure but also provides a concise chronological overview of the economic history of the commodities examined, emphasizing the environmental factors inherent to their production. We aim to highlight how the Brazilian commodity chains of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries showcase some elements of the expansion of the capitalist world economy that Wallerstein did not initially consider, as well as cases related to the commodity frontier, as discussed in environmental history literature. Lastly, we argue that the interpretative framework of center and periphery can include elements of the economic actors’ agency that were involved in the production and commercialization of commodities.