Development and Import Substitution Industrialization: The Consumer Automotive Market in South America, 1950s–70s

This presentation provides a new analysis of the developmental policies applied in postwar South America to foster an import-substitution industry. In classical economic history studies, import substitution has been described as an inefficient and distortive policy that failed to put the region on a sustained developmental path. Historians have mostly focused their analysis on the supply side of the market—the industrial manufacture of cars. Consumers, however, have been neglected.

This paper aims to analyze the consumer automotive market in Argentina, Brazil, and Chile between the 1950s and the 1970s. The three countries shared a common feature: all of them enacted developmental strategies to expand their car industries. These policies aimed to attract foreign capital. Direct investments could help in moving local industry from assembling imported parts to promote the development of local supply chains. However, the three countries differed in almost every other respect: income per capita, territorial size, population, etc.

As a result, the consumer market in the three countries showed distinctive features. This paper analyzes how the consumption of automobiles worked and impacted local industries. In doing so, it has a twofold purpose. First, it describes the composition of the market: which brands were most successful, who was able to buy cars, and the role of credit and purchase plans. Second, it shows how car companies targeted specific sectors of the consumer market through the study of printed advertisements.