The paper analyses the role of ideas and political networks that explain the content of stabilization policies implemented in Brazil after 1985. A set of innovative heterodox ideas concerning the most appropriate stabilization strategy for Brazil were designed by economists from the Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro in the early 1980s. The paper presents these ideas and compares them with the contents of two stabilization programs designed and implemented by the same economists - the "Cruzado Plan" (1986) and the "Real Plan" (1993-present). Political variables are emphasized in the explanation showing a greater similarity of the Real Plan to the original ideas of those economists which, for the author, accounts for the success of that program to control inflation.
Economic policy (Brazil); Economic stabilization (Brazil); Political networks; Cruzado Plan; Real Plan
