Café com leite (
PortuguesePortuguese is a Romance language that originated in what is now Galicia and northern Portugal. It is derived from the Latin spoken by the romanized Pre-Roman peoples of the Iberian Peninsula around 2000 years ago...
: "coffee with milk") was a term that referred to the domination of
Brazilian politicsPolitics of Brazil takes place in a framework of a federal presidential representative democratic republic, whereby the President of Brazil is both head of state and head of government, and of a multi-party system. Executive power is exercised by the government. Legislative power is vested in both...
under the Old Republic (1889-1930) by the landed gentries of
São PauloSão Paulo is a state in Brazil. It is the major industrial and economic powerhouse of the Brazilian economy. It is named after Saint Paul. São Paulo has the largest population, industrial park and economic production of the country. It is the most populous subnational entity in the Western...
(dominated by the
coffeeCoffee is a brewed beverage prepared from roasted seeds, commonly called coffee beans, of the coffee plant. They are seeds of "coffee cherries" that grow on trees in over 70 countries. It has been said that green coffee is the second most traded commodity in the world behind crude oil. Due to its...
industry) and
Minas GeraisMinas Gerais is one of the 26 states of Brazil, the second most populous and fourth largest by area in the federation. The capital is the city of Belo Horizonte, located near the central area...
(dominated by
dairyA dairy is a facility for the extraction and processing of animal milk—mostly from cows or goats, but also from buffalo, sheep, horses or camels —for human consumption. Typically it is a farm or section of a farm that is concerned with the production of milk, butter and...
interests). São Paulo's coffee interests were by far the strongest of the pair.
Under
BrazilBrazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is a country in South America. It is the fifth largest country by geographical area, occupying nearly half of South America, the fifth most populous country, and the fourth most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Atlantic Ocean...
's Old Republic, the patron-client political machines of the countryside enabled agrarian
oligarchOligarch may refer to:* A member of an oligarchy, a form of government* Business oligarch...
s, especially coffee planters in the dominant state of São Paulo, to dominate state structures to their advantage, particularly the weak central state structures that effectively devolved power to local agrarian oligarchies.
Under the Old Republic, the politics of
café com leite rested on the domination of the republic's politics by the states of São Paulo and Minas Gerais — the largest in terms of population and wealth.
Café com leite (
PortuguesePortuguese is a Romance language that originated in what is now Galicia and northern Portugal. It is derived from the Latin spoken by the romanized Pre-Roman peoples of the Iberian Peninsula around 2000 years ago...
: "coffee with milk") was a term that referred to the domination of
Brazilian politicsPolitics of Brazil takes place in a framework of a federal presidential representative democratic republic, whereby the President of Brazil is both head of state and head of government, and of a multi-party system. Executive power is exercised by the government. Legislative power is vested in both...
under the Old Republic (1889-1930) by the landed gentries of
São PauloSão Paulo is a state in Brazil. It is the major industrial and economic powerhouse of the Brazilian economy. It is named after Saint Paul. São Paulo has the largest population, industrial park and economic production of the country. It is the most populous subnational entity in the Western...
(dominated by the
coffeeCoffee is a brewed beverage prepared from roasted seeds, commonly called coffee beans, of the coffee plant. They are seeds of "coffee cherries" that grow on trees in over 70 countries. It has been said that green coffee is the second most traded commodity in the world behind crude oil. Due to its...
industry) and
Minas GeraisMinas Gerais is one of the 26 states of Brazil, the second most populous and fourth largest by area in the federation. The capital is the city of Belo Horizonte, located near the central area...
(dominated by
dairyA dairy is a facility for the extraction and processing of animal milk—mostly from cows or goats, but also from buffalo, sheep, horses or camels —for human consumption. Typically it is a farm or section of a farm that is concerned with the production of milk, butter and...
interests). São Paulo's coffee interests were by far the strongest of the pair.
History
Under
BrazilBrazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is a country in South America. It is the fifth largest country by geographical area, occupying nearly half of South America, the fifth most populous country, and the fourth most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Atlantic Ocean...
's Old Republic, the patron-client political machines of the countryside enabled agrarian
oligarchOligarch may refer to:* A member of an oligarchy, a form of government* Business oligarch...
s, especially coffee planters in the dominant state of São Paulo, to dominate state structures to their advantage, particularly the weak central state structures that effectively devolved power to local agrarian oligarchies.
Under the Old Republic, the politics of
café com leite rested on the domination of the republic's politics by the states of São Paulo and Minas Gerais — the largest in terms of population and wealth. One can illustrate the extent of that domination by noting that the first presidents of the republic were from São Paulo and thereafter succeeded by an alternation between the outgoing governors of the two leading states in the presidency.
The politics of
café com leite rested on an oligarchic system known as
coronelismoCoronelismo was the system of machine politics in Brazil under the Old Republic . Known also as the "rule of the coronels", the term referred to the classic boss system under which the control of patronage was centralized in the hands of a locally dominant oligarch known as a coronel, particularly...
. Known as the "rule of the
colonelColonel is a military rank of a commissioned officer, with corresponding ranks existing in almost every country in the world. It is also used in some police forces and other paramilitary rank structures...
s", this term referred to the classic boss system under which the control of
patronagePatronage is the support, encouragement, privilege, or financial aid that an organization or individual bestows to another. In the history of art, arts patronage refers to the support that kings or popes have provided to musicians, painters, and sculptors...
was centralized in the hands of a locally dominant oligarch known as a "colonel", particularly under Brazil's Old Republic, who would dispense favors in return for loyalty.
Meanwhile, other states resented this grip on the central state by São Paulo and Minas Gerais. The severe
droughtA drought is an extended period of months or years when a region notes a deficiency in its water supply. Generally, this occurs when a region receives consistently below average precipitation. It can have a substantial impact on the ecosystem and agriculture of the affected region...
of 1877 in the Northeast and the ensuing economic collapse — along with the
abolitionAbolitionism was a movement to end the slave trade and emancipate slaves in western Europe and the Americas. The slave system aroused little protest until the 18th century, when rationalist thinkers of the Enlightenment criticized it for violating the rights of man, and Quaker and other evangelical...
of
slaverySlavery is a form of forced labor in which people are considered to be the property of others. Slaves can be held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase or birth, and deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to receive compensation...
in the 1880s — propelled the mass labor migration of
emancipatedEmancipation means the act of setting an individual or social group free or making equal to citizens in a political society.Emancipation may also refer to:* Emancipation , a 1996 music album by Prince...
slaves and other peasants from Northeast to Southeast, precipitating the decay of established
sugarSugar is a class of edible crystalline substances, mainly sucrose, lactose, and fructose. Human taste buds interpret its flavor as sweet. Sugar as a basic food carbohydrate primarily comes from sugar cane and from sugar beet, but also appears in fruit, honey, sorghum, sugar maple , and in many...
oligarchies of the North. With the concurrent growth of coffee in the Southeast, São Paulo, now emerging as the central state, began to increase in power under the Old Republic. Northeastern landowners bitterly opposed rival oligarchs in São Paulo, explaining their role in the 1930 Revolution. (For details, see the main article History of Brazil (1930-1964).)
In time, growing trade, commerce, and industry in São Paulo would serve to undermine the domination of the republic's politics by the landed gentries of the same state (dominated by the coffee industry) and Minas Gerais (dominated by dairy interests) — known then by observers as the politics of
café com leite. Under
Getúlio VargasGetúlio Dornelles Vargas served as president of Brazil from 1930 to 1945 and from 1951 until his suicide in 1954.-Background:...
, ushered into power by the middle class and agrarian oligarchies of peripheral states resentful of the coffee oligarchs, Brazil moved toward a more centralized state structure that has served to regularize and modernize state governments, moving toward more universal suffrage and secret ballots, gradually freeing Brazilian politics from the grips of
coronelismo.
However, the legacy of
café com leite is still strongly visible. Brazilian politics is still known for being highly patrimonial, oligarchic, and personalistic and São Paulo and Minas Gerais remain the country's dominant states.