Name: RAFAEL GONRING
Publication date: 28/05/2026
Examining board:
Name |
Role |
|---|---|
| CARLO EUGENIO NOGUEIRA | Presidente |
| CARLOS TEIXEIRA DE CAMPOS JUNIOR | Examinador Interno |
| FILIPE GIUSEPPE DAL BO RIBEIRO | Examinador Externo |
| GLAUCO BRUCE RODRIGUES | Examinador Externo |
| LUIZ CLAUDIO MOISES RIBEIRO | Examinador Interno |
Summary: This study aims to contextualize, investigate, and understand facts related to the
importance of land transportation as a territorial policy for the integration of Espírito
Santo into the Brazilian developmental project between 1959 and 1969, a brief but highly
significant period for the state's growth. The main hypothesis is based on the idea that the
integration of the state territory, carried out through the construction of land
transportation infrastructure – road and rail – constituted a planned territorial policy
designed to overcome the widely acknowledged developmental lag of Espírito Santo in
relation to some Brazilian states, especially those in the Southeast region of the country.
This notion of backwardness and the need for development shaped a geographical
ideology that influenced the economic and socio-spatial transformation of Espírito Santo.
To this end, the productive appropriation of space – resulting from the integration of
places through land transportation infrastructure – was conceived as a solution to the
problem of economic development by political classes and economic groups in Espírito
Santo, who were highly interested in the success of this endeavor. This process generated
an unprecedented partnership between the State and private initiative in the planning and
execution of the production of the geographical space of Espírito Santo during the
analyzed period and in subsequent decades. With the shift from an agrarian-exporting to
an industrial-exporting economic profile, mainly based on the establishment of large
industrial projects, Espírito Santo transformed its reality, producing economic
developments at the national level from the 1970s onward, with significant socio-
economic and spatial impacts in the following decades. As a result of these
transformations, the territory of Espírito Santo became a strategic alternative for the
dynamics of the domestic market and for the growth of Brazilian exports in the
international context.
