Da concepção imperial de Gilberto Freyre

Abstract

This paper argues that Gilberto Freyre’s “lusotropicalism” was not limited to his support for Portuguese colonialism, but rather encompassed the establishment of a Luso-Brazilian imperial federation spanning Portuguese colonies in the Atlantic, Africa, and Asia. Freyre’s “imperial vision” from 1937 to 1962 is presented in four of its aspects: first, the author’s ambivalence toward the virtues and vices of British primacy; second, his regard of Portuguese colonization as the source of Lusitanian exceptionalism in world affairs; third, his view of the vices and decay of Portugal as an imperial power; fourth, his case for Brazilian participation in the maintenance of a Pax Lusitana within a binational imperial commonwealth.