Resumo:

Brazilian alcohol, recently renamed ethanol, is typically a Brazilian development, though hardly recognizable as such. The Brazilians’ self-image comprises being erratic, often discontinuity-prone, incapable of persevering to achieve long-range goals. Ethanol, along with such diverse cases as coffee and aircrafts, shows us precisely the opposite: conceived as one of the drivers in the national response to the oil price crisis in the 1970s (together with the nuclear power program and the shift of oil exploitation strategy by Petrobras for a new scenario), the program persisted, painstakingly, for over three decades, having even endured times when oil prices justified its immediate phasing out. The fundamental reason for the Brazilian success in producing ethanol originates directly from this persistence. The path of the Brazilian ethanol can hardly be attributed to any specific event, capable of determining its currently notorious success. It is essentially the outcome of the accumulation of multiple scattered advantages, usually incremental and cumulative, gained on each step during three consecutive decades.1 The most remarkable fact along this winning journey is precisely the inexistence of any specific milestone.