Chapecó e a fronteira Sul: o Estado como propulsor do progresso

Abstract

This research proposes to analyze the resonances of the nation-state project, constituted from the victory of Vargas's regime in 1930, in the region of Chapecó. Starting from this premise, the ideals of progress and civilization engendered, mainly with the launch of the March to the West program, are unraveled in the process of inflection of the expansion of the capital frontier towards the West. In this way, the construct of the State desired for the region is visualized in its complexity, especially in its relationship with land speculation, natural resource exploitation, and ethnic/cultural inculcation, carried out by the private agents of colonization. To fulfill this intent, the use of diverse sources allowed for a greater understanding of the theme under discussion. We used journalistic sources, with emphasis on periodicals, such as A Voz de Chapecó, which embodied the colonizer's idealization of civilization. Alongside this, official sources, produced within the bureaucratic framework of the Estado Novo regime, provide an elucidation of the desired state archetype for the West, in which Chapecó was situated. This approach allows us to understand, with greater precision, the dynamics of state construction in light of its relationship with private capital, with the aim of transforming the uncultivated and wild hinterland into a new civilized and dynamic frontier for capital. Furthermore, it relativizes the teleological narrative applied to Chapecó through the crystallization of the ideal of private business initiative as the selected agent for the economic/social transformation of the region, seeking in the State the leading role in that inflection of what was understood as progress in the first decades of the 20th century and the use of this State in the consolidation of the power of certain social groups.