Economic growth and spurious competitiveness in the Amazon: the case of the Carajas region

The article analyzes the reasons why per capita GDP growth in the Amazonian region of Carajas was far above many Brazilian regions and the national average during the first decades of the 21st century. To this end, patterns are outlined that express the combination of capacities and sources of innovation, learning and development on a subnational scale; and indicated technological trajectories of the most relevant economic agents in the region and how they interact within the scope of such spatial configuration. Allowing to demonstrate that the dynamics of regional economic growth is based on spurious increases in competitiveness that sustain the reproduction of the main and most relevant economic agents in the region whose technological trajectories result in social and environmental degradation and in the embarrassment to the construction of alternatives to regional development based on sustainable.