For centuries, in the formation of the modern world, processes of rapid growth outside of the central countries occurred basically in regions with abundant natural resources (agricultural potential, mining) which eventually increased in value. When these resources were exhausted or lost importance, the regions which depended on them fell into decline. In the twentieth century, this pattern changed somewhat. Non-central economies registered notable instances of growth which were not based on the extensive exploitation of abundant natural resources, but rather on intensive processes of industrialization. Following different routes, a number of backward economies benefited from the ability to obtain accelerated production gains through relatively simple strategies, based on the diffusion of knowledge and technology. In this way, a group of intermediate (or semiperipheral) countries emerged during the course of the twentieth century, including several countries in Latin America. For decades, this allowed the formulation of optimistic visions. Apparently, these countries were narrowing the distance which separated them from the leaders. One of the most important developments on the world scene in the last 20 years has been the successive breakdown of all these strategies for achieving the level of the leading countries (in Latin America since the beginning of the 1980s, in Eastern Europe from the end of the same decade, among the Asian Tigers in the 1990s), with the exception, notwithstanding, of China, whose burst of rapid growth is recent. These breakdowns had various causes. In the confines of this article, we will highlight one of them, which will permit us to draw some notable conclusions and deduce serious geopolitical consequences. The international system In international economic relations, those countries which manage to control the major part of the world's surplus production obtain advantages. In order to occupy a vanguard position, a country needs to structure its economy around activities which generate a differential profit, situated above - preferably far above - the average. Such positions are, by definition, exclusionary (if they were not, the profit they generated would not be differential). First conclusion: Because of the way it is organized, the international economic system is structured asymmetrically. The idea of a world governed by cooperation - or by simple market relations which do not express power relations - is utopian, because competition is engrained in the structure of the current system, making it possible only to discipline it, not to eliminate it. Because the activities which guarantee a differential profit vary over time, conquering and maintaining a position in the vanguard cannot depend on the control of a specific sector, technology or market (a sector, technology or market which guarantees differential profit today may cease to do so tomorrow.) They demand leadership in the innovation process, or in other words, a permanent capacity to create new productive combinations, new processes, and new products. Second conclusion: the nucleus of the international system is composed of the national spaces which concentrate the innovative dynamic within themselves. They achieve successive positions of control precisely because they manage to re- create them, thereby obtaining extra benefits from the worldwide division of labor. At the other extreme, dependence is also re-created dynamically. This becomes even more evident with the advance of so-called "globalization," which affects central and peripheral (or semiperipheral) countries in completely different ways. In the first case, the economic and technical sphere, on the one hand, and the sphere of political decisions, on the other, remain closely united by the strong ties between megacorporations and effectively sovereign national States; in the case of peripheral countries, these spheres are highly dissociated, due to the geographic dispersion of the worldwide chain of production, under the mandate of corporations which have no commitments to the most fragile States and societies, where they only install affiliates. Seen through this lens, it is clear that the development efforts of Latin American countries are trapped within the limits of a peripheral type of modernization, and that we will never, in fact, approach a central position in the world system. We manage to progressively assimilate productive activities, which, at one point in history, sustained the leadership of the central countries. But the problem is that these kinds of activities lose their differential character just when the developing periphery manages to capture them, because they are then subject to an intense competitive pressure which decreases their importance and profitability. When this happens, these activities are relegated to a secondary plane for the central economies, who reclaim their privileged position by altering the most effective productive combinations. Inequality is re-created. A double challenge for the periphery A logical impossibility prevents leveling strategies of the type implemented by Brazil and other countries from altering relative positions within the system. Third conclusion: The condition of being peripheral cannot be overcome by simply copying products and technologies which are already well developed in the central countries. Recent experience, in fact, tells us something even more serious: the process of deconstruction of development projects is much faster than that of their construction. The distance between our countries and the central countries, for instance, decreased bit by bit during most of the twentieth century, but has begun to grow dramatically again in the past twenty years. From all of this we can deduce that the large backward economies have a double and very difficult challenge before them: to selectively absorb the most important technologies of the current paradigm, and, at the same time, prepare the conditions for a jump ahead which will enable them to break the logic of dependency and launch them into the vanguard of a new paradigm. This is what Japan did in the period following WWII: absorb the technological base of chemistry and metallurgy through adaptive engineering, and at the same time give birth to microelectronics, which later served to place Japan among the leading nations. The internalization and intensive application of universal sciences and technologies, on the one hand, and the lucid identification of local comparative advantages, on the other, are the twin components of a successful project. The potential of South America Today, South America does not possess the essential conditions to prepare for this leap, which are both of a political character (an endogenous project) and cultural (a clear identity and high self-esteem). But, from a structural point of view, it does not lack the potential for it. With regards to science and technology, many fields of investigation are open to us, awaiting a consistent regional project which will bring them together. We will give a few examples, in order to draw a conclusion of a geopolitical character. - Energy resources Everything indicates that petroleum reserves will run out, at the latest, in the first half of the 21st century. The alteration of the energy matrix is a worldwide problem, extremely complex, and decisive for the reorganization of power in the medium and long term. The greatest possibilities for confronting it are in the tropics, via the development of now embryonic ways of using the renewable sources represented by the sun and by biomass. Once the Xingo plant is completed, for example, no large-scale hydroelectric plant can be constructed in the northeast of Brazil, where the index of incident solar energy is more than abundant; the low efficiency of today's solar energy converters represents a scientific challenge which we will need to take on. In the same area, a second challenge is obtaining detailed knowledge of the still quite mysterious mechanism of biological storage of solar energy; that is to say, of the synthesis of hydrocarbons through photosynthesis, which is much more intense in the tropics. Whoever can gain a full understanding of this process and manage to make it more efficient will open up new perspectives. A third challenge involves liquid fuel. With an effort that lies within our reach, we could take a significant worldwide lead in the use of biomass for energy. Once a few remaining technical issues have been resolved, the use of native palms, such as dende and pupunha, could produce around 12 tons of high-calorie oil per hectare (70% more energy per area planted than is produced by using cane sugar to make combustible alcohol.) The vegetable oil thus obtained is the only known renewabx¿