Starting from the Congress of Vienna, in which only eight "Christian" states assisted, through the Hague Peace conferences and the Versailles treaty, mobilizing no more than two dozens countries, to the current UNO system, virtually universal, international society has undergone a deep democratization in the last two centuries, even if the sources of political and economic power and its distribution among countries have been substantially maintained. This process of enlargement of the old "restrictive democracy" is mostly evident in the institutional rule making for the international economic relations, where multilateral organizations for technical and economic cooperation - among them the IMF, the World Bank and the WTO - have a significant role in reinforcing the global interdependence among states. This historical essay follows the evolution of multilateralism, in the longue durée, with particular attention to its economic features, and examines Brazil's international insertion in the world economy, as one of the few "peripheric" countries which took an active part in the making of "international economic order". Indeed, Brazil was present at the creation of most, if not all, intergovernmental organizations and took part in various multilateral conferences from the 19 th century to our times.
International Politics; International Economic Order; Intergovernmental Cooperation Organizations; Multilateralism
