The Center`s purpose is to document development, and to study, formulate, debate and propose initiatives on the subject of development. In line with these objectives, the Center, in reality, is dedicated to the task of updating the development agenda. 

The stubborn desire to understand Brazil presupposed understanding why the country was underdeveloped, and, therefore understanding the mechanics of underdevelopment. This was the primordial mark of his life’s trajectory.

Developmentalism was a response to the challenges and opportunities created by the Great Depression of the 1930s.This Center supports research and the growth of teaching on the subject of Economic and Social Development in  Brazilian universities.

The Celso Furtado Center was a proposal by the then President of the Republic, Luiz Inácio Lula de Silva, at the opening session of the 11th United Nations Conference on  Trade and Development (Unctad XI), held in São Paulo, on June 14th, 2004. 

The Celso Furtado Center publishes two periodicals, “The Development Journal” and “Memories of Development” and, jointly with Publishing House Contraponto, two collections: “The Celso Furtado Archives” and “Political Economics and Development”.

Bringing together a collection built up by Celso Furtado over the course of his personal, this library contains more than seven thousand volume which between them reflect the subjects that fascinated him from early on in his life.