The Cambridge History of Latin America is a large scale, collaborative, multivolume history of Latin America during the five centuries since the first contacts between Europeans and the native peoples of the Americas in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries.

Brazil: Empire and Republic, 1822–1930 brings together five chapters from volumes in and v of the Cambridge History – three on the Empire (1822–89) and two on the First Republic (1889–1930) – to provide in a single volume an economic, social and political history of Brazil from independence in 1822 to the Revolution of 1930. This, it is hoped, will be useful for both teachers and students of Latin American history. A chapter on the separation of Brazil from Portugal (1808–22) forms an introduction to the volume and a link with Colonial Brazil, a collection of seven chapters drawn from volumes 1 and 11 of The Cambridge History of Latin America. Each chapter is accompanied by a bibliographical essay.