The country’s political situation under Salazar's regime did not escape his attention; Portugal was engaged in a war in Africa, largely supported by a conservative and colonialist historiographical narrative. The limitations of European historiographical perspectives on Latin America led him to continue his studies in the United States, where new research approaches were being embraced and leading scholars in the field were based. He ultimately applied to Princeton, where Professor Stanley Stein was teaching, and who agreed to supervise his Ph.D. It was through Stein that Maxwell first met the Brazilian historian Sérgio Buarque de Holanda. From Princeton, he embarked on a journey to explore Brazil through a multidisciplinary and inter-university programme at Columbia University.

Kenneth Maxwell dedicated himself to the study of Iberian and Latin American regions, with a strong focus on the histories of Brazil and Portugal, especially Luso-Brazilian relations. Chronologically, while his primary focus was on the Modern period, particularly the 18th century, he also examined key dynamics of the Contemporary period.

Since the discovery of the first gold deposits at the end of the 17th century, Brazil had assumed a central role within the Portuguese pluricontinental monarchy. The significance of this overseas territory grew throughout the 18th century, particularly through the political actions of Sebastião José de Carvalho e Melo. This process culminated in the transfer of the Portuguese court to Rio de Janeiro in 1808 — a decision shaped by the European political landscape, but also by an ongoing debate about Brazil's increasing centrality within the monarchy. This shift ultimately led to Brazil's declaration of independence in 1822. Maxwell was drawn to studying the processes that influenced and sustained this extraordinary development in Brazil.

In his book Conflicts and Conspiracies: Brazil & Portugal 1750-1808 (1973), translated into Portuguese in 1977 under the title A Devassa da Devassa: a Inconfidência Mineira, Brasil – Portugal, 1750–1808 , which has since become a classic in the discussion of the 1789 Minas Gerais conspiracy, Maxwell constructed an interpretative framework that cross-referenced information from various archives. He highlighted the role of local elites in this first organised movement against metropolitan power. For the British historian, by the 1780s, the Captaincy of Minas Gerais was experiencing economic and social development that distinguished it from the rest of Brazil. Furthermore, the example of the American Revolution (1776) was not lost on Minas Gerais at a time when tensions with the Lisbon government were rising. The local elite viewed the metropolis as a drain on wealth and blamed it for hindering economic growth. However, Maxwell notes the absence of a cohesive national identity, which would have been impossible in such a diverse and regionally fragmented Brazil in the 18th century.

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