Maxine Molyneux Institute of the Americas University College London

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1 Studies of the Americas edited by Maxine Molyneux Institute of the Americas University College London Titles in this series include cross-disciplinary and comparative research on the United States, Latin America, the Caribbean, and Canada, particularly in the areas of politics, economics, history, anthropology, sociology, development, gender, social policy, and the environment. The series publishes edited collections, which allow exploration of a topic from several different disciplinary angles by eminent scholars, and booklength studies, which provide a deeper focus on a single topic. Titles in this series published by Palgrave Macmillan: Cuba s Military : Revolutionary Soldiers during Counter-Revolutionary Times By Hal Klepak The Judicialization of Politics in Latin America Edited by Rachel Sieder, Line Schjolden, and Alan Angell Latin America: A New Interpretation By Laurence Whitehead Appropriation as Practice: Art and Identity in Argentina By Arnd Schneider America and Enlightenment Constitutionalism Edited by Gary L. McDowell and Johnathan O Neill Vargas and Brazil: New Perspectives Edited by Jens R. Hentschke When Was Latin America Modern? Edited by Nicola Miller and Stephen Hart Debating Cuban Exceptionalism Edited by Bert Hoffman and Laurence Whitehead Caribbean Land and Development Revisited Edited by Jean Besson and Janet Momsen Cultures of the Lusophone Black Atlantic Edited by Nancy Priscilla Naro, Roger Sansi-Roca, and David H. Treece Democratization, Development, and Legality: Chile, By Julio Faundez The Hispanic World and American Intellectual Life, By Iván Jaksić The Role of Mexico s Plural in Latin American Literary and Political Culture: From Tlatelolco to the Philanthropic Ogre By John King Faith and Impiety in Revolutionary Mexico Edited by Matthew Butler

2 Reinventing Modernity in Latin America: Intellectuals Imagine the Future, By Nicola Miller The Republican Party and Immigration Politics: From Proposition 187 to George W. Bush By Andrew Wroe The Political Economy of Hemispheric Integration: Responding to Globalization in the Americas Edited by Diego Sánchez-Ancochea and Kenneth C. Shadlen Ronald Reagan and the 1980s: Perceptions, Policies, Legacies Edited by Cheryl Hudson and Gareth Davies Wellbeing and Development in Peru: Local and Universal Views Confronted Edited by James Copestake The Federal Nation: Perspectives on American Federalism Edited by Iwan W. Morgan and Philip J. Davies Base Colonies in the Western Hemisphere, By Steven High Beyond Neoliberalism in Latin America? Societies and Politics at the Crossroads Edited by John Burdick, Philip Oxhorn, and Kenneth M. Roberts Visual Synergies in Fiction and Documentary Film from Latin America Edited by Miriam Haddu and Joanna Page Cuban Medical Internationalism: Origins, Evolution, and Goals By John M. Kirk and H. Michael Erisman Governance after Neoliberalism in Latin America Edited by Jean Grugel and Pía Riggirozzi Modern Poetics and Hemispheric American Cultural Studies By Justin Read Youth Violence in Latin America: Gangs and Juvenile Justice in Perspective Edited by Gareth A. Jones and Dennis Rodgers The Origins of Mercosur By Gian Luca Gardini Belize s Independence & Decolonization in Latin America: Guatemala, Britain, and the UN By Assad Shoman Post-Colonial Trinidad: An Ethnographic Journal By Colin Clarke and Gillian Clarke The Nitrate King: A Biography of Colonel John Thomas North By William Edmundson Negotiating the Free Trade Area of the Americas By Zuleika Arashiro History and Language in the Andes Edited by Paul Heggarty and Adrian J. Pearce Cross-Border Migration among Latin Americans: European Perspectives and Beyond Edited by Cathy McIlwaine

3 Native American Adoption, Captivity, and Slavery in Changing Contexts Edited by Max Carocci and Stephanie Pratt Struggle for Power in Post-Independence Colombia and Venezuela By Matthew Brown Taxation and Society in Twentieth-Century Argentina By José Antonio Sánchez Román Mexico s Struggle for Public Security: Organized Crime and State Responses Edited by George Philip and Susana Berruecos Raúl Castro and Cuba: A Military Story By Hal Klepak New Political Spaces in Latin American Natural Resource Governance Edited by Håvard Haarstad Politics and Power in Haiti Edited by Kate Quinn and Paul Sutton Citizenship and Political Violence in Peru: An Andean Town, 1870s 1970s By Fiona Wilson Aesthetics and Politics in the Mexican Film Industry By Misha MacLaird Reconfiguring the Union: Civil War Transformations Edited by Iwan W. Morgan and Philip John Davies Making Brazil Work: Checking the President in a Multiparty System By Marcus André Melo and Carlos Pereira Sexual Violence during War and Peace: Gender, Power, and Post-Conflict Justice in Peru By Jelke Boesten Argentina Since the 2001 Crisis: Recovering the Past, Reclaiming the Future Edited by Cara Levey, Daniel Ozarow, and Christopher Wylde The Origins of Bourbon Reform in Spanish South America, By Adrian J. Pearce

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5 Argentina Since the 2001 Crisis Recovering the Past, Reclaiming the Future Edited by Cara Levey, Daniel Ozarow, and Christopher Wylde

6 argentina since the 2001 crisis Copyright Cara Levey, Daniel Ozarow, and Christopher Wylde, Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition All rights reserved. First published in 2014 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN in the United States a division of St. Martin s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world, this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number , of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave and Macmillan are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. ISBN ISBN (ebook) DOI / Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available from the Library of Congress. A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library. Design by Newgen Knowledge Works (P) Ltd., Chennai, India. First edition: July

7 Contents List of Figures and Tables Editors Acknowledgments Foreword Colin M. Lewis ix xi xiii Introduction Revisiting the Argentine Crisis a Decade on: Changes and Continuities 1 Daniel Ozarow, Cara Levey, and Christopher Wylde Part I The Political Economy of (Post)Crisis Argentina Chapter 1 Continuity and Change in the Interpretation of Upheaval: Reexamining the Argentine Crisis of Christopher Wylde Chapter 2 Post-Convertibility Growth in Argentina: Long-Term Dynamics and Limits, Cecilia T. Lanata Briones and Rubén M. Lo Vuolo Chapter 3 Macroeconomic Governance in Post-Neoliberal Argentina and the Relentless Power of TNCs: The Case of the Soy Complex 67 Miguel A. Rivera-Quiñones

8 viii Contents Part II Social Movements and Mass Mobilization before, during, and after Que se vayan todos! Chapter 4 It s the Economy, Stupid, or Is It? The Role of Political Crises in Mass Mobilization: The Case of Argentina in Olga Onuch Chapter 5 Disagreement and Hope: The Hidden Transcripts in the Grammar of Political Recovery in Postcrisis Argentina 115 Ana Cecilia Dinerstein Chapter 6 Argentina since 2001: From Spontaneous Uprising to Transition, or a Crisis Intermezzo? 135 Heike Schaumberg Chapter 7 Revisiting Argentina : From Que se vayan todos! to the Peronist Decade 155 Maristella Svampa Part III Cultural and Media Responses to the 2001 Crisis Chapter 8 Tropical Buenos Aires: Representations of Race in Argentine Literature during the 2001 Crisis and Its Aftermath 177 Ignacio Aguiló Chapter 9 Desalambrando el aire: Communication and Mapuche Struggles in Postcrisis Patagonia 195 Saskia Fischer Chapter 10 Assembling the Past, Performing the Nation: The Argentine Bicentenary and Regaining of Public Space in the Aftermath of the 2001 Crisis 215 Cecilia Dinardi Afterword 233 Ezequiel Adamovsky Contributors 239 Index 243

9 Figures and Tables Figures 1.1 Evolution of primary and total surplus as a percentage of GDP GDP per capita in US dollar and HP trend Argentine national savings and investment Evolution of the overvaluation of the Argentine peso in terms of the REER Internal savings and gross fixed capital formation (investment), ; Million pesos, constant prices of Functional distribution of income, Accumulation rate and profit rate, Average wage, labor productivity, capital productivity, and profit rate, Granger causality relationships between variables, measured in levels, in the savings-investment process in Argentina, Granger causality relationships between variables, measured in rates, in the savings-investment process in Argentina, Postneoliberal macroeconomic governance in Argentina Share of soy products exports by TNCs average, Poverty in Greater Buenos Aires, Percentage of households and individuals living below the poverty line in the amalgamated GBA, Unemployment in Argentina, Growing dissatisfaction with the economic crisis and unemployment,

10 x Figures and Tables 4.5 Political satisfaction Argentina, Perceived causes of protest: Economic versus political triggers Perceived causes of protest: Testing focus group responses 107 Tables 1.1 Argentine fiscal accounts Argentine trade data

11 Editors Acknowledgments The completion of this book has been a truly collaborative writing and editing process, which has brought together the contrasting expertise of the three editors, who are friends as well as colleagues. This companionship has been crucial in facing the intellectual and practical challenges of editorial work, but has also made the process an enjoyable and stimulating one. There are a number of people without whom this book would not have been possible: First we would like to thank Paulo Drinot for his invaluable support in the organization of the Crisis, Response and Recovery: A Decade on from the Argentinazo conference that was held at the Institute for the Study of the Americas in December 2011, out of which this book emerged. The Society for Latin American Studies and the University of London should also be thanked for the grants that they awarded to facilitate the conference. We would like to thank all of the authors for their contributions and patience, in particular Colin M. Lewis and Ezequiel Adamovsky for providing such a thoughtful and stimulating Foreword and Afterword. We extend our gratitude to Sara Doskow and Farideh Koohi-Kamali from Palgrave Macmillan for their excellent editorial work, for supporting and encouraging this project throughout, and for their guidance as the manuscript was completed. In addition, we are grateful to Palgrave Macmillan s Editorial Board and the anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments, which have been enormously significant in strengthening and improving this work. Finally, and perhaps more than anyone, we owe a debt of gratitude to Maxine Molyneux, who has influenced the publication of this book in more ways than she could possibly know, through both her endorsement of the 2011 conference and for encouraging us to establish the Argentina Research Network of students and scholars working on Argentina. Both of these events lay the foundations for this book. In particular, we are

12 xii Editors Acknowledgments grateful to Maxine for her support for the project as series editor of the Palgrave Latin American Series. This book is dedicated to the memory of those who fell during those days of terror and hope in December 2001, as well as to all those whose lives were changed beyond recognition by the crisis that followed.

13 Foreword To borrow from Carlos Acuña, the future cannot be what it used to be, and the 2013 elections indicated that it will not be. This book speculates about potential trajectories for Argentina, and offers tantalizing hints about possible outcomes, as well as exploring the immediate and long-term buildup to the crisis of Crises can pose challenges, as much as catastrophes, and may present particular problems of management for political and economic elites, as well as testing institutional resilience or fragility. While crises often result in the emergence of new sets of winners and losers, they can also provide opportunities for the formulation of a new consensus about the distribution of gain and pain associated with delivering a sustainable settlement. Following a profound crisis such as that experienced in the country at the time, the likelihood of Pareto optimal outcomes are determined by views about the causes and nature of a crisis, and the capacity of the governing class, accepting that capacity and governance are themselves subject to change at moments of systemic shock. Arguably, the transfer of political power in , represented such a moment and opportunity. As this book recognizes, the crisis was multifaceted and multilayered, as were its impacts. And there were multiple possible outcomes. Living through the crisis, contemporary and retrospective evaluations of the events and processes of the preceding years, plus the immediate aftermath, all configured medium- to long-term expectations of what the future could, or should, bring. Timing and phasing are also important. Whether slow moving or rapidly developing, crises unfold in phases; there is a tendency for sequences of collapse, reaction/response, recovery, and an expectation of promise that things will continue to improve and lessons be learnt. Of course, who learns what lessons, and how blame (as much as pain and gain) are attributed and distributed also shape expectation and behavior during discrete phases as well as the cycle as a whole.

14 xiv Foreword The manner in which crises emerge (or erupt) and unfold provide an optic through which to explore state and society, and the nature of the relationship between them. Hardly static, the shifting condition of this relationship helps frame crises, response and consequences, as detailed here. Crises test the robustness of the state and resilience of society and institutions, and ideas are challenged. Distinct projects or options may be advanced. The articulation and implementation of projects (usually involving an evaluation of what went wrong and a pledge that the future will be different ) is trammeled by societal receptivity and organizational capacity. Reconstituting the state and reintegrating civil society is likely to be a messy, unpredictable process. Drawing on rich, diverse new data, this book sheds considerable light on that process. It details how ideologies and models, old and new, were examined and questioned, and how particular forces inchoate and organized sought to shape the course of events and determine outcomes. Innovative perspectives are generated by analyses of grassroots and neighborhood organizations and popular assembles bodies of ordinary citizens fed up with cycles of crisis and corruption. Alienated, if not entirely disenfranchised, these active, organizing ordinary citizens epitomized such civic virtues as participation and solidarity. The extent to which emergent organizations and distinct forms of participation associated with such groups constitute a new politics and a new understanding of politics, based on a redefinition of citizenship, is critical to debates about rupture and continuity, as much as state-society relations. In the long run, what changed and why and how and what did not? Although the analysis centers largely on the crisis, several contributions emphasize the frequency of crises. Susceptibility to serial crises suggests that the problem was systemic, as well as having a historic dimension resulting in the largest default in national and global history. The events of that year confirm that crises are intrinsic to polity and economy, and that in the aftermath of previous such episodes there has been a tendency to opt for short-term correctives or palliatives, rather than to engineer a profound overhaul that is likely to preempt future collapse. To reprise an apocalyptic assessment of the 1990s, at the moment of crisis, the Argentinian political class looks into the abyss of chaos, takes a deep breath, pulls itself together, decides that something has to be done, turns around, and marches off to the next abyss. History matters because it is many things happening at the same time, not one thing happening after another thing. How the past is memorialized, ideologized, and conceptualized also matters. While some movements of the moment were unique to the

15 Foreword xv immediacy of the 2001 crisis, as is shown, the origin of others could be traced to earlier, socioeconomic shocks, and yet others rooted in national myths, conceptualizations of history that were revised or vaunted-to validate socioethnic interpretations of its causes, courses, and possible consequences. Possibly more than other twentieth-century shocks to the system, the Argentinazo constituted a crisis of culture and confidence about national identity: wither then nation and who, or what, constituted the country. In effect, the predicament broached by Argentinian intellectual Victoria Ocampo almost a century ago was given renewed salience by early twenty-first-century upheavals. Writing about the elite during the Belle Époque around 1910 (the centenary of Argentinian independence) she observed that, when in Argentina, we feel European, when in Europe, as Argentinians we always feel like strangers. Did the 2001 crisis reinforce the Latin Americanization of society and economy that had been first remarked in the 1970s? Where does the future lie? In the construction of a new project dynamic, nationalist, mass, radicalized, ethnically heterogeneous, yet integrated, or in the modernized, productive republic envisaged in liberal and neoliberal discourses that were essayed at various points, notably around 1880 and 1990? These questions have intensified during the second Fernández de Kirchner presidency (2011 ) as the regime places even greater emphasis on claims to be the authentic heir, and modern representation, of Perón. But does the allusion to Peronism signal a movement and nation in which there is space for everyone, or a divided society composed of the nationalpopular and the antinational-popular? National myths do not always unify, particularly when subject to capture. Today, the question remains: Which is the true republic and which is the possible republic, and to whom does the republic belong to all or a particular interest? As the book shows, delivering growth with equity was critical before and after 2001, a concern for much of the public and some of the political classes, and essential for the sustainability and acceptability of the economic model of the day. Arguably, this accounts for the fear, expectation, promise, and relief that greeted the opening years of the Kirchnerato. Such progressive social relief policies as the Programa Jefes y Jefas de Hogar Desocupados (Unemployed Heads of Households Plan), which was launched during the interim presidency of Eduardo Duhalde (2002 3), and maintained by Néstor Kirchner (2003 7) may be credited with preventing social disorder and political meltdown between 2002 and around 2004, as the economy moved from recovery to growth. Although introduced as an emergency response to a crisis that had seen unemployment and indigence

16 xvi Foreword rates soar, effectively funded and administered, this social safety net was the first to be applied in the country and held the prospect of enshrining a commitment to equity in the emergent economic model. Perhaps similar considerations about rising inequality, and institutionalizing a commitment to equity, shaped the introduction in 2009 of the Asignación Universal por Hijo (Universal Child Benefit Scheme). Another first for the country and implemented during the inaugural presidency of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner (2007 ), Child Benefit was a targeted, conditional cash-transfer policy designed to meet the needs of unemployed and low-paid workers, particularly those engaged in the informal sector. The realization of the objectives of poverty and inequality reduction has been compromised by the poor administration of payouts. Nevertheless, the rhetoric surrounding the debate about inequality signals continuing popular perceptions of the problem, and enduring concerns that are currently on the rise again as fears about the next crisis intensify. Notwithstanding successive pragmatic and often technically sophisticated programs and policies, constructing a credible system of social welfare has proved more difficult in Argentina than in many other polities. Financial stability, operational efficiency, and capacity to deliver have plagued various initiatives and reforms. The overlaying of one scheme by another, and repeated restructuring of social agencies has facilitated manipulation and corruption. On occasion, the opacity of the institutional set-up seems to have been devised to facilitate politicization and clientelism, not a reasonably transparent and effective delivery of funds to the needy. Inevitably, the economy features substantially in this book, but does not dominate. Assessments of the economy inform and complement chapters that explore the political and sociocultural realms. Considerable detail is provided about distinct/contending economic projects associated with different regimes and political configurations. Descriptions of events and policies pre- and post-2001 facilitate an understanding of the charter of Argentinian capitalism, and the specificities of models of accumulation. There is an informative assessment of emergent structural rigidities and of fiscal and financial dimensions of crisis and recovery. There is also much about the disfunctionality of economic decision making. In this sense, incompetence and political rivalry were as or more significant than corruption. Pink economics (possibly the distinct economics of the Casa Rosada) is considered, which has witnessed efforts to restructure the economy in a manner that is likely to affect a permanent reconfiguration of society and political institutions. That is, economics as

17 Foreword xvii an adjunct to a political project that aims to engineer a profound restructuring of society so as to preclude a return to the economics and politics of the past. In this sense, the key question is whether or not Kirchneromics constitutes a structural break, representing rupture instead of a set of palliatives that provide a temporary remedy, not a permanent cure. Taken together, these chapters connect with ongoing speculation about the content and direction of the current economic model, and ask whether based on industrialization and distribution it is sustainable. This collection shows that evaluating the outcome of the 2013 legislative elections is not simple: the government did not lose, nor the opposition win, and non-kirchner Peronists considerably enhanced their electoral base. The governing party was the most voted nationally, retaining its Congressional majorities; in the province of Buenos Aires Peronists took more than three-quarters of the vote, with dissident Peronists enjoying a lead of around 12 points over Kirchnerists. The initial reaction of the government was to emphasize business as usual, and a deepening of the model. This is unsustainable. As the 2015 presidential elections approach, possible realignments within Peronism may result in a dilution of the model; an incoming Peronist president will not want to pick up the pieces of a crisis that could become a new reference point for Argentinians. Will there be an institutional shock facilitating the creative destruction envisaged by some elements of La Cámpora, or a more internationalist rapprochement? Hope and expectation, as much as crisis, recovery, and response, feature in this book that explores crises entries and exits. As the Kirchner era draws to a close, these chapters are a timely reminder of what propelled the Kirchners onto the national political stage, and shaped the emergence and evolution of Kirchnerismo. They also hint at what Kirchnerismo delivered and what it did not. Yet, these studies in recovering the past and reclaiming the future go much further than contextualizing Kirchnerismo and the events of ; they explain why is going to be a pivotal year. To paraphrase the thoughtful concluding remarks of one of the chapters, the book contributes to an assessment of whether Argentinian political and economic arrangements will remain inconsistent and unstable, or are capable of acquiring stability and coherence, while also recognizing that the country s long-standing structural problems necessitate an overhaul of the political economy model that is likely to engender resilient, systemic institutional recalibration. Colin M. Lewis