Actors, Resources and Economic Interaction. The Role of Fiscal Spending during the Emergency of Buenos Aires (17th century)

WASSERMAN, MARTÍN L. E.

Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires

Conferencia; Economic History Conference; 2019

Universidad de San Andrés

This paper deals with the role of the public spending in the economic activity, identifying the incidence that the fiscal disbursement had on the performance of the most influential actors in the local market. The hypothesis proposed is that the economic performance of the actors was affected, unequally, by the flows of resources of fiscal origin. To address this hypothesis, two universes are put in contact: the economic interaction between individuals, and the disbursements of the Buenos Aires Royal Treasury. A basic indicator from the Social Network Analysis expresses the incidence of the second universe on the first one: the betweenness centrality held by the actors in the economic interaction. This paper is based on the survey of 1182 transactions notarized (debt obligations, sales, charters and consignative censuses, in which 1136 actors of the local economy were involved), along with 912 spending accounts from the Buenos Aires Royal Treasury, from notarial and fiscal documentation of the XVIIth century preserved in Rooms IX and XIII of the Nation General Archive (Argentina).