"The rise of the textile district of Buenos Aires, 1914-1960"

BELINI, CLAUDIO FABIÁN

Utrecht, Holanda

Congreso; XVth. World Economic History Congress, Utrecht, August 2nd- 7th, 2009; 2009

International Economic History Association, Utrecht University, International Institute of Social History

This paper analyzes the origins of the textile district of Buenos Aires between 1920 and 1960. In this period, the cotton textile industry led the import substituting industrialization in Argentina. This industrial development accentuated the characteristics that the industrial location had assumed in the Argentina; specially the spatial concentration in the south of the city of Buenos Aires and the outskirts. It is supported that this case adapts it parcially to the industrial district model, but its differs from the cluster studied bay Michael Porter. Although the industrial concentration in Buenos Aires allowed to the argentine textile industry to benefit of the external economies defined by Alfred Marshall, the industrial growth assumed typical forms of "the late and last development" analyzed by Albert Hirschman.