The Cold War and the Argentine labor movement: the presence and influence of the ICFTU and the ORIT, 1949-1983

VICTORIA BASUALDO

Amsterdam

Workshop; Research Workshop; 2010

International Institute of Social History (Amsterdam)

This paper aims at presenting the main features of a recently started research project that focuses on the presence of the “free” trade union movement in Argentina and its influence on the labor leaders and organizations. The project will study specifically the impact and connections of the ICFTU and its regional organization for Latin America, the Inter-American Regional Workers’ Organisation or Organización Regional Interamericana de Trabajadores (ORIT), from the late 1940s to the early 1980s. Although most of the existing contributions on the history of the labor movement in Argentina have dealt only superficially with the dimension of international relations, the available evidence suggests that the debates and controversies that took place among different groups of the Argentine labor movement from the 1950s to the 1970s were far from isolated from some of the larger divides and disputes in the international arena. This project will not only illuminate some very interesting and yet unknown aspects of the history of the Argentine labor movement, but also contribute to place the particular traits of Argentine history into the larger context of the Cold War in the western hemisphere.