The Argentine Crisis: The End or the Beginning of a New Era

RICARDO CICERCHIA

AILASA, La Trobe University

Lugar: Melbourne; Año: 2004 p. 196

1-86446-578-6

JILAS JOURNAL OF IBERIAN AND LATIN AMERICAN STUDIES Special Issue of Journal of Iberian and Latin American Studies (JILAS) The Argentine Crisis: The End or the Beginning of a New Era? Guest Editor: Ricardo Cicerchia, CONICET/UNIVERSITY OF BUENOS AIRES  Summary:  The economic collapse and political implosion in Argentina has served notice to advocates of democracy and market-driven reforms that contrary to their claim that the two work hand in hand for the overall improvement of developing nations, the combination of foreign-dictated market-oriented reform policies and electoral politics is unstable due to an important contradiction: policies advocated by the non-voting foreign economic elites are pursued in spite of their adverse impact on the lives of the majority of the voting population. As a system stabilised only through mass consent, capitalist democracy has lost its foundation in Argentina.  With the Argentine political and business elites discredited by their citizens, (seriously weakening the two major parties) and support coming only from foreign lenders, new forms of social and political organisation are emerging to fill the void. People´s assemblies and spontaneous local referenda have joined with food riots and wildcat strikes, road blockages and other forms of unconventional collective action as the emerging face of a type of direct democracy in civil society. The remarkable aspect of this reconstruction of civil society in Argentina is that it crosses traditional socio-economic divisions, bringing together middle and working class people, as well as the unemployed, youth, indigenous and other marginalised groups in an informal network united against the "politics as usual" of the traditional elites. Neither pre-revolutionary nor fundamentally restorative, this embryonic civil and political society represents an unprecedented form of democratic praxis. Giving it visibility both internally and abroad have been new documentaries, which serve as a testimonial to this process.  Despite efforts to "contain the tango effect", similar economic and political movements are emerging in Uruguay and Paraguay, while in Brazil a parallel phenomenon with its own dynamic is gaining momentum suggesting the interrelated nature of Mercosur economies.  Is Argentina only the beginning or does it serve as a new paradigm for post-authoritarian politics, and as an exemplar of "failed" democratic consolidation?  This special issue will define the emerging contours of the reconstruction of civil society in Argentina in a comparative framework focusing on the role of new and old subordinate groups and collective agents and the horizontal networks between them, offering a study of the historical, political and cultural aspects of this important moment, including a consideration of the relevance of this movement for Asia-Pacific researchers and policy makers.