International, regional or local economic liberalism? Political economy and international experts in Latin America, 1850-1890

CARAVACA, JIMENA

Buenos Aires

Congreso; ESOCITE; 2014

Sociedad Latinoamericana de Estudios Sociales de la Ciencia y la Tecnología

The proposed work analyzes the calls to the French experts Jean Gustave Courcelle-Seneuil and Paul Pradier-Fodéré to Chile and Peru, respectively, in the second half of the 19th century. From those experts, it explores the limits of application of the supposedly universal theorizations in contexts of economic, political and social as the Latin American. Along with this, it is discussed the construction of a regional and local economic liberalism that combined elements of theories "imported" through these experts, with notions which have emerged from national experience and with a series of references less explicit but equally present in political and academic debates. Finally, we analyze the impact that these visits had in Argentina, both in the academic and political space. Some of the issues that we want to unraveling are: how social knowledge is appropriate in different contexts?, do theoretical references, both implicit and explicit, mix to get a new kind of knowledge?, is the a concept of Latin American as a region in the economic debates of this period?, what type of relationship exists between international experts and contracting officers for their services? On that last point, our hypothesis is the hiring of these experts must be read as a sign of rationality and political strategy rather than define it purely from economic and ideological subjugation