Essays In Argentine Labour History 1870 1930

From 1870 to 1930 Argentina underwent massive changes. The development of the working classes shaped the direction of those changes by promoting democratization and economic redistribution. This text looks at the formation and weaknesses of the Argentine working classes during this period.

Democracy has always been an especially volatile form of government, and efforts to create it in places like Iraq need to take into account the historical conditions for its success and sustainability. In this book, Joel Horowitz examines its first appearance in a country that appeared to satisfy all the criteria that political development theorists of the 1950s and 1960s identified as crucial. This experiment lasted in Argentina from 1916 to 1930, when it ended in a military coup that left a troubled political legacy for decades to come. What explains the initial success but ultimate failure of democracy during this period? Horowitz challenges previous interpretations that emphasize the role of clientelism and patronage. He argues that they fail to account fully for the Radical Party government’s ability to mobilize widespread popular support. Instead, by comparing the administrations of Hipólito Yrigoyen and Marcelo T. de Alvear, he shows how much depended on the image that Yrigoyen managed to create for himself: a secular savior who cared deeply about the less fortunate, and the embodiment of the nation. But the story is even more complex because, while failing to instill personalistic loyalty, Alvear did succeed in constructing strong ties with unions, which played a key role in undergirding the strength of both leaders’ regimes. Later successes and failures of Argentine democracy, from Juan Perón through the present, cannot be fully understood without knowing the story of the Radical Party in this earlier period.

This extensive survey of migration in the modern world begins in the sixteenth century with the establishment of European colonies overseas, and covers the history of migration to the late twentieth century, when global communications and transport systems stimulated immense and complex flows of labour migrants and skilled professionals. In ninety-five contributions, leading scholars from twenty-seven different countries consider a wide variety of issues including migration patterns, the flights of refugees and illegal migration. Each entry is a substantive essay, supported by up-to-date bibliographies, tables, plates, maps and figures. As the most wide-ranging coverage of migration in a single volume, The Cambridge Survey of World Migration will be an indispensable reference tool for scholars and students in the field.

This is a social and political history of the Argentine landowners, for many decades Latin America's most affluent propertied class. Roy Hora develops a historically based view of how socio-economic and political change affected the landowners and was in turn affected by them between the 1860s and 1940s. He questions the excessively static picture of the landowners of the pampas, which unquestioningly accepts the image of power, lineage, and permanence given by both panegyrists and critics of the estancieros. Dr Hora challenges the view of a powerful, reactionary landed class, dominating the country's history from colonial times to the rise of Peronism in the 1940s. But he also challenges revisionist interpretations which seek to de-emphasize the central role played by the landowning class in the evolution of modern Argentina.

The years between 1930 and 1979 witnessed a period of intense labor activity in Latin America as workers participated in strikes, unionization efforts, and populist and revolutionary movements. The ten original essays AEMDNMOin this volume examine sugar mill seizures in Cuba, oil nationalization and railway strikes in Mexico, the attempted revolution in Guatemala, railway nationalization and Peronism in Argentina, Brazil's textile strikes, the Bolivian revolution of 1952, Peru's copper strikes, and the copper nationalization in Chile--all important national events in which industrial laborers played critical roles. Demonstrating an illuminating, bottom-up approach to Latin American labor history, these essays investigate the everyday acts through which workers attempted to assert more control over the work process and thereby add dignity to their lives. Working together, they were able to bring shop floor struggles to public attention and--at certain critical junctures--to influence events on a national scale. The contributors are Andrew Boeger, Michael Marconi Braga, Jonathan C. Brown, Josh DeWind, Marc Christian McLeod, Michael Snodgrass, Andrea Spears, Joanna Swanger, Maria Celina Tuozzo, and Joel Wolfe.

This is an exploration of how Latin America developed an alternative modernity during the early twentieth century, one that challenges the key assumptions of the Western dominant model.

An enlightening account of the entwined histories of knowledge and nationhood in Latin America—and beyond The rise of nation-states is a hallmark of the modern age, yet we are still untangling how the phenomenon unfolded across the globe. Here, Nicola Miller offers new insights into the process of nation-making through an account of nineteenth-century Latin America, where, she argues, the identity of nascent republics was molded through previously underappreciated means: the creation and sharing of knowledge. Drawing evidence from Argentina, Chile, and Peru, Republics of Knowledge traces the histories of these countries from the early 1800s, as they gained independence, to their centennial celebrations in the twentieth century. Miller identifies how public exchange of ideas affected policymaking, the emergence of a collective identity, and more. She finds that instead of defining themselves through language or culture, these new nations united citizens under the promise of widespread access to modern information. Miller challenges the narrative that modernization was a strictly North Atlantic affair, demonstrating that knowledge traveled both ways between Latin America and Europe. And she looks at how certain forms of knowledge came to be seen as more legitimate and valuable than others, both locally and globally. Miller ultimately suggests that all modern nations can be viewed as communities of shared knowledge, a perspective with the power to reshape our conception of the very basis of nationhood. With its transnational framework and cross-disciplinary approach, Republics of Knowledge opens new avenues for understanding the histories of modern nations—and the foundations of modernity—the world over.