Contemporary Argentina: A Geographical Perspective

Since 1989, Argentina has experienced perhaps its most significant period of change since federation in 1880. Under the leadership of Carlos Menem and the Justicialista political party, contemporary Argentina is emerging from the chaos of long-term instability to reassert itself as a viable player in both regional and global systems.In this perceptive book, David Keeling analyzes Argentina's emergence within the modern world economy against the backdrop of the country's regional development processes. Combining systematic and area-based approaches, he discusses international and national trends that have shaped the social and economic geography of Argentina in profound and fundamental ways.Drawing on new material from recent demographic and economic censuses and on the Menem government's privatization and deregulation policies, Keeling asks whether participation in the new world economy has forced workers, communities, and cities in Argentina to downgrade environmental, labor, and social conditions. He also traces national economic and societal trends by region, showing how these trends will continue to affect regions and localities to the end of the decade and into the twenty-first century. Keeling concludes by assessing how changes in Argentina—a semi-peripheral country and emerging regional power—could affect the restructuring of its role in the new regional and world economies.