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This article analyzes the causal mechanism that underlies conditional cash transfers, based on analysis of the implementation processes of the Universal Pay for Children of Argentina and the Family Allowances Regime (Equity Plan) of Uruguay. We carry out an in-depth study of how conditionalities are communicated to the recipients of both policies, how they are understood by them, and how noncompliance is sanctioned. The comparison between Argentina and Uruguay shows how each policy focuses on different stages of implementation. This accounts for two different ways of implementing conditionalities, each of which alters the causal chain through which conditionalities could modify recipients' behavior. The analysis questions the expectation that conditionalities can modify recipients' behavior and seeks to understand conditions under which such an expectation is reasonable. Este articulo analiza el mecanismo causal que subyace a las condicionalidades a partir del analisis de los procesos de implementacion de la Asignacion Universal por Hijo de Argentina y el Regimen de Asignaciones Familiares (Plan de Equidad) de Uruguay. Para ello, con el objetivo de aportar elementos sobre la relacion causal entre condicionalidades y el eventual cambio de comportamiento de las familias, aqui se profundiza en como las condicionalidades son comunicadas a los receptores de ambas politicas, como son entendidas por ellos, y como el incumplimiento es sancionado. La comparacion entre Argentina y Uruguay muestra como cada politica pone el foco en distintas etapas de su proceso de implementacion. Esto da cuenta de dos formas distintas de implementar las condicionalidades, alterando en forma distinta la cadena causal a traves de la cual las condicionalidades podrian modificar la conducta de los receptores. El analisis provee elementos para reflexionar sobre el grado en que es esperable que las condicionalidades de las politicas de transferencias logren los efectos deseados y en que condiciones es esto razonable., Introduccion En los ultimos veinte anos practicamente todos los paises de America Latina han adoptado politicas de transferencias monetarias condicionadas (PTC) para familias en situacion de indigencia o vulnerabilidad. Aunque [...]

We analyze Argentina's macroeconomic policy and performance between 2003 and 2013. The period began with a rapid recovery following the 2001-02 crisis. Recovery then turned into strong and sustained growth. By late 2011, despite a very favorable external context, Argentina entered a stagflationary trap. Facing a visible lack of foreign exchange, the authorities introduced and reinforced a series of controls, which did not prevent a currency crisis in late 2013 and early 2014. We argue that macroeconomic performance during the whole period was closely related to the way macroeconomic policy was conducted. More specifically, we claim that the shift from high growth to stagflation was due to a change in the approach to macroeconomic policy: from one aiming to preserve a stable and competitive real exchange rate and twin surpluses, to another one of populist orientation. Comparative Economic Studies (2015) 57, 369-400 doi:10.1057/ces.2015.3 published online 26 March 2015 Keywords: Argentina, macroeconomic policy, populism JEL Classification: E6, E5, F41, INTRODUCTION This paper analyzes macroeconomic policy and performance in Argentina between 2002 and 2013. This is a very interesting case study. The period began with a severe financial and debt [...]

Any system which gives so much power and so much discretion to a few men that mistakes--excusable or not--can have such far reaching effects is a bad system.... Mistakes, excusable [...]

This article engages critically with an emerging Brazilian research programme, 'varieties of capitalism and development in Latin America', a perspective which seeks to ascertain the institutional chances of, and limits to, the implementation of state-led 'national development strategies'. Adopting a critical political economy viewpoint, the text discusses the deficiencies inherent in this perspective and its neoinstitutionalist and neodevelopmentalist fundamentals. In particular, it questions the vision of the world economy as an arena of free competition and that of the nation-state as a 'collective actor', both of which are politically and analytically problematic. These criticisms are substantiated through evidence drawn from a case analysis of the recent trajectory of the Argentinian neodevelopmentalist project. Keywords Comparative capitalisms, development, neodevelopmentalism, varieties of capitalism, Argentina, Introduction This article seeks to contribute critically to the 'globalisation' of comparative capitalisms (CC) research by engaging with an emerging (predominantly) Brazilian research programme which seeks to put this field's [...]

In 1992, Argentine president Carlos Menem launched the convertible peso, fixing the national currency at a one-to-one value with the U.S. dollar. This artificially over-valued peso gave Argentines strong purchasing [...]

A demand-based theory of subnational debt bailouts is presented. It is shown that demand for bailouts among politicians with regional constituencies is affected by revenue sharing arrangements as a bailout implies a shift of taxation toward the federal tier. Automatic revenue sharing may lead to the formation of pro-bailout coalitions formed by indebted states and states that are net recipients of the revenue sharing arrangement. The model shows that the state debt bailouts approved by the Brazilian Senate prior to the enactment of the Fiscal Responsibility Act were consistent with politicians who maximize the proceeds accruing to their constituencies. (JEL H70, D70), I. INTRODUCTION A number of countries have undergone several rounds of bailouts of subnational government debts in the last decade. The Brazilian government, for instance, assumed the debts of the [...]

A study showing how the construction of political power in Argentina leads the empowerment of multiple actors towards adaptive, coordinated economic development is illustrated. San Juan's depoliticization approach stressed the ability of the government to centralize and insulate policy-making power and in contrast Mendoza's participatory restructuring approach helped improve upgrading capabilities and reshaped the relationships among the government.

The two competing views about intergovernmetnal fiscal transfers, one emphasizing on the traditional neoclassical approach to federal-subnational fiscal relations is compared with the other that suggests that transfers are contingent on the political fortunes and political vulnerability of each level of government, to assess the explanatory power of both. Data from Argentina is used to test these models, and findings suggest that the decision makers in federal countries must pay close heed to the need to synchronize institutional reforms and fiscal adjustment.

The impact of economic policies on capital stocks before 1998 in Argentina, from the use of production functions, is examined.

American banks were not prepared to note down the existing indebtedness piled up in 1970s. The complex of free-market policies started to be known as 'Washington Consensus'.

This paper analyzes the continued dollarization of the Argentine economy, which experienced a rapid decline in inflation following its hyperinflations of the 1980s. First, a measure of dollar currency circulating in Argentina is developed, thereby improving upon previous studies of dollarization and currency substitution that focused on dollar deposit holdings only. Second, cointegration analysis of peso money demand in Argentina finds a negative `ratchet effect' from inflation. The reduction in peso money demand attributable to the ratchet mirrors the estimated stock of all dollar assets held domestically by Argentine residents, consistent with the hypothesis of irreversible dollarization. Keywords: Argentina; Broad money; Cointegration; Currency substitution; Dollarization; Error correction; Hyperinflation; Irreversibility; Money demand; Ratchet effect

"The Argentina crisis will not provide an opportunity to make a break with the past and take the IMF in the new directions that director Horst Kohler has enunciated. Instead, the fund needs to accept that the humanitarian crisis in Argentina demands quick disbursement with relaxed conditionality."

"As 2002 came to an end, the Argentine economy seemed to have touched bottom after contracting more than 10 percent. But a robust recovery during 2003 will be blocked by many of the same forces that helped create Argentina's economic catastrophe: the hard-line stance of the IMF, the muddle that is Argentine politics, and a dispirited and politically disaffected populace."

Argentina began an international railroad privatization trend in 1991, when its Rosario to Bahia Blanca line was turned over to a private concession, and its example had been followed in [...]

"Until last December, we observed evidence of malnutrition in some 30 children per month. Today the monthly average is more than 40. When these children come in to the clinic, [...]

This article examines reasons for the failure of market reforms and their inability to produce prosperity and sustained growth in Mexico and Argentina, resulting in the economic meltdown in both countries. The author discusses policy reforms such as increased social spending supported by tax reform, and an end to corruption and support for small and medium sized businesses, which would require government's autonomy from business interests; the author finds that the market reform experiences in Argentina and Mexico simply reinforced political practices and the power structures that already existed, strengthening the personalized access of business owners to politicians and increasing their economic clout.

Argentina's current economic crisis is used as a backdrop to illustrate some fundamental economic principles, notably convertibility. The country set up a currency board ten years ago to peg the Argentinian peso to the United States dollar. This was viewed as an anti-inflationary device and a way to gain stability and respectability and end its reputation for hyper-inflation. However, the economy's underlying structural weakness reappeared as rising unemployment and shrinking real gross domestic product.

Implicit in the debate over dollarization are two very different views of the sequencing of policy measures. One view is that dollarization, to work smoothly and yield more benefits than costs, must wait on the completion of complementary reforms. The other view is that dollarization need not wait on these other reforms because the very act of dollarizing will produce the changes needed to smooth the operation of the new regime. In this paper I consider these arguments as they apply to the cases of labor market reform, fiscal reform, and financial sector reform. I conclude that neither theory nor evidence suggests that removing all scope for an independent monetary policy will necessarily accelerate the pace of reform., IN THE LITERATURE on dollarization, the issue of timing is touched on only obliquely. It might seem appropriate that timing is treated as a subsidiary issue. The key question is [...]

This article discusses the regulation of utilities which are traditionally considered monopolists, re-evaluating the role of the regulator by focusing on the case of Argentina. The authors suggest that regulators often have their own agendas, face political restrictions, lack the ability to make commitments thereby opening them up to opportunistic behavior and making regulation imperfect and failing to meeting social goals.

We posit that the fiscal behavior of Argentine provinces is determined by a common pool game at two levels: within each province, and across political units. In the latter game, the national government has a greater incentive than the provincial governments to internalize the negative externality of fiscal imprudence. Given relatively strong party discipline, the president is able to induce governors from his party to internalize a portion of the externality to a greater extent than opposition governors. In Argentina 'party matters' for fiscal behavior, but it does so for reasons different from those identified in studies of OECD countries.

Existing research has failed to address the impact of subnational polities on economic adjustment. This article attempts to fill this gap by outlining theoretical reasons for anticipating policy divergences across levels of government and by offering three hypotheses to account for variation at the subnational level. The authors explore these ideas on the basis of the Argentine experience. The study traces the impact of subnational policy on Argentine economic adjustment and tests hypotheses about subnational policy variation on the basis of provincial fiscal data. The authors' findings underline the importance of subnational policy choice for national performance and suggest a revised understanding of the role of political competition in the economic adjustment process. The authors find considerable evidence that interactions between party competition and the structure of the public sector shape provincial fiscal performance and thereby condition the capacity for economic adjustment at the national level.

Author's Abstract COPYRIGHT 1999 The Economic History Association. Did macroeconomic interventions make any contribution to Argentina's recovery from the Great Depression? Macroeconomic policy deviated from gold-standard orthodoxy after the final suspension of convertibility in 1929. Fiscal policy was conservative. Monetary policy became unorthodox after 1931, when the Caja de Conversion began rediscounting to sterilize gold outflows and avoid deflation. This change predated the creation of the central bank in 1935. A wider literature links the interwar depression in the core to flaws in the gold standard, and active monetary policy to escape from deflation and slump; our work extends this idea to the periphery.

The political impact of difficult economic conditions in the democracies of the developing world depends in part on how people at the grass roots evaluate their political interests. This article argues that understanding the political interests of lower-income persons requires two separate analyses: how people think about their material conditions, which is affected by the type of material hardships and the objective capacity to cope with those conditions; and how people think about politics, given party and class identities and economic, historic and political contexts. Using in-depth interviews in Argentina, the research develops an analytical framework through which to evaluate the conditions under which people would, and would not, support a government that does not alleviate their economic difficulties. The analysis is used to examine recent events in Argentina and is applied to other cases.

For the people of Argentina the 1980s were a frightening and disorganized period of social adjustment rooted in the unraveling of the 1985 Austral Plan, the state-led economic reorganization that [...]

Since the military took power in 1976, there has been a systematic effort to undermine the power of the labor movement, which was consolidated during the rule of populist leader [...]

Punished by years of high inflation, Argentines enthusiastically supported Menem's anti-inflationary Convertibility Plan. The government, however, utilized the success of the Plan to peddle a larger neoliberal shock program that [...]

Introduction Privatization is conceived as a drastic change in the role of government. Advocates of privatization maintain that the state administration should desist from production and pricing decisions, and instead [...]

Just how far can privatization be pushed, and with what consequences? Based on a study of Argentine railroads, this paper concludes that even large, unprofitable firms in developing countries faced with market failures can be privatized, but the gains from doing so depend on how badly the state enterprise was performing to begin with, and the potential for introducing competition in the market and for the market. The broader lesson is that when both market failures and government failures are present, a public-private solution is preferable to a purely private or a purely public Solution. Privatization is not a panacea but potentially a palliative, when it comes to reducing subsidies or coping with regulatory failures. Key words - privatization, regulation, railroads, infrastructure, Argentina, Latin America

An evaluation of Argentina's economic stabilization programs during the Menem administration reveals that policy makers do 'learn by doing' and that they do believe that stabilization is all but impossible to obtain. The study also supports evidence that leadership also plays a role in commercial policy success and that inflation determines the type of economic policy formulated.

I. INTRODUCTION In the past 15 years, there has been a major change in thinking about the appropriate economic role of state. Privatization of state-owned enterprises has been at the [...]

Mexico can solve its monetary problems in the Argentinian way by clearly defining its exchange rate regime. The problems originate from the incoherent monetary policy and half-hearted liberalization. Political parties take different approaches to the economic problems of the country. Argentina's national economy has improved considerably with the strict implementation of Mexico's Convertibility Law that enjoys the support of all major political parties. It has developed a sound currency and credit system which can be copied to solve the Mexican economic problems.

Latin American countries such as Brazil and Argentina experienced significant economic successes due mainly to their governments' liberal economic programs. However, the 1995 devaluation of the Mexican peso and its concomitant after-effects, have led many observers to question the effectiveness of such liberal economic programs. Many observers believe that Latin American countries should proceed slowly in implementing such programs to prevail a possible repeat of the Mexican currency crisis.