The great exchange rate debate after Argentina

In this paper I discuss in what way, if any, the collapse of Argentina’s experience with a currency board has affected the policy debate on the appropriate exchange rate regime in emerging and transition countries. More specifically, I deal with three issues: (1) I discuss some important aspects of the Argentine experience; (2) I provide a comparative evaluation of economic performance under strict dollarization; and (3) I analyze emerging countries’ experiences with flexible exchange rates, including the issue of “fear of floating.”     

Corporate discourse and environmental performance in Argentina

There is substantial research and policy interest in the relationship between firms and the natural environment, including how this relationship is influenced by regulators, international pressures, rival firms and stakeholder demands. With some exceptions, the ‘softer’ dimensions of environmental aspect management – how attitudes, beliefs and perceptions and the human factors drive corporate behaviour – have been understudied. The work that exists tends to be informal, and allows little scope for the statistical validation that is required for robust inference. This paper examines whether corporate values towards the environment affect a firm's environmental performance. It uses survey methods as well as content and discourse analyses of interview text and corporate reports and web sites to explore the links between managerial ‘mindsets’ and the environmental performance of the firms of which they are a part. Though the application is Argentina, the lessons learned can be generalized to other developing and industrialized countries. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

Argentina: Inflation, Income Distribution and Class Conflict

Mrs Thatcher's slow progress in freeing the economy shows how little she has learned from the failure of attempts abroad. The lesson of Argentina is that she will have to buy support for her policies by creating groups with a direct interest in her success.     

Federal budget allocation in an emergent democracy: evidence from Argentina

This paper studies the determinants of the distribution of the national budget amongst Argentinean provinces. We evaluate the relevance of the alternative theories of budget allocation using the Arellano–Bond dynamic panel technique. Our results confirm our presumption that Federal funds allocations are dominated by the Executive and the governors while the Congress plays a minor role. Unlike some findings for the US, neither the overrepresentation variables nor the congressional theories find support in our sample. Our paper fills the gap in the literature on Argentina’s fiscal federalism deficient in analysis of the decision making process of the National Budget. This paper is based on a chapter of Osvaldo Meloni’s Ph.D. thesis at the Universidad de San Andrés.     

Firms’ linkages with public research organisations in Argentina: Drivers, perceptions and behaviours

This paper analyses firms’ drivers for linking to public research organisations (PRO) (first goal) and compares perceptions and behaviours of linked vs. unlinked firms (second goal). We used an original firm database constructed from a representative survey with information for linked and unlinked firms for year 2005 in Argentina. Drivers were estimated using a Probit model, while differences in perceptions and behaviours between linked and unlinked firms were assessed with propensity score matching techniques. For our first goal we found that (i) firms’ knowledge bases were not drivers for linking to PRO and (ii) networking capabilities matter but there is a substitution effect between interacting with PRO and interacting with other economic agents in the market when firms aim at exchanging information rather than doing joint research. These findings may imply that current linkages are not exploiting properly their knowledge potential; it may be worth designing a division of labour among PRO in their functions in PRO-industry interactions. For our second goal: we found that (i) linked firms invest more in innovative activities; (ii) they are more prone to patenting; (iii) both groups of firms value similarly PRO research outputs available at arm length (i.e. without direct linking). Given the asymmetric development on appropriability tools between PRO and firms and the fact that all firms benefit from PRO research outputs, the higher predisposition of linked firms towards patenting, suggests that special attention should be placed at analysing the risks of a private appropriation of publicly created knowledge.     

Impact of increased external debt servicing on government budgetary priorities: The case of Argentina

As external debt servicing has increased, developing countries have been forced to re-evaluate programs in an effort to curtail government spending. This paper attempts to examine the character of the sectoral adjustments that have taken place (1961–1982) in the main functional areas of Argentinean government expenditures. In general, it appears that social services, particularly education and health along with public administration, have borne the brunt of the government's rising debt service problem. The social sectors have suffered further due to regime changes, with military regimes tending to cut back even more severely allocations to the social sectors than normal debt service constraints would have warranted.     

State-society relations and national development: a comparison of Argentina and Taiwan in the 1990s

Research on national development in developing and newly industrializing countries (NICs) has focused on issues of economic growth and social change independent of each other, without paying much attention to the way the two elements relate to each other and to the conditions that could lead to their simultaneous occurrence. This paper argues that explanations of how economic growth with — or without —‘positive social change’ can occur require attention to changing state-society relations. This research investigates the cases of Argentina and Taiwan, where economic growth in the 1990s has not translated into positive social change. By analyzing changing state-society relations, this research shows that relations of power within societies have a clear effect on national development; it also reveals how different social actors may be able to influence a state’s developmental strategies. This paper re-evaluates traditional views of the state and society in Argentina and Taiwan by examining the fluctuating composition of the societal base of the state and the changing relations between the state and its societal coalition. The analysis reveals the processes under which economic growth without social change is occurring in both countries, and provides general insights into the way dynamic state-society relations can influence national development in other contexts. — La recherche sur le développement national des pays en voie de développement et les pays nouvellement industrialisés a exploré les questions de croissance économique et de changement social séparément, sans s’occuper du rapport entre les deux et des conditions qui pourraiemt mener à leur occurrence simultanée. Cet article soutient qu’une explication de la croissance industrielle, avec ou sans ‘changements sociaux positifs’, demande que l’on prête attention aux relations changeantes entre l’état et la société. Cet article examine les cas d’étude de l’Argentine et de Taï?wan, où la croissance économique n’a pas apporté de changements sociaux positifs. En analysant les relations changeantes de l’état et de la société, cette étude démontre que les relations de pouvoir à l’intérieur des sociétés ont un effet manifeste sur le développement national; elle révèle aussi comment les différents participants sociaux peuvent influencer les stratégies de développement de l’état. Cet article ré-évalue les vues traditionnelles de l’état et de la société en Argentine et à Taïrsquo;?wan en examinant les compositions changeantes de la base sociale de l’état et les relations variables entre l’état et sa coalition sociale. L’analyse révèle les processus par lesquels la croissance économique survient sans changement social dans les deux pays et offre un aperçu général de la façon dont les relations dynamiques entre l’état et la société peuvent influencer le développement national dans d’autres contextes.     

A Tale of two narratives: assessing the sociological hypothesis of the appeal of the US dollar in Argentina

Quality & Quantity - A remarkable feature of the Argentinean economy is the widespread use of the US dollar as a measure of value, storage of value and in several high-end markets, as a medium...     

Comparing modes of privatisation: a study of the telecommunications sectors in Argentina and Mexico, 1990–2000

This article examines the variation in the post‐privatisation pattern of labour and employment relations in the telecommunications sectors of Argentina and Mexico. The findings suggest that the initial mode of privatisation—negotiated vs. imposed reform—shaped changes in employment, subcontracting and work rules in the period following privatisation. The research also suggests, however, that negotiated reform is more likely to emerge only when certain political incentives are present.     

Privileged Accumulation Spaces and Restrictions on Development of State‐Business Relations in Argentina (1966–1989)

The aim of this work is to explain how the state‐business relation has influenced economic development in Argentina. I will make a historical and systemic analysis of the Argentinian case to illustrate how and why state‐business relations supporting privileged accumulation spaces (PAS) increased development restrictions from 1966 to 1989. During this period, successive governments shared a common view about the central role the state had to perform for industrialization, especially by supporting the growth of big domestic industrial companies. This view would only radically change in 1989, when neoliberal structural reforms were implemented. To support this hypothesis, I suggest a methodological strategy that combines several techniques and sources in order to analyze the evolution of three complex variables and their multiple relations: state economic intervention, business behavior, and performance by large corporations.