Nancy R. Powers,Grassroots Expectations of Democracy and Economy: Argentina in Comparative Perspective. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2001. xvi + 296 pp. $19.95 paper; Paula Alonso,Between Revolution and the Ballot Box: The Origins of the Argentine Radical Party. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. xiii + 242 pp. $52.95 cloth.

Extract

The Argentine political system has provided a source of endless debate for scholars pondering the enigmas of this anguished nation. Thanks to media coverage of the current Argentine crisis, a concerned public around the world has become interested in understanding the roots of the country's recent troubles. Two new academic works provide excellent guides through the complexities of Argentine politics that will reward attention from specialists and a more general scholarly audience. Political scientist Nancy R. Powers explores popular reactions to Argentine democracy and neoliberal economics during the early 1990s. Focusing on events a century earlier, historian Paula Alonso investigates the rise of the Radical Party, an organization that became one of Argentina's two major parties in the twentieth century. Both authors offer rich accounts of political orders undergoing uneasy transitions.