Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-7cvxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T04:22:16.653Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Fast, clean and green: Cold War ideologies and urban reforms in Buenos Aires, 1976–1983

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 August 2015

JENNIFER T. HOYT
JENNIFER T. HOYT*
Affiliation:
Department of History, Berry College, PO Box 5010, Mount Berry, GA 30149, USA
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract:

The last military dictatorship to come to power in Argentina is most well known for its atrocious human rights violations. However, this campaign of terror represents just one act carried out in the regime's efforts to counter leftist activities. The military sought to provide responsive administration as a means to pacify the nation. In the national capital, Buenos Aires, the military pursued a comprehensive set of urban reforms meant to streamline and control the metropolis. Cold War ideologies deeply penetrated the every-day and profoundly changed how citizens lived in Buenos Aires.

Type
Research Article
Information
Urban History , Volume 42 , Issue 4 , November 2015 , pp. 646 - 662
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 The Montoneros supported the return of exiled populist president Juan Perón. However, they increasingly incorporated Cuban revolutionary tactics into their activities. The Ejército Revolucionario del Puebelo was an expressly Communist-Marxist group that allied with labour groups. Gillespie, R., Soldiers of Perón: Argentina's Montoneros (Oxford, 1982), 29–30, 41Google Scholar; Childs, M.D., ‘An historical critique of the emergence and evolution of Ernesto Che Guevara's foco theory’, Journal of Latin American Studies, 27 (1995), 596–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Lewis, P.H., Guerrillas and Generals: The ‘Dirty War’ in Argentina (Westport, 2002), 39–48Google Scholar.

2 For more on the Dirty War, see Mignone, E.F., Witness to the Truth: The Complicity of Church and Dictatorship in Argentina, 1976–1983 (Maryknoll, 1988)Google Scholar; Fisher, J., Mothers of the Disappeared (Boston, MA 1989)Google Scholar; Hodges, D.C., Argentina's ‘Dirty War’: An Intellectual Biography (Austin, 1991)Google Scholar; Bouvard, M. Guzman, Revolutionizing Motherhood: The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo (Wilmington, 1994)Google Scholar; Taylor, D., Disappearing Act: Spectacles of Gender and Nationalism in Argentina's Dirty War (Durham, NC, 1997)Google Scholar; Seoane, M., El dictador: la historia secreta y público de Jorge Rafael Videla (Buenos Aires, 2001)Google Scholar; Lewis, Guerrillas and Generals; Feitlowitz, M., A Lexicon of Terror: Argentina and the Legacies of Torture (New York, 2011)Google Scholar.

3 Many Latin American militaries of the late 1960s and 1970s embraced this broader conceptualization of their mission. Throughout the region, armed forces found it necessary to intervene in the state and take control to prevent complete economic and social collapse. Loveman, B. and Davies, T.M. Jr (eds.), The Politics of Antipolitics: The Military in Latin America, 2nd edn (Lincoln, 1989), 8–9, 307–12Google Scholar; and Pion-Berlin, D., ‘The national security doctrine, military threat perception and the ‘Dirty War’ in Argentina’, Comparative Political Studies, 21 (1988), 382–407CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 ‘Bases para la intervención de las fuerzas armadas en el proceso nacional’, in Compendio de documentos del Proceso de Reorganización Nacional (Buenos Aires, 1976), 5.

5 Ibid.

6 ‘Discurso del Excmo. Señor Presidente de la Nación Argentina, Teniente General Jorge Rafael Videla, pronunciado el día martes, 30 de marzo’, in Compendio, 28. At the time, President Juan Perón had greatly expanded the state in an effort to co-opt workers. He provided unprecedented support through state agencies that improved working conditions and expanded social welfare services (education, housing and health). Rock, D., Argentina, 1516–1987: From Spanish Colonization to Alfonsín, revised and expanded edn (Berkeley, 1987), 283–7Google Scholar.

7 Compendio, 29; ‘Mensaje del Presidente de la República, Teniente General D. Jorge Rafael Videla, pronunciado el 22 de Abril de 1976, en el Comando del Tercer Cuerpo de Ejercito’, in Compendio, 33.

8 ‘Discurso del Exmo. Señor Presidnete de la Nación Argentina Teniente General D. Jorge Rafael Videla (24 may 76)’, in Compendio, 41; ‘Discurso del Señor Presidente de la Nación Teniente General D. Jorge Rafael Videla en la primera conferencia de gobernadores organizada por el Ministerio del Interior y qué se efectuo en salones de la Sala de Representantes (01 jul 76)’, in Compendio, 48.

9 ‘Discurso del Exmo Señor Presidente. . .(24 may 76)’, 39; ‘Discurso del Señor Presidente de la Nación. . .(01 jul 76)’, 47–51.

10 ‘Discurso del Excmo. Señor Presidente. . .30 de marzo’, 29. Paul H. Lewis provides an extensive analysis of the Proceso regime's favouring of technical expertise and the resulting technocratic character of policies implemented. Lewis, P.H., ‘The right and military rule, 1955–1983’, in Deutsch, S.M. and Dolkart, R.H. (eds.), The Argentine Right: Its History and Intellectual Origins, 1910 to the Present (Wilmington, 1993), 147–9Google Scholar.

11 Lewis, P.H., The Crisis of Argentine Capitalism (Chapel Hill, 1990), 450–7Google Scholar.

12 Buchanan, P.G., ‘The varied faces of domination: state terror, economic, policy, and social rupture during the Argentine “Proceso”, 1976–1981’, American Journal of Political Science, 31 (1987), 11–13CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

13 Snow, P.G. and Manzetti, L., Political Forces in Argentina, 3rd edn (Westport, 1993), 109–10Google Scholar.

14 Castiglione, M., La militarización del estado en la Argentina (1976/1981) (Buenos Aires, 1992), 30, 54–5Google Scholar.

15 ‘Cacciatore, el militar que cambió la ciudad’, La Nación, 30 Jul. 2007; and Potash, R.A., The Army and Politics in Argentina, 1968–1973 (Stanford, 1980), 71–3, 314–16Google Scholar.

16 ‘El brigadier Cacciatore asumió en [sic] al Intendencia’, La Nación, 3 Apr. 1976. Emphasis added.

17 Approximately 3 million people called the Capital Federal home at this time, with the remaining 8 million residing in Greater Buenos Aires.

18 Laura, G.D., 10,000 kilómetros de autopistas por 10 centavos (Buenos Aires, 1999), 151–2Google Scholar.

19 Laura, G.D., La ciudad arterial (Buenos Aires, 1970), 26, 90Google Scholar.

20 Ibid., 25–6, 48.

21 Ibid., 23.

22 Laura looked to the experiences of Philadelphia, Chicago, New York City, Los Angeles, Detroit and municipalities in Germany and Australia. Laura, G.D., El cinturón ecológico (Buenos Aires, 1978), 40, 42, 49, 53–6Google Scholar.

23 50,000 hectares was hardly an arbitrary number. In fact, Laura based that figure on recommendations made by the National Recreation Association of the United States. According to this association, cities should have at least one acre of open park space for every 100 residents in a city. Buenos Aires had a metropolitan population of 11 million at this time, so that would make for a total of almost 45,000 hectares needed. Ibid., 40.

24 The Highway Plan was part of the Código de Planeamiento Urbano (Urban Planning Code), approved in 1977 and put into action May of that year. Municipalidad de Buenos Aires, Código de planeamiento urbano (Buenos Aires, 1977).

25 Lewis, The Crisis, 455.

26 Autopista 25 de Mayo, Autopista Perito Moreno: Red de Autopistas Urbanas (Buenos Aires, 1978), 8–9.

27 ‘Buenos Aires’, Summa, 114 (1977), 23.

28 The offices of Autopistas Urbanas, SA, which built and still manages the highways to this day, are located at Piedras 1260, one of the commercial spaces under the 25 de Mayo highway. Unfortunately, a significant portion of these spaces goes unused or facilities lie in disrepair.

29 Aside from short extensions being added to Line E in 1967 and 1973, no significant expansion had taken place in recent decades. Hunt, P.J., História de los subtes de Buenos Aires (Buenos Aires, 1998), 126Google Scholar.

30 Autopista 25 de Mayo, 7.

31 de Hoz, J.A. Martínez, Bases para una Argentina moderna, 1976–80 (Buenos Aires, 1981), 49–50Google Scholar.

32 ‘25 de Mayo’ referred to the day in 1810 when inhabitants of the Río de la Plata viceroyalty established an independent government, the Primera Junta, in a move that preceded Argentina's eventual independence from Spain. ‘Perito Moreno’ recognized the contributions of Francisco Pascasio Moreno (1852–1919; also known as Perito Moreno), an explorer and naturalist who travelled extensively through Patagonia.

33 Municipalidad de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires, Autopista 25 de Mayo (AU1), Autopista Perito Moreno (AU6) de la Red de Autopistas Urbanas: Licitación nacional e internacional para la concesión de la obra por el sistema de peaje (Buenos Aires, 1978), 61.

34 Ibid., 37; ‘Habilitarían en 1980 dos de las autopistas metropolitanas’, La Nación, 15 Jun. 1978.

35 ‘Se inauguran hoy las autopistas urbanas’, La Nación, 6 Dec. 1980. Archbishop Aramburu maintained a close relationship with the Proceso regime as he supported their extreme efforts to rid the nation of Marxist influence. Burdick, M.A., For God and Fatherland: Religion and Politics in Argentina (Albany, 1996), 233–4Google Scholar.

36 ‘Velocidad en las autopistas’, La Nación, 3 Dec. 1980; ‘Habilitarán hoy las autopistas’, La Nación, 5 Dec. 1980; ‘Las expropriaciones y las obras’, La Nación, 5 Dec. 1980; ‘Los factores que ofrecen seguridad en la conducción’, La Nación, 5 Dec. 1980; and ‘Emergencias’, La Nación, 5 Dec. 1980.

37 ‘Se inauguran las autopistas urbanas’, La Nación, 7 Dec. 1980.

38 Laura, El cinturón, 45. Martin Melosi also picks up on this theme with his discussion of trash disposal in the United States in the post-World War II period. Melosi, M., The Sanitary City: Environmental Services in Urban America from Colonial Times to the Present (Pittsburgh, 2008), 201CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

39 CEAMSE's board of directors consisted of public authorities, including Guillermo Laura, the minister of government for the province, the minister of public works for the province, and the secretary of government for the Capital Federal. Cinturón Ecológico del Área Metropolitana, SE, Memoria general y balance 1977 (Buenos Aires, 1977), 1.

40 Cinturón Ecológico del Área Metropolitana, SE, Memoria 1979 (Buenos Aires, 1979), Annex II and III.

41 Prignano, Á.O., Crónica de la basura porteña: del fogón indígena al cinturón (Buenos Aires, 1998), 151Google Scholar.

42 ‘Cinturón Ecológico Área Metropolitano’, Construcciones, 279 (1979), 34–5; and ‘Inauguración en el Cinturón Ecológico’, La Nación, 28 Apr. 1979.

43 ‘Bosque artificial’, La Nación, 13 Jun. 1979.

44 CEAMSE, Memoria y balance general 1980 (Buenos Aires, 1980), 14Google Scholar.

45 CEAMSE, Memoria y balance general 1981 (Buenos Aires, 1981), 9–10Google Scholar.

46 CEAMSE, Memoria 1979 (Buenos Aires, 1979), 16Google Scholar.

47 ‘Cinturón Ecológico Área Metropolitano’, 34–5.

48 CEAMSE, Memoria 1979, 19.

49 Scholars have explored the effect the projects had on lower-income neighbourhoods, namely the villas de emergencia (shantytowns), but this tells only part of the story. The letters reprinted in newspapers show widespread discontent among the middle class, the target recipients of the reforms’ benefits. Yujnovksy, O., Claves políticas del problema habitacional argentino, 1955–1981 (Buenos Aires, 1984)Google Scholar; Clichevsky, N., Schapira, M.F.P. and Schneier, G., Loteos populares, sector inmobilario y gestión local en Buenos Aires: el caso del municipio de Moreno (Buenos Aires, 1990)Google Scholar; and Oszlak, O., Merecer la ciudad: los pobres y el derecho al espacio (Buenos Aires, 1991)Google Scholar.

50 ‘El proyecto de la Autopista Perito Moreno’, La Nación, 16 Oct. 1980; and ‘Autopistas’, La Prensa, 30 Dec. 1980.

51 ‘La avenida subterránea’, La Nación, 19 Nov. 1979.

52 ‘Austeridad y autopistas’, La Prensa, 27 Apr. 1979; and ‘Inflación y autopistas’, La Nación, 5 Dec. 1979.

53 ‘Un proyecto al margen de ideas urbanísticas’, La Nación, 8 Nov. 1978.

54 ‘La recolección de residuos’, La Nación, 18 Jan. 1979; ‘Limpieza de la ciudad’, La Nación, 7 Feb. 1979; and ‘Recolección de residuos’, La Nación, 31 Jan. 1980.

55 ‘Smog todavía’, La Nación, 30 Dec. 1979; and ‘Hollín’, La Nación, 18 Jan. 1980.

56 The green belt eventually drew severe criticisms from those living in the immediate vicinity. In the late 1990s, families living close by reported startling rates of disease among children, indicating that deteriorating refuse had polluted soil and water supplies. ‘La disposición final dónde yacen los residuos’, in La gran ciudad: planeamiento estratégico para la Región Metropolitana de Buenos Aires (Buenos Aires, 2004), 51–2; and Shammah, C., El circuito de los residuos: los basurales a cielo abierto (Buenos Aires, 2009), 71, 162–3Google Scholar.