Field and State in the Argentine pampas. The perspective of agrarian actors in regards of state intervention in the sector (province of Buenos Aires, 2007-2020)

Abstract

The tensions between the main agricultural associations and the State have assumed an important role in the media, political and academic agenda in recent decades in Argentina, mainly from the so-called "countryside conflict" of 2008. However, the representations of different social actors that play a leading role in agricultural production on the state intervention have been scarcely studied. In a context in which the role of the State in the regulation of the economy assumes a new role as from the crisis unleashed by Covid-19 throughout the world, the approach of the relationship between the State and a strategic sector of the Argentine economy as the agro-exporter, assumes great relevance. The main of this paper is to adress the perspective of agricultural actors in the Argentinean pampas on the State and its actions linked to the agricultural sector. We analyze data from focus groups and in-depth interviews carried out between 2007 and 2020 with different types of agrarian subjects from eight counties of the province of Buenos Aires, located in areas with different agro-ecological conditions and productive profiles. The predominance of a consensus contrary to state intervention is verified, but also the existence of demands and tensions that run through the discourses and allow us to glimpse the possibility of recovering and promoting the debate on the link between the State and the "countryside"