Ebook: The Poor's Struggle for Political Incorporation: The Piquetero Movement in Argentina

Book description:

How has the sociopolitical arena expanded to include the interests of the poor and the excluded strata of society? Putting poor people's movements into the long-term perspective of societal transformations produced by neoliberalism, this books studies unemployed people's struggle for their reincorporation into society as citizens and workers in Argentina.

- Presents a theory for understanding the cyclical pattern of expansion and contraction of the polity in Latin America
- Critically evaluates conceptual innovation in strategy making analysis from a historical and collective perspective
- Provides a comprehensive analysis of the largest movement of unemployed people in the world

Abstract:

This book offers an innovative perspective on the ever-widening gap between the poor and the state in Latin American politics. It presents a comprehensive analysis of the main social movement that mobilized the poor and unemployed people of Argentina to end neoliberalism and to attain incorporation into a more inclusive and equal society. The piquetero (picketer) movement is the largest movement of unemployed people in the world. This movement has transformed Argentine politics to the extent of becoming part of the governing coalition for more than a decade. Rossi argues that the movement has been part of a long-term struggle by the poor for socio-political participation in the polity after having been excluded by authoritarian regimes and neoliberal reforms. He conceptualizes this process as a wave of incorporation, exploring the characteristics of this major redefinition of politics in Latin America.

Reviews:

‘The wave of anti-austerity protest that spread globally in response to exclusionary neoliberal policies in the 2010s had, in Latin American social movements, a major source of inspiration which calls for more scientific reflection. Theoretically original and empirically rich, this volume provides a most valuable contribution in this direction, bridging social movement studies and historical institutionalism, through a critical conceptualization of contentious politics as a relational phenomenon.’ Donatella della Porta, Centre of Social Movements Studies, Scuola Normale Superiore

‘Federico M. Rossi’s study of the unemployed workers’ movement in Argentina sheds new light on the patterns of social mobilization that lie behind the political reincorporation of popular sectors following neoliberal reform in Latin America. Rossi explains how historical patterns of class-based corporatist representation have given way to new kinds of social actors, more territorial forms of collective action, and new repertoires of contentious politics. This book is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand how Argentina’s piqueteros and other grass-roots actors have reshaped state-society relations and constructed new forms of social citizenship that challenge market orthodoxy.’ Kenneth M. Roberts, Cornell University

‘The Poor People’s Struggle for Incorporation provides a refreshing new framework on how popular movements struggle within historical pendulums swaying between social exclusion and institutional access. Focusing on arguably one of the most potent social movements in contemporary Latin America, the unemployed workers’ movement, Rossi passionately demonstrates how economically marginalized groups negotiate the treacherous path toward inclusion through assertive and strategic interactions with the state, political parties, and ossifying corporatist structures. In short, The Poor People’s Struggle offers a fascinating new model on how to understand the complex terrain of social movement mobilizations in the age of free market driven globalization.’ Paul Almeida, University of California, Merced

‘Rossi’s book provides an excellent and detailed account of Argentina’s piquetero movement, and is recommended for any scholar or individual interested in Argentina’s recent political history. The work and analysis that went into sketching out each stage of the movement is extraordinary and interesting, and provides an example of a successful poor people’s movement … The consideration of the historical roots of strategies is appreciated and needed in social movement literature.’ Cynthia Williams, Mobilization

‘Rossi’s monograph is of considerable interest, providing a large body of information on political organization and social mobilization. Its conclusions parallel those of other researchers whose work is included in this issue of Latin American Perspectives, emphasizing how important political mobilization against neoliberal policies was in securing some limited but broad-based government services and income transfers to retirees, the unemployed, and low-income households.’ Ray Bromley, Latin American Perspectives

‘The main concepts used to construct this macro-historical narrative … makes a remarkable contribution to social movement studies by defining the notions of ‘repertoire of strategies’ and ‘stock of legacies’. Constructed around blind spots in Charles Tilly’s traditional notion of repertoire, these concepts are presented as crucial means by which to avoid a teleological perspective when looking at re-incorporation processes. … By emphasizing the process whereby social movements rely on the sedimentation of past struggles and their results, Rossi manages to dissipate the structuralist foundation of Tilly’s original concept.’ Tomás Gold, Journal of World-System Research

‘This important book makes an original contribution to answering the fundamental question of how we can understand the relationship between processes of mobilization and sociopolitical change. While the author studies this relationship in the context of Argentina, its lessons also apply to other Latin American countries.’ Juan Pablo Ferrero, Latin American Politics and Society

‘The Poor’s Struggle for Political Incorporation is a landmark text for those studying social movements in Latin America. It revisits and updates Collier and Collier’s (1991) classic study of the incorporation of labour movements by the state and parties in the mid 20th century … Rossi argues that early 21st century Latin America witnessed a second wave of incorporation following the disincorporation of labour movements under neoliberal regimes. Of key interest to geographers is Rossi’s argument that this second wave was primarily territorially based, rather than a labour based process.’ Sam Halvorsen, Antipode: A Radical Journal of Geography

‘One of this book’s main values, therefore, is its refreshing elements of theoretical innovation, which appear to be widely applicable beyond a specific case study. The non-teleological or normative perspective on incorporation is an effective framework for analysing contemporary Latin American macropolitical shifts. At the same time, the concepts of the repertoire of strategies and stock of legacies offer concrete tools that scholars of contentious politics, even beyond Latin America, will find useful in their own work. Another merit of the book is that it refrains from reading the Argentine case through the often-abused lenses of exceptionalism, instead situating the Piquetero movement in the context of broader transformations and macroprocesses of sociopolitical change.’ Lorenza Fontana, International Sociology

‘… la hipótesis del libro es que la intensa lucha de las organizaciones sociales de algunos colectivos activistas de América Latina, todos ellos perdedores netos de largas décadas de políticas de ajuste neoliberal y desindustrialización, desembocó en la segunda ola de incorporación social de excluidos en la historia reciente de América Latina.’ Salvador Martí i Puig, América Latina Hoy

‘Rossi proposes two central and novel concepts that help us to understand social movements as agents of change that act within institutional structures, of which their own trajectories of mobilisation are also part. The first concept is the repertoire of strategies, which includes not only the strategies of mobilisation outside the movement, but also those that help to construct the movement and keep people within it mobilised. The second is the stock of legacies, which includes all the practices the movement received from other social actors and previous political processes. These two concepts are very helpful in illustrating long term processes of social mobilisation and change.’ Carolina Cepeda Másmela, Journal of Latin American Studies

‘Rossi offers two main concepts to make sense of the movement’s trajectory: ‘stock of legacies’ and ‘repertoire of strategies.’ The former is understood as the sedimentation of experiences among activists, whose previous struggles shape the available strategies that their movements can deploy. The ‘repertoire of strategies’ is perhaps the book’s main contribution and the concept that social movement scholars might find more relevant and applicable to other settings. In a nutshell, this idea makes reference to the set of options that social movements employ to achieve their goals. The fruitfulness of the ‘repertoire of strategies’ is that it seeks to encompass not only contentious collective action, but also the non-contentious or collaborative relationships between social movements and governments…’ Pablo Lapegna, Social Movement Studies

‘Another valuable theoretical intervention is Rossi’s distinction between horizontal and vertical opportunity structures. … Without dismissing the notion of political opportunity, Rossi notes that scholars of contention need to pay attention to divisions among elites at different levels in a polity. For instance, concerning horizontal opportunities, he focuses on elites who wield the same relative institutional power within a particular policy area. Vertical opportunities differ, even though the policy area may be the same, but division may exist between actors who occupy different positions within a state’s institutional hierarchy. … This theoretical innovation will help scholars who study contention, especially in federal systems.’ Anthony Pahnke, Perspectives on Politics

‘El análisis de Rossi muestra que el problema de la incorporación no enfoca de modo directo en los mecanismos de integración social. En ese sentido, no implica una respuesta directa a la pregunta por la constitución de una sociedad más igualitaria ni la ampliación de un Estado de bienestar; permite dar cuenta, más bien, de la reorganización de la arena política a partir de una redefinición y expansión de los actores legítimos.’ Sebastián Pereyra, Revista de la Sociedad Argentina de Análisis Político

‘La obra de Federico Rossi muestra en profundidad el desarrollo y activación del movimiento piquetero en Argentina y cómo su impacto supuso un proceso de incorporación de un sector social antes excluido en el régimen político argentino, y lo compara con otras movilizaciones acontecidas en otros países de la región.’ Salvador Martí i Puig, Revista CIDOB d’Afers Internacionals