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P r e f a c e t o t h e F i r s t E n g l i s h - L a n g u a g e E d i t i o n With this book, I hope to offer English-speaking readers a broad overview of Argentina’s contemporary history and of the country’s current problems, such as they at present appear to be. The book was originally written for students and the general public in Argentina, that is, for people who, it was assumed , knew little about Argentine history. Thus, I have sought above all to explain with clarity processes and events that were enormously complex. I have based my conclusions not only on my own scholarship but also on that of my fellow historians—the best of them—and I cannot say what it is that is original in this book, save a personal viewpoint, a perspective, and a synthesis. I do not know whether I have managed to offer a profound analysis, but I do believe I have succeeded in offering a clear one, a book that can be read to good effect by students and all those interested in the past trajectory and future of Argentina. This English-language edition coincides with the publication of the second edition of the Spanish-language one. For the second edition, I added a new chapter dealing with the ten years (1989‒99) of the government of Carlos Saúl Menem, a decade we Argentines refer to as the menemato. This new chapter brings with it the problems that are unavoidable in dealing with so recent an experience. On examining those years, I realized that I lacked the generosity and impartiality that I believe I achieved in analyzing earlier periods , even those I lived intensely. Although if I have detested anything in my life, it is the menemato, I am fully aware that such strong feelings are not the best path to understanding. I was helped in overcoming my biases by some recent excellent studies on economic policies and reform of the state during the Menem years. Nonetheless, it was not easy for me to integrate as rigorous xvii an analysis on that other very characteristic dimension of Menem’s government : the dimension dealing with the singular behavior of the ex-president Menem, his family, friends, and cronies, that is to say, the members of the gang that for ten years governed the country. I have simply attempted to provide as much objectivity as I am capable of on these controversial aspects of our recent history. As I said in the Preface, I wrote this book thinking of my children, of Argentina’s students, and of all those young people who needed to know something about what happened in our country, With this translation, I am thinking of those in the United States and those in other countries who are able to read about this history in the English language. We live in a world in which national borders are becoming increasingly blurred. This brings with it both a risk and an opportunity. The risk is the temptation to enclose oneself in what is familiar, whether it be the individual or the nation, and resist those changes, which are indeed in many cases negative, wrought by so-called globalization. The opportunity resides in the quest to understand the other and to struggle together to build a better world. I only hope this book is taken as a gesture in support of that struggle. James Brennan is one of those who believes in such collaboration across national borders and in the possibility that men and women of good faith can improve this terrible world we live in. He thought he saw something of interest in this book and expended great efforts to find a publisher interested in translating it. Most important, he himself accepted the most difficult part of the undertaking: to translate it. Jim is well known to professors and students in Argentina. We value his multilayered and comprehensive studies and also his personal qualities, his generosity and modesty, qualities that are sadly uncommon nowadays. I am deeply grateful to him. Luis Alberto Romero Buenos Aires, May 2001 Preface to the First English-Language Edition xviii ...

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