Summer 2002 Research Report Elena Shever Ripps Department of Anthropology "Producing Petroleum, Naturalizing the Nation"

 

Argentina celebrated its Independence Day on the ninth of July and marked 186 years since the country won independence from Spain. Although hands and buildings waved Argentina’s bright flag, it was not a particularly joyous occasion because of the dire economic situation in the country. The Argentine peso had sunk to nearly a fourth of its previous worth compared with the dollar, unemployment was above 20 percent and rising, the government had defaulted on $141 billion in public debts and there was little hope of assistance from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) any time soon. Within this bleak situation, many Argentines took that cold but sunny Tuesday as an opportunity to reflect on the history and current condition of their nation. The newspaper La Nación quoted one man’s comment that the national rituals of Independence Day “help to rediscover what unites us as a nation and as a country (patria)” (Barcia 2002). Yet numerous Argentines found the Independence Day observances, meant to invoke pride in their nation, out of date and irrelevant to their lives. The prevailing sentiment was one of frustration, loss and even despair at the situation in Argentina. One public festival intended to celebrate the day turned into a march of protest against the national government and the IMF.

The Argentine president, Edwardo Duhalde, attempted to dissipate the gloom with a message of hope for the future in his official Independence Day speech. He spoke about reconstruction of the country, recuperation of a national spirit and the achievement of a common destiny for all Argentines. “Argentina is in danger and on the edge of a epic collapse unlike any known before,” Duhalde declared. But he called on “all the social and political sectors to work together to return to being a free and sovereign nation” (Riva 2002). Duhalde’s talk about a “free and sovereign nation” contrasted sharply with a popular discourse about the sale of the nation that I encountered almost daily during my stay in Argentina. Again and again, people told me how the national government and private businesses had sold Argentina to foreign corporations. My interlocutors cited examples such as Havanna Alfajores, a favorite Argentine cookie, Aerolineas Argentina, the national airline, and the petroleum industry to illustrate the extensiveness and depth of the transformation from national autonomy to subordination that they felt. I was told that these and other formerly Argentine companies (both state-owned and private) were now under the control of foreign companies which did not have the interests of the nation in mind. These comments were usually followed by a sigh of sadness and disappointment that the Argentina that was once so great was falling, or being taken, apart.

The issue of national freedom and sovereignty come together especially powerfully in the history and present of the Argentine petroleum industry. While inhabitants of the territory that is now Argentina have known for centuries about the existence of the dark and sticky substance, the first commercial production of petroleum took place in the second half of the nineteenth century. The industry took off when a significant oil field was discovered beneath state-owned land in the Patagonia in 1907 (Solberg 1982:17). The discovery of oil at Comodoro Rivadavia initiated a conflict between privatization and national ownership of the natural resources found within the national territory. This conflict has taken several different forms over its long history, but it has always pitted those who claim that privatization of the petroleum industry means giving away a national treasure against those who argue that nationalization arrests the development of the nation.

At stake throughout the changes in regimes of rule and their different laws, policies and programs, is not only material wealth and human prosperity, but also the construction of the Argentine nation. By “construction of the nation” I mean the words and actions that aim to connect a heterogeneous group of people to each other and to a piece of land. These connections that make up the nation are constantly being created, contested and recreated through a diverse set of practices, including those of oil company employees, government officials, labor union members and Mapuche Indians. These and other Argentines are in effect asking and answering questions such as: Is Argentina a sovereign or dependent nation? Does it belong to the “developed” or “undeveloped” world? More specifically, what are the roles of people and nature in making and maintaining the Argentine nation? Does relinquishing control of natural resources, such as petroleum, signify the loss of national sovereignty? A destruction of the nation itself?

When Carlos Menem became president of Argentina in 1989, he criticized the long-standing idea of “petroleum as sovereignty” and began to treat the petroleum industry as an economic resource (Ravina et al. 2001:58). Since its formation in 1927, the mammoth state-owned petroleum company, Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales (YPF), had embodied the idea of national progress and independence. In the words of its first director, General Enrique Masconi, “YPF was, since its origin, a symbol of Argentine sovereignty” and “a further link of nationalism between all the inhabitants of the country” (Ravina et al. 2001:59, 42). During the 1990s, the national government privatized YPF and subsequently sold it to Repsol, the formerly national oil company of Spain. This radically transformed what was once a symbol and engine of national prosperity and sovereignty into a part of multinational company that operated in countries across the world. While the economic impact is becoming evident, still it is not clear what YPF’s sale means for the Argentine nation.

When I mentioned the recent changes in the petroleum industry in conversation, the response was repeatedly a lamentation that the nation’s resources and wealth had been sold to foreigners and that the nation was experiencing the unfortunate consequence. The price of gasoline, I learned, was higher in July of 2002 than every before in Argentine history. YPF was extracting petroleum from the Argentine subsurface at record rates, but exporting rather than selling it within Argentina. The enormous rise in unemployment among petroleum workers had led to economic decline, and consequently violent protests, in many formerly prosperous regions of the country. Popular critics argue that the sale of YPF has returned Argentina to a relationship of colonialism that it renounced more than a century before. The journalists Alfredo and Eric Calcagno observe that under Repsol´s control, YPF aims to “extract lots, explore little and export as much as possible.” They assert that “when is was privatized, the national and social policies yielded to the rules of the market; already they do not care about the country and its inhabitants: now only the law of profit rules” (Calcagno and Calcagno 2001:5). YPF’s privatization and reorganization under Repsol are reconstructing the national landscape in many ways. The company is transforming patters of production, consumption, employment, travel and communication within the Argentine territory and between Argentine citizens.

I found widespread agreement about the problems in YPF and the petroleum industry, but great disagreement over how Argentines should respond to the situation. Numerous people I spoke to seem resigned to the “loss of a national treasure” and its affiliated human suffering as well as the decline of the nation. On the other hand, some groups of Argentines have offered proposals to reclaim or repair the nation. The Movement for the Recuperation of the Nation’s Energy Direction aims to renationalize the petroleum industry so that it benefits Argentines rather than foreigners. The Association of Mapuche Organizations is fighting to restore authority over the Mapuche’s traditional territory and the petroleum resources below it. And in the oil rich province of Neuquén, there is a popular movement to secede from the national government to form a new provincial nation that can control over natural resources. A recent New York Times article quotes one Neuqueño as stating “They take everything from here, our oil and gas and lumber and minerals, and give us nothing in return except problems” (Rohter 2002). These are just three examples of groups who are claiming petroleum resources as an essential aspect of their efforts to remake the nation.
While investigating the petroleum industry in Argentina this summer, I often wondered what it meant to say that the Argentine nation was being sold. Why use this term shot through with capitalist implications to talk about an “imagined community” (Anderson 1991) as a tangible thing? How should we understand the connection between changes in the petroleum industry and transformations of the nation in our 21st century world? In my dissertation, I will return to Neuquén to investigate exactly how different groups use petroleum to define themselves and their interests, and in the process, make and remake their nation.

Works Cited:

Anderson, Benedict. 1991. Imagined communities: reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism. New York: Verso.

Barcia, Maricruz. 2002. "Los actos escolares, como hace un siglo." La Nación, July 9, 1,10.

Calcagno, Alfredo Eric, and Eric Calcagno. 2001. "Azaroso destino de YPF." Le Monde Diplomatique, Edición Cono Sur, July, 4-6.

Ravina, Aurora, Alejandro Cristófori, Gabriel A. Ribas, María Cristina San Román, Karin Grammatico, and Sergio Galiana. 2001. "Petróleo argentino: del nacionalismo a la privatización." Página/12, October.

Riva, Manuel. 2002. "En peligro y al borde del derrumbe." Clarín, July 10, 4.

Rohter, Larry. 2002. "Some in Argentina see secession as the answer to economic peril." New York Times, August 27, A1,9.

Solberg, Carl E. 1982. Petróleo y nacionalismo en la Argentina. Buenos Aires: Emecé Editores.