Beyond Clientelism: The Piquetero Movement and the State in Argentina

Abstract

The piqueteros, Argentina’s unemployed workers’ movement, emerged in 1996. Since then it has been one of the main contentious actors in the resistance to neoliberal reforms and in the struggle for the reincorporation of the popular sectors in Argentina’s sociopolitical arena for almost two decades. The name piqueteros (picketers) is based on the type of protest action that brought the movement to the public’s awareness: the picketing/blocking of the country’s main roads in their demand for jobs, unemployment subsidies, food, etc. In their struggle, the piqueteros needed to deal with a wide array of actors, such as elected and appointed public officials, informal party and union brokers, the police, churches, and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). The purpose of this chapter is to present the basic features of the piqueteros’ relationship with state institutions. I first show the limitations of the clientelism-based explanation of the interactions between the piqueteros and state institutions. I then propose an alternative logic for the pattern of interaction in question, which is based on two elements: the evolution of public policies and the territorially based dispute between the movement and other political actors. I also briefly analyze the strategic interaction between the state and the main piquetero social movement organizations (SMO)s.