Colegio Secundario Santo Tomás de Aquino

Materia: Social Studies

Nombre y apellido del profesor: Zyska Magalí and Flores Espinoza María

How did the ISI Model affect the infrastructure in our cities?

Nombre del alumno: Lipnjak Simonelli Alan Paris

Curso: D

Año: 5
 How did the ISI Model affect the infrastructure in our cities?

The topic that I chose for my thesis is the ISI Model, and how it has made an impact on
infrastructure in our nation. Relating this to the three subjects; geography, politics and
history. My tutor is going to be Maria Flores Espinoza

History: The topic that will be used for developing this area is the international division of
labor. Argentina used this method that was used for the first time in England. This system
consisted of importing the best product or service that a country can give. For example,
meat, corn, and cereals.
Furthermore, I would like to talk about President Peron’s charge and how he managed to
keep pushing the country forward.

Geography: This can be related with the geographical location of the neighborhood. The
nation started new houses and buildings around the different factories. Changes in the city
are seen and people must adapt to them.

Politics: It is related to politics as people who voted Peron had benefits for themselves. The
ones who voted for another candidate did not receive this kind of benefit.

Introduction:
 The ISI model in Argentina has made an impact in both ways, positively and
negatively. It allowed the country to make a great development in transportation
infrastructure for various means of transport and textile industries. Considering this, people
had to invest more money in the rural areas for exportation. The issue was as we had as
priority the railways, ports and roads to make, other areas of infrastructure had been affected
due to the lack of diversification, so less money was invested in other sectors. The country
went down in boosting and making other areas of infrastructure. However, they were very
successful in rural areas, it was a great idea at that time for having easier access to send
products abroad. Argentina’s process of industrialization was highly increasing and the
sovereignity of the whole country was doing it too but in the end not everything was so
bright.

The process of import substitution industrialization was used by Argentina after the
Fall of Wall Street, as many banks of the U.S and the whole world were impacted by the
exaggerated crash of the New York Stock Exchange bank. It was such a bankruptcy that it
delivered businesses, trading and a lot of money, only a memory. The reason why it went
down was due to tons of speculation, people who invested their savings or the ones that
borrowed money from others.

Furthermore, what I intend for this thesis is to answer the following question; How
did the ISI model affect the infrastructure in our cities? For this research, I will use an
extended variation of sources and videos seen by myself to be better informed.

Nevertheless, I will also use the information that my relatives can give me, full of
experiences and anecdotes. The feedback that I am going to receive will help myself to have
objective opinions and will provide fair and objection to the events.

I strongly support that the ISI Model is a great method for boosting and developing
the buildings and economics of our nation. With this economic policy, the goods imported
were reduced and more local goods were used in order to be less dependent on the
products of other countries. In addition, the government does not have the need of spending
much money on paying the taxes that importing products from abroad would mean.

As I said before, what ISI intends is to fully develop the national companies and
domestic industries so that these can compete with imported products from multinational
companies. By contrast, ISI is directly counter to the advantage concept that occurs when
countries specialize in producing goods at a lower opportunity cost and export them.

State of the Art:

 For this research, I will use many different sources that in the following paragraphs
will be specified. Undoubtedly, I will not use as my main reference my personal opinion and
knowledge as it would be very disrespectful and inappropriate for the research due to the
subjectivity that my opinion would present.

To start with, I will use as my first big source, the book “Transforming Labor-Based
Parties in Latin America ( Argentine Peronism in Comparative Perspective) written in 2009
by Steven Levitsky. Published by Cambridge’s University Press, certainly in Massachusetts.
This book is perfect for giving a concept for those who have a little knowledge about the
topic and need a base for understanding it. This article will provide how the Argentinian
government, headed by Peron, managed to use the ISI model for reducing the consumption
of exported products and historical events.

For contrasting, I am definitely going to mention why the ISI model had its negative
and bad effects and ended up in failure and for using different points of view, I will use an
article/thesis written in 2009 by Hernán Fair. This article mentions plenty of vital information.
Certainly, the “Theory of Dependence”, etc.

Moreover, exposing the agroexport model, emphasizing on how the conservative

liberal elite inserted themselves to the international market in a dependent economic
relationship and how Juan Domingo Peron implemented a new economic policy and different
ways of establishing a better economy for the country.

Thirdly, for a deeper development I chose an article named “Argentina’s industry: a

process of disarticulated restructuration” by Bernardo Kosacoff. It consists of how Argentina
has been affected from the change from the agroexport model to the ISI and from ISI to a
major tecno-productive with different mechanics and logistics that make the ISI look
obsolete. This change of model was due to the depression of factors that lead to failure of
the ISI model. One of the main reasons was that the ISI neglected free commerce, which
had led the companies the privilege of making whatever they desire with the market as they
were the most influential part and the ones who most money moved.

For the last source, I will use what I have learned from my social studies classes,
certainly in geography and one of my relatives' extensive knowledge about this topic. This is
as he studied economics at "Universidad de Buenos Aires"(UBA) and has a degree in it.
Moreover, I believe this is going to fulfill and cover all the areas and give the reader a more
dynamic and interesting read as points of view of different ages and generations are
analyzed.
Theoretical Framework: (nationalism, urbanization, trading, protectionism and
economic development)

To give this thesis a proper and accurate development, it is essential to define some
concepts that will be used as keywords to explain all sorts of events that are related to this
topic. I have chosen three crucial ideas that better be explained before continuing with this
research.

For the first term I chose the word, “ urbanization”. Urbanization is often seen as an
important development policy in many countries to raise the economic growth or general
well-being of the citizens. This is the reason why the ISI model can lead to urbanization
processes as cities experience increased economic activities and population growth due to
the development of other ISI model industries. Indeed, industrialization plays an important
role in shaping urban landscapes and in the socio-economics of cities. In a few words, the
goal of the ISI model theory is to protect, strengthen, and grow local industries using a
variety of tactics, including tariffs.

The second term that will be used is “nationalism”. This is because the ISI model
consists of prioritizing the consumption of our materials, goods and products for us not
having the need to buy them abroad. However, everyone has the opportunity of purchasing
products away from the country, but you will have to pay even more taxes and somehow it
does not justify. Overall, the government is encouraging their citizens to consume the
national products in order to get benefits from this and also make exchanges with other
countries for other areas.

Thirdly, another term that I chose is “trading”. Without the import and export of
manufacturing products, the industrialization import of substitution could not function
properly as we depend on products that can not be made here. International trade is vital as
countries rely on other countries for the import of goods that can’t be readily found
domestically. If a country specializes in the exports of goods, it may have more supply of
certain raw materials than there is demand in its own markets.

However, one of the economic policies implemented by Argentina despiting ISI is

“protectionism”. This is totally related to my thesis as it consists of the method of how the
local industries are protected for making the ISI function correctly. Protectionism is the
principle or practice of protecting a country’s own industry by taxing foreign goods( Oxford
Dictionary).
 In general, this economic policy allows each country that uses the ISI model to
reduce dependency of foreign countries to fulfill their domestic demand. and reduce
importing. Moreover, it increases employment rate as import substitution will increase the
demand for local goods and services, which increases labor requirements. With an increase
in labor requirements, employment will drastically rise.

Sources: https://www.britannica.com/event/stock-market-crash-of-1929
http://alhe.mora.edu.mx/index.php/ALHE/article/view/e952/1527#:~:text=El%20modelo
%20agroexportador%20en%20Argentina%3A%201870%2D1930,crecimiento%20econ
%C3%B3mico%20de%20este%20pa%C3%ADs.
http://www.ica.com.ar/read/5a3c054d01a4ce465d58c811#:~:text=Dentro%20de%20la%20Divisi
%C3%B3n%20Internacional,pa%C3%ADs%20m%C3%A1s%20rico%20del%20mundo.
https://campus.ort.edu.ar/secundaria/almagro/cienciassociales/articulo/1754380/la-division-
internacional-del-trabajo#:~:text=La%20divisi%C3%B3n%20internacional%20del%20trabajo
%20consist%C3%ADa%20en%20un%20sistema%20organizado,creando%20una%20relaci
%C3%B3n%20de%20dependencia..

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0264275121001116
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/i/importsubstitutionindustrialization.asp
https://online.sunderland.ac.uk/what-is-international-trade-and-its-importance/#:~:text=International
%20trade%20is%20important%20because,demand%20in%20its%20own%20markets.

https://homework.study.com/explanation/what-are-the-advantages-of-import-
substitution.html#:~:text=One%20of%20the%20advantages%20of,labor%20requirements%2C
%20employment%20will%20rise.
https://economipedia.com/definiciones/industrializacion-por-sustitucion-de-
importaciones.html#:~:text=El%20objetivo%20del%20modelo%20ISI,sector%20metalmec
%C3%A1nico%20o%20al%20textil.
State of the art:
point 1
https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/transforming-laborbased-parties-in-latin-america/
19E1D90B9305D8958A24CA46DE801CE9 book
point 2 https://campus.ort.edu.ar/secundaria/almagro/cienciassociales/articulo/1781953/el-proceso-de-
industrializacion-por-sustitucion-de-importaciones- thesis/article
point 3
https://repositorio.cepal.org/handle/11362/2747 article
theoretical framework:
https://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/english/protectionism?q=protectionism