PUBLIC ACCESS TO INFORMATION & ICTs PHASE II REPORT Argentina

Abstract

For the last eight years, Argentina has suffered the ups and downs of a deep political, economical, and social crisis, which had been brewing since the late 1970s. This crisis is being overcome in the macro economic and institutional aspects (NGP, increase of National reserves, payments of the external debt, financial stability, increase in the monetary flow, unemployment decrease, poverty and indigence rates’ diminution, reinforcement of public powers and of the constitutional State, etc.). Nevertheless, the 2001‐2002 crisis has left a deep mark in the Argentine society. The social gaps, the economic unbalances, and the inequities that resulted from this crisis have generated the weakening of social networks, which had historically been assumed as this society’s main capital. This research considers the inequalities that have impacts on general living conditions, and particularly on information access. Two types of inequalities have been defined: socio economic, related mainly to the external processes affecting individuals and families – poverty and indigence, income distribution, employment, labour situation, gender, ethnic factors, etc.)‐ ; and territorial, both regional and intra‐urban. This has been key when developing research on public accesses to information, since inequality is a main constituent of the present development model. Not only does inequality generate poverty: it is at the very origin of the mentioned deep crisis of social cohesion. This is the general context which frames our research, aimed at identifying and analysing public venues for information access. Our survey of institutions, individuals, and processes linked to information access has been a complex but exciting exercise.