Snow and Heat in Argentina

A strange thing happened recently in Buenos Aires. It snowed. It’s the first time in 90 years that the city has been graced with a snowfall and people made the most of it. Spontaneous parties broke in the streets all around the capital with people gathering to make snow balls, sing songs, and just take it all in. For most Porteños this was the first (and likely the last) time they have seen snow. Unless you can afford a holiday to the southwestern part of the country, where the peaks of the Andes bring snow and South Americas only skiing, it is pretty safe to say that this was a once in a lifetime event.

Of course the winter weather brought chaos to the city as well. Both airports were closed for a couple of days because there is no de-icing equipment here. The roads were even worse than usual and it resulted in countless accidents for drivers not accustomed to the slippery conditions. The public bus system, the absolute life-beat of public transport here, was reduced to slow and sporadic service leaving many people without a way to get home in the evening after finishing up at the job. Most didn’t seem to mind though as they were captivated by the falling flakes.

Needless to say the snowfall wasn’t quite as magical for me as it was for my Argentine friends. When I decided to move to South America last year snow was probably the last thing on my mind. Well not quite, I was thinking about escaping the winter in Duluth, I just wasn’t expecting to find it here. I can’t really complain too much though. The snowstorm (about 3/4 of an inch fell) did remind my of MN and all the good people there. I always find a bit funny when an Argentine complains to me about how cold it has been here this winter. “You should visit Minnesota in the winter sometime,” I tell them, “then you can complain about the cold all you want.”

As much fun as the night of the snow was for people here, there is also a much more serious side of the story. Argentina is currently in the midst of an energy crisis that leaves thousands without a reliable source of power to heat their homes. Those that feel the effects the most are inevitably the poor, but the crisis is affecting every strata of Argentine society. The energy crisis is not the only major problem that Argentina is facing at the moment. Inflation has been on the rise in recent months and people are feeling the squeeze. Remember, this is a country whose economy collapsed in 2001 and most people were left to fend for themselves. Anyone who had money in a bank here lost 70% of what they had been saving. These traumatic events are still very much on people’s thoughts.

The fact that the snowfall came at just this time has made the problems here clearer than ever. As a foreigner it has been interesting and sad to watch what is unfolding. I say sad because after all that these people have been through it is almost painful to see the political establishment following the same path that led to the 2001 collapse. But Argentina isn’t alone in reliving history; I see the same thing mirrored in the US, repeating a policy today that has failed in the past. Unlike the US though, there is a shimmering prospect for hope here. Ordinary people are coming together to form independent political and social movements to challenge the establishment and the current direction the country is going. I gathered the following information from talking with many Porteños, and believe me the all have an opinion on it, but most of it comes from talks I have had with our comrade Fede Castagnet, local university student and a member of the MST (Socialist Workers Movement). This is their assessment of the problems I mentioned above and what they think needs to be done about it.

To say that the energy crisis is a new problem confronting Argentina is a bit deceiving. In reality the crisis can be traced back to the mid 90’s when then president Menem began privatizing the energy companies. The oil, gas, and electricity sectors all went from state control to private hands. The crisis has been exasperated because of the growth in population and industry in the country since the 90’s without corresponding investment in the energy infrastructure. The power plants are working to the absolute limit now, but there just isn’t enough to meet demand. The privately owned companies have actually shut down two hydropower plants, Atucha I and II, because they were not making a suitable profit from them. This is the problem when crucial sectors of the economy come under private control; profit takes precedence over social needs.

The current government has only added to the mess by providing subsidies to the private companies to encourage them to keep expanding their operations here. The only problem is that the companies are not investing in country. They use the subsidies to expand their extraction operations, not to add the crucial infrastructure to bring the energy to the cities. They are certainly making a profit, but that windfall is then taken out of the country.

So what is happening in Buenos Aires is this; due to the energy shortage different areas of the city are subject to random power cuts for hours at a time. These are planned cuts by the government, but no one knows when or where they will occur until the lights go out. This has been going on for about 10 years now. Now this is being combined with rising inflation. The Argentine economy is based on exports and as international prices for goods rise compared to national prices the businesses are forced to raise the cost for things locally. Unfortunately salaries are not going up with inflation leaving people struggling to make ends meet. There is actually a law here to deal with just this situation, Ley de Abastecimiento, that says basic necessities for life can be subject to price control so that they do not become more expensive than what people can afford. The current government, under president Kirchner, is choosing not to enforce the law, favoring big business instead. The people end up being the losers in this situation.

I asked Fede what was up with this and he gave me a pretty straight forward answer, “Well there was this guy named Karl Marx, perhaps you have heard of him, who said that the desire for profit under capitalism is something that makes capitalism move, but is also the same thing that undermines capitalism.”

Well that’s fine as a critique of the situation, but I wanted to know what could be done now to solve the problem. So I asked Fede to if had any thoughts. “Of course there are things that could be done right now, if there was the will to do them. We don’t need to have socialism before we address these problems. The first thing is we need to renationalize the oil and gas sectors or at the least ask the companies to make an investment in country, in accordance with current laws. The second thing we can do is have democratic and consumer control over the resources. The people are the ones that need the resources and it does them no good to have a company making a profit off of oil when the are sitting in there house freezing their ass off.”

As you can all see there are many hurdles to overcome before Argentina meets the basic needs of its citizens. Right now a struggle is being wagged by the people to reclaim what should have been theirs all along. A lot of hard work lies ahead, but the will to fight is there. We could all learn a valuable lesson from the Argentines on what it really means to have a participatory democracy.