Research Paper, December 2018, for class GEOG 259 “Latin American Geography”
Argentina is famous for fine beef, wine, leather, and one of the most places rivers on the planet. The Matanza-Riachuelo river, lined by homes and tanneries, is also the site for a precedential court case Mendoza Beatriz Silva et al vs. State of Argentina et al that will alter the way Argentina addresses its environmental concerns in the future. To understand how this might play out, we have to look to understand the past. In this essay, I will review the case of the Matanza-Riachuelo river pollution, its history, and its causes through the lens of Andre Gunder Frank’s theory of dependency, and Walt Whitman Rostow’s theory of modernization.
Argentina’s Matanza-Riachuelo river lies sixty kilometers west of Buenos Aires and is home to some fifteen-hundred businesses and about five million people (Blitzer). Literally translated in English to “Slaughter-Creek,” the Matanza-Riachuelo river has historically been the most polluted rivers in Argentina (Riachuelo) if not one of the most polluted rivers in the world (Blitzer). Chemical spills, industrial waste (Matanza-Riachuelo), and animal remains (Hoshaw 2) from industrial production along the river, and improper sewage systems or lack thereof altogether (Riachuelo) are the main contributors to the toxicity of the environment. The river and its basin where the most runoff accumulates is so toxic that 60% of the twenty-thousand people living in the basin live in territory “deemed unsuitable for human habitation” (Matanza-Riachuelo). This pollution is in the soil where their local food grows, the water they pull form wells to drink and bathe, and even the air they breathe, so it is no wonder that 30% of the residents of the Matanza-Riachuelo basin have dangerous levels of lead in their blood (Riachuelo), leading to gastrointestinal diseases, respiratory diseases, cancer, and death (Matanza-Riachuelo). The people who suffer the most are the ones unable to escape their situation, with most of the affected population living in urban slums (Blitzer) or squatter towns (Riachuelo).
In 2004, residents of the Matanza-Riachuelo river basin area, led by Beatriz Silva Mendoza and backed by several non-governmental organizations, filed a lawsuit against the national government of Argentina, the Province of Buenos Aires, the City of Buenos Aires, and 44 companies for various damages caused by the pollution of the Matanza-Riachuelo river in the supreme court case Mendoza Beatriz Silva et al vs. State of Argentina et al (ESCR-Net). The supreme court of Argentina ruled that the state of Argentina, the Province of Buenos Aires, and the City of Buenos Aires were responsible for the damages caused by the pollution. They ordered a clean-up of the river and prevention of future pollution in six measures with funding from the state and the World Bank. The first means was to distribute public information about the river and clean up. The second means was to control industrial pollution. The third means was to clean up waste dumps. The fourth means was to expand the water supplies and sewer works. The fifth means was to develop an emergency sanitation plan and begin it. The last means was to adopt a measurement system to ensure and evaluate compliance with the rest of the plan (ESCR-Net). The goal of these steps was to improve the quality of life of the river basin residents, restore the environment of the area, and prevent future damage to the other two (FARN).
The World Bank, which provided funds to the state of Argentina under the pretense of the continuation of the project until March 31st of 2022, keeps an ongoing record of the project. As of June 29th, 2018, 22.3 cubic tonnes of pollution have been reduced from the river per year out of a target 62,400 cubic tones, 6,800 people in the basin have improved water and sanitation services out of a target 50,000, but no sewage discharge in the area has been adequately treated (Matanza-Riachuelo Basin). Ten years, almost to the day, after the Supreme Court Ruling in the Mendoza v State of Argentina case, the Autoridad de Cuenca Matanza Matanza-Riachuelo (or ACUMAR) which was created to oversee the clean up project, announced that the effort is moving to its second phase: building a substantial sewer system for the residents of the river basin. While not yet in operation, 15% of the sewer system has already been built (Riachuelo).
Andre Gunder Frank was a German economic historian who spent much of his time writing about Latin America and a theory he helped found, Dependency theory (Frank 2005). Dependency theory is, in a brief definition, the understanding of the current world economic system as flows of primary resources from the periphery- or global south- nations to the industrial productions and markets of the core- or global north- nations which benefit the center nations and harm the periphery nations. Frank criticizes the idea that periphery, or as he refers to them, underdeveloped or satellite countries, are backward and resemble the past of core, or as he refers to them, developed or metropolis countries (Frank 3). It imagines core and periphery countries to have grown that way on their own. This understanding, Frank suggests, fails to consider the relationship between these two actors, and that the underdevelopment of a country is not an isolated incident, but rather a product of the historical circumstances and actively produced by core countries to maintain domination over periphery countries (Frank 4). Furthermore, large, more developed sectors of an underdeveloped country, such as the city of Buenos Aires, act as metropoles in relation to the poorer satellite districts of the state, such as the communities in the basin of the Matanza-Riachuelo river, by extracting labor and natural resources at a low cost while generating significantly larger profits from domestic and international trade of the products created by the original resources (Frank 6-7). In the context of the case of the Matanza-Riachuelo river, 25% of Argentina’s Gross Domestic Product was generated through, in, and around the river (Hoshaw 1), so while Argentina as a whole increases its wealth from the economic activity in the river, those around the river whose land and labor is exploited to generate that 25% suffer from increasing poverty. This, Frank argues, is not so much a result of an inattentive government as much as a result of interference from foreign capitalist states. Frank says specifically about Buenos Aires that “the expansion of Buenos Aires as a satellite of Great Britain and the introduction of free trade in the interest of ruling groups of both metropoles destroyed the manufacturing and much of the remainder of the economic base of the previously relatively prosperous interior almost entirely. Manufacturing was destroyed by foreign competition, lands were taken and concentrated into latifundia by the rapaciously growing export economy, intra-regional distribution of income became much more unequal, and the previously developing regions become simple satellites of Buenos Aires and through it of London” (Frank 12). Frank’s argument is that the introduction of a free market capitalist system into Buenos Aires created opportunity for foreign industry to displace local industries. These foreign industries work to advance the interests and profits of themselves and their homeland, increasing the export economy. As a result, wealth began to move out of the country, rather than throughout it, widening the wealth disparities of the nation. In the context of the Matanza-Riachuelo river, this theory explains the situation of extreme poverty in which the residents of the river basin live and the stark juxtaposition between these slum villages and the wealth of the capital city just sixty kilometers away.
According to Andre Gunder Frank, the underdevelopment of the villages around the Matanza-Riachuelo river was and is actively produced, and in this framework, capitalist competition, foreign interference, and industrial dominance created the environment that allowed the Matanza-Riachuelo to become so polluted. But now that the Supreme Court of Argentina have ordered a cleanup, shouldn’t the situation improve? Frank’s theory about the nature of loans and debt between core and periphery countries presents some troubling possible implications for the future of the project and the Matanza-Riachuelo. Frank proposes that part of the maintenance of metropole domination is the use of loans, like that of the World Bank to the State of Argentina for the Matanza-Riachuelo river project. The United States, says Frank, earns nine percent from its economic holdings abroad while those nations abroad earn three percent return on their own (Frank 2006 331). Furthermore, to pay back the debt to the United States states “raise taxes and fees from the population but lower social spending on education and health at home so as to divert funds to pay the debt abroad” (Frank 2006 33). While the World Bank is an international organization, they operate out of Washington D.C. and provide their loans in USD (Who We Are), so the interests of the United States are important in keeping the organization alive, so ultimately, this loan falls into Frank’s paradigm. This evokes the possibility that in the future, to repay the loan, Argentina will negatively affect the population the loan was intended to help.
Frank theorizes that for any satellite to become a metropole it must isolate itself and stop trade with already metropole area. Frank says that historically, industrial development in Latin America “has taken place precisely during the periods of the two world wars and the intervening depression… during these periods, the satellites initiated marked autonomous industrialization and growth.” Latin America has industrialized at a faster and more efficient rate when it has been least connected to the metropoles of Europe and The United States (Frank 10). In the context of the Matanza-Riachuelo river, Frank posits that cutting off the international trade that pushed these polluting industries into the Matanza-Riachuelo river would help Argentina domestically industrialize. Whether this is a generally positive or negative development is unclear in Frank’s work.
Walt Whitman Rostow was an American economic historian who helped found Modernization theory (The Editors). Modernization theory posits that all human societies follow a five-stage linear path to development, the pique of which is a capitalist system (Rostow 1). The first stage is the traditional society which is characterized by a lack of both practical and theoretical tools to understand the surrounding world, a hierarchical system of power the authorities of which tend to be landowners, and low productivity (Rostow 4). The second stage is the preconditions for take-off which is characterized by the beginnings of modern science, the increase of productions and scope of trade, the advancement of transport and agricultural technologies, and the increased presence of a large government and military corps (Rostow 4-7). The third stage is the take-off which is characterized by modern industrial techniques such as in the industrial revolution, an increase in a class of industrial entrepreneurs, and the emergence of a resilient economy (Rostow 7). The fourth stage is the drive to maturity which is characterized by the use of technology expanding to most of the exploited resources of the area and the shift of a large portion of the labor class from agriculture to urban sectors (Rostow 8, 10). The fifth stage is the age of high mass consumption which is characterized by increased social security, increased private consumption of goods, and increased global power (Rostow 11). In the framework of modernization theory, Argentina is in the fourth stage. Technology is used to exploit the natural resources and have a large urban labor class but is not a significant actor on the world economic stage.
In contrast to Andre Gunder Frank’s understanding, Rostow imagines the development of Argentina and this region of the river as isolated from their relationships with outside nations. As stated above, Argentina is in the fourth stage of the modernization model, a stage the United States entered in approximately 1900 (Rostow 8). In this fourth stage, the United States also saw the effects of the increase of industry on the environment and on poverty. In Rostow’s understanding, Argentina now is a mirror that will eventually improve its own situation internally like the United States did. The poverty of the Matanza-Riachuelo basin is not any groups fault, modernization theory would argue, but rather a natural part of the stage of the drive to maturity. In this framework, the solution to poverty is not the slowing or regulation of the industries located on the river, as the supreme court ruling attempts, but rather the increase of industry as a method of job creation and expanding of profits for the national wealth.
While Andre Gunder Frank’s dependency theory attempts to establish a more complex understanding of the situations of Latin American underdeveloped countries, it is still limited. Andre Gunder Frank provides no solutions for underdevelopment or similar situations in Latin America. Another dependency theorist, Raul Prebisch, suggests that the solution to poverty in Latin America is research into the history of Latin American economics and more internally controlled development (Prebisch 2). This solution is limited in that while dependency theory is often framed in contrast to the failings of modernization, the two theories offer essentially the same solution- more capitalist industrial development- and differ on why it’s needed and where it should come from. Neither of these frameworks address the issue of justice. Who is truly at fault in the case of Mendoza Beatriz Silva v The State of Argentina? Modernization theory would put the blame on the state, which was charged, but Dependency theory would put the blame on international industry, which was not charged, and Buenos Aires, which was. Dependency theory offers a place to put the blame but does not offer any solutions for when the justice system fails to agree with it. The focus of both theories is on capitalist industrial development. Post-development thinkers like Colombian anthropologist Arturo Escobar, believe that this focus is the fatal flaw of both discourses (Escobar 214). Development in Latin America, in the framework of post-development theory, is an inherently colonial because the concept of capitalist industrial development was introduced from colonial powers through violence. In post-independence projects in Latin America, development was forced onto the satellite areas from the metropole areas of Latin American countries through similar violence (Escobar 214). In post-development theory, development will always be violent, so development as a solution to the pollution of the Matanza-Riachuelo river does not attack its roots, and any fix that uses development would be a band-aid solution. The real solution, Escobar argues, is that there is no one solution that can apply to all situations. All problems caused by development must be addressed at a micro level by the people they affect in grassroots and indigenous movements, not in etic academic theory (Escobar 222). In the context of the Matanza-Riachuelo river case, a post-development solution would involve a group of residents of the Matanza-Riachuelo river basin, like the group Mendoza Beatriz Silva led into court in 2004, need to be the ones to dictate the progress of their river and home. They tried to and achieved some results, but to succeed in a post-development solution, the bureaucratic systems in place in Argentina would need to change or at least become more flexible in working with satellite communities to create a solution beyond development,
The case of the Matanza-Riachuelo river offers insight into the relationship of industrial development to a low-income community, the actions the community took, the response they received, and the future of environmental activism in Argentina. In the framework of Andre Gunder Frank’s dependency theory, this pollution was caused by metropole regions intentionally keeping the area underdeveloped to maintain a low purchasing price on high-profit primary resources. In the framework of Walter Whitman Rostow’s modernization theory, the pollution and underdevelopment of the area were simply caused by a lag behind in global modernization. In the framework of Arturo Escobar’s post-development theory, neither of these theories address the root of the cause that is the violence of development. The clean-up and infrastructure development project of the Matanza-Riachuelo river is ongoing, so the full effects remain to be seen, but for now, this case is an inspired one of a community unifying to improve their collective situation.
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Gabe Simpson 