Abstract
To sustain what has been the rural development model (or models) that has predominated in Argentinean recent times is not a simple task. The objective of this paper is to analyze the trajectory of rural development in the Argentine Republic from a retrospective perspective, paying special attention to how family farming has been conceived. The main argument is that agrarian policies have generally privileged the capitalist production modes to the detriment of small peasant-based family farmers, who have never been seen as a central productive sector in the dynamics of national development. The text is structured in three parts. In the first one, the different models of rural development and the place of family agriculture in the state policies are presented. Then, the agrarian transformations caused by the implementation of the neoliberal policies in the period that coincided with the structural adjustment in the country and the post Washington´s consensus are described. Finally, some of the measures taken by the current government and its impact on family farming are analyzed. The text consists of a review of various documentary sources, articulating different time scales in the analysis.
Key-words
rural development; public policies; peasant family farming; Argentina; neoliberalism