Geopolitical Imaginaries of the Soviet Union in the discourse of Argentine Peronism (1946-55)

• In Event: Geopolitical Imaginaries in the Americas

Abstract

The paper asks how the imaginary of the Soviet Union is constructed and used within the discourse of Juan Domingo Perón’s government in Argentina, that is to say from 1946 until the coup d’état against him in 1955. While the impact of the United States in relation to Peronism has been outlined in many studies, the role of the Soviet Union has often been overlooked. The immediate political influence of the Soviet Union was indeed small, but the Peronist government’s positioning vis-à-vis the USSR turned into an important imaginary within the discourse at that time. This can especially be observed in the context of the emphasis on a “Third Position” between the two superpowers of the Cold War, which constituted the attempt of a redefinition of the Argentine stance in global perspective. This “Third Position” also implied bilateral relations with the Soviet Union, in particular to stress independence from the USA within the national political debate. In doing so, Perón never lost sight of distancing himself from the Soviet ideological model.
Writings and speeches of Perón, parliamentary debates, internal communication and the press coverage on important events in which the Soviet Union and its international role were decisive constitute the base of sources for this paper. Theoretical considerations are made on the basis of Ernesto Laclau’s works on discourse and populism which are put into dialogue with the field of Critical Geopolitics.

Author

• Mirko Petersen, University of Bielefeld