Resistance and Social Representation of Official Identification in Latin America during the Interwar Years

• In Event: Biometrics, Civil Society, and Resistance in Modern Latin America

Abstract

The international expansion of modern identification systems was developed through the negotiation between various social actors, which helped to establish their legitimacy and local features. In Latin America, governments accumulated biometric information from the entire population, whereas in North-Atlantic governments, such mechanisms would be considered illegal. Although scholars have examined the ways in which experts and technologies circulated within Latin America, this approach does not explain why such identification systems were so different and varied. This paper seeks to provide an explanation for this question by analyzing the interwar years, when governments built their identification systems and adopted certain features that have endured until the present day. Hence, I will investigate the forms of resistance to official identification exhibited by workers, and the circulation of techniques and knowledge that spread through newspapers, scientific dissemination, and popular culture.

Author

• Mercedes Garcia Ferrari, Universidad Nacional de General Sarmiento