Kirchner Lo Hizo … Y Deshizo

Famous for its beef and tango, Argentina is also infamous among diplomats and investors for what they say is its deeply manic approach to public policy.

For good or bad, when Argentine leaders come into power, they often undo or reverse their predecessors’ policies. This is often true to a much greater extent here than it is in other countries.

Unlike Brazil or Chile, Argentina doesn’t have a long tradition of a stable, respected and professional civil service that ensures continuity in public policy regardless of who occupies the “sillón de Rivadavia,” or the presidential throne.

Examples of Argentina’s public policy vicissitudes abound.

The 1976-1983 military junta was followed by the democratically-elected government of President Raúl Alfonsín. To restore a sense of justice and clamp down on the impunity that reigned during the dictatorship, Alfonsín in 1985 set up the Trial of the Juntas, ensuring that at least some of those responsible for crimes against humanity were punished for their deeds.

The trial won Alfonsín international accolades. But in some ways it was all for naught. Alfonsín’s successor, Carlos Menem, pardoned those involved in the Dirty War.

As noted in this 1990 NY Times story, Menem freed from prison those who had directed the Dirty War, reversing what Alfonsín considered to be one of his most important accomplishments.

Was Menem right to issue the pardons? For our purposes here, an answer is beside the point. The point is: what Alfonsín did, Menem undid. Alfonsín’s reaction was succinct: “This is the saddest day in Argentine history,” he said.

The following year Menem tied the peso one-to-one to the US dollar, creating a currency system known as “convertibility.” The system crushed the hyperinflation that had been destroying Argentina’s economy and helped set the stage for almost a decade of nearly unprecedented economic growth and price stability.

But the system also created problems, in part because of Argentina’s difficulty keeping a cap on public spending. In 2002, one of Menem’s successors, Eduardo Duhalde, undid convertibility, saying it was a massive mistake and was partly responsible for Argentina’s 2001-2002 economic meltdown. What Menem did, Duhalde undid.

Menem also carried out a wide range of privatization policies, converting state-run organizations – including telecom and utility companies – into private sector firms. One of the companies he privatized was Aerolineas Argentinas, the country’s flagship airline. At the time, as is also the case now, Aerolineas was bleeding money, costing the state millions.

When Néstor Kirchner, another of Menem’s successors, took power in 2003, he quickly moved to undo many of Menem’s policies. Among other things, Kirchner undid Menem’s pardons and helped launch trials across the country to imprison those who had been involved with the Military Junta.

Kirchner also re-nationalized some of companies privatized by Menem, saying that Menem’s nationalization policies were a nefarious scandal aimed at lining the pocketbooks of public employees.

The companies included the water provider Aguas Argentinas, the postal company Correo Argentino, the train company Metropolitano, and Thales Espectrum, which oversees radio airwaves.

Cristina Fernández, Kirchner’s wife and successor, then had her turn.

In 2008 Fernández re-nationalized Aerolineas Argentinas. Then, in one of the boldest moves in presidential history, she nationalized the country’s 14-year-old, $30 billion private pension fund system, which had been created by Menem. From almost one day to the next, Fernández wiped out more than a decade of public policy, leading to countless thousands of lawsuits that are still being contested.

What Menem did, Fernández undid.

Of course, elections often bring about change – sometimes profound – in all democracies. Indeed, the very point of voting is often to effect change. US President Barack Obama’s campaign slogan was “Change We Can Believe In.” Obama’s explicit message was that, if elected, he would change, reverse and even undue some of his predecessor’s policies.

The same thing has happened over and over again in Argentina. Menem slammed Alfonsín’s policies, saying he would change them. Kirchner then trashed Menem’s policies, and reversed many of them.

But whereas campaign rhetoric in other countries often rises to exaggerated decibels and degrees, candidates in other countries frequently fail to bring about the kind of change they promised before being elected.

This is almost always the case in the US and it is typically the case where institutions and the rule of law carry more weight than contemporary political concerns.

Meanwhile, although certain economic and foreign policy practices can shift somewhat in other countries, they don’t typically undergo the kind of seismic transformations like those in Argentina, where the rule of law is frequently changed by unrelenting assaults on its consistency.

Such was the case recently when Congress passed a controversial media reform law.

Fernández pitched the media reform law as a necessary way to overhaul antiquated laws dating back to the dictatorship. Virtually everyone agreed a new media law was needed. And in many ways the new law does change laws first established under the dictatorship.

But what may be most interesting – or perhaps most perplexing – about the complex and broad-ranging media law is not the way that it undoes policies implemented by the dictatorship or by Alfonsín, Duhalde or Menem. What’s notable is the way it changes policies of former president Kirchner, Fernández’s husband, who is broadly believed to control government policy from behind the scenes.

In this sense, Kirchner’s policy shifts are even more radical than those of his predecessors. He and his wife have both done and undone their very own policies. What the Kirchners did, the Kirchners undid.

In 2005 Kirchner’s administration extended the broadcast license for Channel 13, owned by Grupo Clarín, through 2025. Grupo Clarín is the nation’s leading multimedia conglomerate.

The following year, in one of his last acts as president, Kirchner allowed Grupo Clarin to buy a controlling stake in cablevisión, the country’s leading cable distributor, giving Clarín a virtual monopoly on the local cable industry.

These two things happened back in the days when, analysts say, Grupo Clarín was publishing stories that were not particularly critical of the government. Last year, however, the government and Clarín began to part ways in what became a highly publicized battle for influence in Argentina.

Over the past year Kirchner has repeatedly criticized Clarín for biased coverage.

“I’m not afraid of anyone,” Kirchner said earlier this year in response to a Clarin reporter’s question about Kirchner’s unusually large pension benefits. “If they want to insult me, they can insult me. If they want to attack me, they can attack me. They can insult me everyday, but everyone should know that they’re doing it to maintain their monopoly, to maintain their position, to keep the privileges that they have.”

Many say the government’s new media law was tailor-made to cut Clarín down to size.

It forces Clarín to sell off key parts of its business, which could notably reduce its influence and earnings. It also forces Clarín to give up much of its control over the cable industry while requiring it to give up licenses that the Kirchners themselves granted it just recently.

In July the Communications Secretariat gave Clarín a green light to start offering telephone (VOIP) services to a limited number of residential homes in Buenos Aires. A week later, the same Secretariat reversed track, taking the right away.

“We’ve become so used to these constantly shifting rules and changing laws that we don’t even pay any attention anymore,” a former Argentine official told me recently. “The laws change from one day to the next and we don’t even notice anymore. It’s become normal for us.”

Fernández is now about to push a new electoral reform law that would limit the use of private campaign funds and force political parties to hold internal primaries before general elections. This represents a clear reversal of public policy. In this article for lanacion.com, political analyst Rosendo Fraga noted the abrupt shift.

“It’s paradoxical that it is the Kirchners who now want to establish a system which, when it was in place, they suspended via decree for the 2005 election and later undid for the 2007 election,” Fraga wrote. “That’s how the Peronist ticket (led by Cristina Fernández) was able to get elected without an internal primary.”

Fraga cited the policy reversal as an example of political and legal “incoherence” – they’re “looking now to establish rules that they themselves didn’t abide by.” He said the new rules would make it easier for Kirchner to be elected in 2011.

Regardless of the validity of that statement or the need for new rules, this ping-pong approach to public policy is characteristic of this government in particular and, to a lesser degree, of Argentine governments in general.

Such a fluctuating approach to public policy may or may not be wise. After all, bad policies should be improved. Moreover, governments, just like people, can make mistakes and they should be allowed to correct them – their own or those of previous administrations.

But what can’t be said on behalf of Argentine public policy is that it is consistent.

Over the decades, history has demonstrated that the only consistent thing about Argentine executive policy is its inconsistency. Just as governments come and go, so do policies and laws and regulations.

As of early Friday, Argentina didn’t know if by Sunday it would change its clocks by an hour for Daylight Savings Time. At the last minute, the government decided to backtrack on its plans to change the time. In other cases, policies are often enacted retroactively. Such was the case with the government’s decision a year ago to raise rates on gas and electricity. After denying for years that higher rates were necessary, the government raised them retroactively, giving consumers no notice.

The Kirchners have surpassed their predecessors by adding a new level of unpredictability to public policy. This is not to say that their policies are necessarily bad. But they have managed to undue both the policies of their predecessors and those of their own government, which surely is worth noting.

What was good policy yesterday is now bad, while what is bad today may be good tomorrow.

At the end of his term in 1999, Menem launched an advertising campaign to bolster his flagging popularity and win support for his desire to remain in office.

The now famous campaign slogan, as mentioned last week in this post, was “Menem Did It.” Or, in Spanish, “Menem Lo Hizo.”

Kirchner’s slogan, critics could say today, might be Kirchner Did It, and Undid It.”

Or, “Kirchner Lo Hizo y Deshizo.”

Popularity: 1% [?]