This book is dedicated To the memory of Carlos F Diaz Alejandro. Specialists on Argentine economic history are familiar with his 1970 publication, Essays on the Economic History of the Argentine Republic (Economic Growth Center, Yale University), an early application of econometric methods to historical study. He was part of a group at the Economic Growth Center inspired by Simon Kuznets and sponsored by the Ford Foundation. The brightest young development economists came together there in the early 1960s and went forth from New Haven to assemble country-specific data and write a number of path-breaking studies. Among them were R. Albert Berry, Werner Baer, Gerald Helleiner, Clark Reynolds, Shane J. Hunt, and Howard Pack. Carlos may well have been among the very best of those very best. He died prematurely in 1985. In recognition of his contribution to economic history, a number of books honor his memory and several awards are named for him. This book is thus one in a series to remind us of the special contribution Diaz Alejandro made in his career.

An Irish econometrician who worked for years on Argentine macro-economic policy for the World Bank, Desmond McCarthy, has said of that country's economic policies that everything has been tried twice and failed both times. Data from Angus Maddison, The World Economy: A Millennial Perspective (OECD Development Centre, Paris, 2001, p. 195) indicate a growth of per capita product of 1.6 percent, 1870–1913. As della Paolera and Taylor write in their thoughtful introduction, “Argentina's 1913 level was clearly in the world top ten, and almost the top five. Whatever its exact status in 1913, for all practical purposes Argentina was an advanced country” (p. 3).

What has happened since 1913? The cumulative per capita product growth rate, despite many ups and downs, was about 1.1 percent per annum (excluding the painful downward adjustment in the last few years). Quite respectable, as such a growth rate can double average standards of living in 70 years or so. But Argentina's 2002 I$10,000 per capita product is now very far from the top ten. The high income countries of Europe and its overseas expansion now average more than I$28,000 per capita (data from World Bank World DevelopmentIindicators 2004).

Australia, like Argentina, an antipodal country whose modern economy focused on primary product export, but one unencumbered by rent-seeking governments and leaders, grew its per capita product at 1.8 percent per annum, 1913–1998. Somewhat more than Argentina but enough to put its per capita product level over I$27,440 by 2002. Both countries were primary product exporters; both suffered the vicissitudes of demand fluctuations in the center countries. They varied in the effectiveness of public policy.

The 12 chapters in this excellent collection are generally aware of policy failures and their linkage to the unfolding events in the several sectors. Perhaps most poignant is the chapter by della Paolera, Irigoin, and Bozzoli, “Passing the Buck: Monetary and Fiscal Policies,” pp. 46–86, which emphasizes the willingness of a succession of governments to pass difficult policy choices on to the next occupant of the presidency. “The once abundant economic rents of Argentina have been consumed bit by bit during the twentieth century, and this of necessity prompts society to take more seriously the simple but ill-understood phenomenon of economic scarcity…. [A] new constitutional and fiscal design could help the country escape the trap of discretionary rulers and diminish the incentives for opportunistic administrators to pass the buck” (p. 76).

In their epilogue, della Paolera and Ezequiel Gallo address the Argentine puzzle: How could a country do so well at the start of the twentieth century, a belle époque,yet do so (relatively) badly at century's end? Their answer: Argentina “missed the opportunity to design the right institutions that would secure sustainable growth and insulate the society from the voracity of politicians and rent seekers” (p. 374). Perhaps inevitably, such an answer only stimulates the urge to seek some “deeper” explanation.

A valuable feature of the work is inclusion of a CD-Rom with data developed and used in the study. It will facilitate continuing work to explore for more profound answers to the Argentine puzzle so effectively laid out by the authors and editors of this very useful collection of papers.