Britain, the British Landed Class, and Argentine Landowners

Abstract

This article analyzes the economic and cultural relationship between the British landowning class and the Argentine estancieros (large property owners) in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and explores some explanations for the influence of the former over the latter. It argues that for much of the nineteenth century, the example of the British rural order largely failed to appeal to the estancieros, and that it was only during the last quarter of the century that Argentine landowners became increasingly attracted to British farm technology and to the lifestyle of their British counterparts. Finally, it analyzes the reasons why the British example became increasingly irrelevant in twentieth-century Argentina. This article shows that the changing influence of the British landed order over the pampean estancieros is a phenomenon that merits historical exploration, for it reveals broad social transformations that have taken place in Great Britain as well as in Argentina.