Land grabbing, power configurations and trajectories of China’s investments in Argentina

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper analyses the display of the power relations involved in the trajectory of China’s land grabbing in Argentina. Through a study of the failed agri-food project of Beidahuang Group in Rio Negro, it shows the centrality of the dynamic configurations of material, discursive and institutional power surrounding Chinese investments to both facilitate land grabbing and condition its outcomes. Drawing on a neo-Gramscian approach, three configurations of power are identified in interaction with a logic of agricultural accumulation with hegemonic aspirations: the alignment of power relations; the challenges and the misalignment of these forces. Consequently, the project suspension results from a change in power relations caused by reactions from ‘below’ and ‘above’, although this does not affect the global primacy of agribusiness.