Politics and academy in the Argentinian social sciences of the 1960s

Abstract

Social sciences in Latin America experienced, during the 1960s, a great number of debates concerning the very foundations of different academic fields. In the case of Argentina, research programs such as Proyecto Marginalidad constituted fundamental elements of those controversies, which were characteristic of disciplinary developments within the social sciences, particularly sociology. Mainly influenced by the critical context that had been deepened by Project Camelot, Argentinian social scientists engaged in debates about the theories that should be chosen in order to account for ‘national reality’, the origins of funding for scientific research, or the applied dimension of science. In this sense, the practices of philanthropic organizations like the Ford Foundation stimulated considerably the ideological passions of that period; those practices also contributed to fragmentation in various academic groups. In this way, the problem of American imperialism, and its consequent economic and cultural dependencies, were present in the controversies of academic fields whose historic evolutions cannot be fully understood without considering their strong links with national and international politics.

Psychoanalysizing science itself: Psychoanalysis, philosophy of science and scientific research in the institutionalization of Argentinian psychology (1962–1983)

“…Nevertheless, the issue of how that approach took over Argentinian psychology programs during the 1960s and 1970s—and how it was upheld by younger psychoanalysts and their psychology students—has not been yet subjected to a philosophically oriented historical analysis. Previous historical scholarship on this issue has tended to emphasize either the sociological‐institutional dimensions this phenomenon (Borinsky, 2020; Dagfal, 2018; Piñeda, 2020; Plotkin, 2003) or its political underpinnings (Avelluto, 2013; Gil, 2016; Plotkin, 2011). As suggested by Rosner (2018), historical accounts of psychoanalysis in South America can be further explored by novel methodological approaches.…”

“…This rationale was common to other social sciences in Argentina during the 70 s: in Buchbinder's terms, receiving external grants and funding was seen by Argentinian academics as a form of “ imperialist penetration” (2005, p. 187; emphasis in the original). As stated by Gil (2016, p. 66), “organizations such as the Rockefeller and Ford Foundations were objects of the same accusatory logic [in Argentina], according to which every institution and every individual participating in a research project financed with ‘dollars coming from the Empire’ were considered dangerous and suspected of engaging in espionage”.…”