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MODERNIZATION, MIGRATION AND NATIONAL IDENTITY IN THE ARGENTINE CASE, 1870-1945 particularly during the period 1880-1930, was a kind of big bang because of its enormous effects on Argentine history until the middle of the 20th century. Among many others, we can point out the following ones. First, immigration accelerated the population growth that increased from 1,897,000 inhabitants in 1869 to 4,123,800 in 1895, 8,162,000 in 1914 and 15,893,800 in 1947. These figures show an average annual rate superior to 3% between 1869 and 1914 and 2% between that date and 1947. In other words, the population duplicated every 24 years from the middle of the 19" century until the decade of 1920. Second, although the number of immigrants to the United States was far higher than in Argentina, the proportional weight of immigrants in the latter was the highest in the world during this period. Thus, the proportion of foreigners in the total Argentine population went from 12.1% in 1869 to 29.9% in 1914, to fall to 15.3% in 1947. This contribution is even more important if we consider its indirect impact: the children of immigrants born in the country, Argentine people according to native law based on ius solis or land right. The European migratory flux became less important after the economic crisis of 1930. A new flux arrived during the second post war period. In effect, between 1945 and 1959 Argentina received 899,977 immigrants (basically Italians and Spaniards, but also 22,500 Germans) which in general (70.8%) remained in the country.’ In contrast with European migration, emigration from Latin American countries was Clearly smaller but continuous (between 2 and 3 % of the total immigrants between 1869 and 2001). Third, the main mechanisms of travel and initial settlement were migratory chains and primary social networks, composed by members of the same family or village. Interpersonal knowledge favored the spreading of trustworthy information, the loans of money for the tickets and other kinds of material support. For that reason, and in spite of many important colonization enterprises, migration to Rio de la Plata was largely spontaneous, especially after the economic crisis of 1890. ' On the immigration to Argentina see José Moya: Cousins and Strangers. Spanish Immigrants in Buenos Aires, 1850-1930, University of California Press, Berkeley, Los Angeles, California, 1998; Maria Bjerg: Entre Sofie y Tovelille. Una historia de los inmigrantes daneses en la Argentina (1848-930), Buenos Aires, Biblos, 2001; Alejandro Fernandez: Un ‘mercado étnico’ en el Plata. Emigraciôn y exportaciones españolas a la Argentina, 1880-1935, Madrid, CSIC, 2004; Fernando Devoto: Historia de la inmigraciôn italiana en la Argentina, Buenos Aires, Camara de Comercio Italiana de la Repüblica Argentina, 2006; Marcelino Irianni: Historia de los vascos en la Argentina. Buenos Aires, Biblos, 2010; Hernän Otero: Historia de los franceses de la Argentina, Buenos Aires, Biblos, 2012; and, especially, Fernando Devoto: Historia de la inmigraciôn en Argentina, Buenos Aires, Sudamericana, 2003. Maria Inés Barbero y Maria Cristina Cacopardo: La inmigracién europea a la Argentina en la segunda posguerra: viejos mitos y nuevas condiciones, Estudios Migratorios Latinoamericanos, No. 19, 1991, 291-322. + 21°
