Argentina’s golden age, on the basis of agricultural exports to European markets, lasted from 1880 to 1930. That very success has obscured the fact that a period of unparalleled growth preceded it. This growth was based on wool exports, and it lasted from the 1840s to the 1880s. Hilda Sábato’s excellent book accounts for this period—the pastoral age. The book covers all aspects of wool production and commercialization; but this broad picture of an industry over 50 years is attained at the price of some unevenness in the individual chapters.
The analysis of land tenure and distribution (chapter 2) is based mainly on a rather old bibliography, which cannot be accepted (though it tends to be accepted here) without further criticism. Moreover, the author’s use of the 1830 cadastral record is based on the assumption that areas left blank correspond to public land. This was not necessarily the case: properties around Buenos Aires were not recorded, but they were not public land. The chapter devoted to labor includes a superb description of wage labor and aparcería (sharecropping), while the evidence supporting the assertions on family labor is less convincing. Labor legislation is analyzed without going into the problem of enforcement (why so many coercive regulations from 1815 on?).
The description of the unit of production—estancias—is equally successful. Probate records provide rich evidence, and the author makes good use of it. Tables 14 through 17, however, are based on too-different sources. The result neither applies to nor illuminates any specific case. Sheep farms have been singled out as a different type of unit of production. The author complains about other authors’ failure to identify them, but her own contribution here does not add much.
Trade mechanisms and market operations are described using a wide variety of sources, including the archives of European merchants who dealt with Argentine wool. Based on bank reports and the ledgers for one branch located at the core of the wool-producing region, the last chapter shows the extension of bank operations and their role in the expansion of this industry.
It is somewhat disappointing to find so many references to the author’s dissertation (figures 1, 2, 3a, 3b, 5, and 6; tables 3 and 5) instead of a proper record of sources for each table or figure. Moreover, sources for table 12 and tables 14 through 18 are not given.
For those interested in the dependency debate, arguments are found in the introduction and the epilogue. For the rest, the chapters on labor, estancias and estancieros, and wool trade and commercial networks are rewarding reading. There lies the gist of this notable contribution to the understanding of the social and economic history of nineteenth-century Argentina.
