ABSTRACT
The province of Santa Cruz, located in Patagonia in southern Argentina, has a long sheep farming tradition. Southern Patagonia is a region with unique characteristics. Reform and transformation undergone by the State within a framework of political and economic innovations, promoted by globalization face highly complex challenges in the Southern Patagonia region. New forms of organization, management and development cannot be completely applied in the entire region since the effective presence of the State is essential. The region gradually gained its present sheep farming characteristics, which generated rapid livestock growth, and, the depopulation of its interior regions. The area is a strongly marginal region. This situation has turned the region into a territory vulnerable to the impacts of globalization. The region was not integrated into the National State from the point of view of its population, infrastructure, productive participation and the absence of the internal division of work which characterized the other Pampean regions socio-territorially.
