ABSTRACT
There are a number of reasons that make the comparative study of the 2001–2003 financial crises in Argentina and Uruguay particularly relevant as a contribution to the broader understanding of the political dimensions of financial crises. While the international significance of the 2001–2003 crises in Argentina and Uruguay paled in comparison to the 2008 crisis in the US and the Eurozone, they were arguably the worst financial crises in the modern history of the two countries (Argentina’s default was the largest in the world at the time) and by several measures they were among the worst in the modern history of Latin America (Sturzenegger and Zettelmeyer 2006; Roubini and Setser 2004; Wylde 2011). The upturn has been as remarkable as the downturn. Since their nadir in 2002, the economies of the two countries have recovered faster and more vigorously than predicted. This led some commentators to present the two countries’ very different crisis resolution strategies as examples of how to come out of a crisis, particularly for small peripheral European countries such as Greece. 1
