Roca-Runciman Pact (1933)

The Roca-Runciman Pact (1933) was an Anglo-Argentine trade agreement that gave Britain sweeping concessions. Since 1825 Anglo-Argentine trade had been conducted on the most-favored-nation principle, except for a brief suspension during World War I (1914–1918) and an increasing number of sometimes successful attempts at circumvention from the late 1920s. The Argentine leadership feared that the rise of British imperial preference implied the reduction if not abolition of Anglo-Argentine trade. Britain's government, in contrast, saw it as a means to deal with Argentina more harshly by buying less Argentine farm produce and selling more British manufactured goods to help British industry out of the depression. The negotiations for Argentina were conducted by Vice President Julio A. Roca, Ángel Cárcano, and Raúl Prebisch. The British were led by Walter Runciman, the president of the Board of Trade. Meat and foreign-exchange issues were dealt with in London and Argentine tariff policy in Buenos Aires. The outcome was judged so unfavorable to Argentina that the pact, which some argued was a failure, has generated fierce controversy ever since.

See alsoBritish-Latin American Relations .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Fodor, Jorge G., and Arturo A. O'Connell. "La Argentina y la economía atlántica en la primera mitad del siglo XX." Desarrollo económico 49 (April-June, 1973)

Gravil, Roger. The Anglo-Argentine Connection, 1900–1939. Boulder: Westview Press, 1985.

Additional Bibliography

Mauro Pipino, Ovidio. Tratado Roca-Runciman y el desarrollo industrial en la década del treinta. Buenos Aires: Editorial Galerna, 1988.

                                       Roger Gravil