Ezequiel Adamovsky: A History of Argentina: From the
Spanish Conquest to the Present,
translated by Rebecca Wolpin, Durham, Duke University Press, 2024.

In A History of Argentina,
originally published in Spanish in 2020, Ezequiel Adamovsky presents
over five hundred years of Argentine economic, political, social, and
cultural history. Adamovsky highlights the experiences of women,
Indigenous communities, and other groups that have traditionally been
left out of the historical archive. He focuses on harmful aspects of
Spanish colonization such as gender subjugation, the violence enacted in
the name of the Catholic Church, the role of the economy as it shifted
from the encomienda system into modern industrialization, and the
devastating effects of slavery, violence, and disease brought to the
region by Spanish colonizers. Adamovsky also discusses Argentina’s
independence and territorial consolidation, the first democratic
elections in 1916, military coups, Peronism, democratization and the
neoliberal reforms of the 1980s, and many other facets of Argentine life
up to the 2019 presidential election. Concise, accessible, and
comprehensive, A History of Argentina is an essential guide to this nation.
Table of Contents
1. Violence: The Conquest and the Colonial Order
2. Revolution! The End of the Colonial Order, the Wars of Independence, and a Long Period of Discord (1806–1852)
3. The Great Transformation: The Expansion of the State and the Market in Argentina (1852–1912)
4. Liberal Argentina and Its Constraints: From Failed Democracy to Peronism (1912–1955)
5. The Pendulum: Dictatorship, the Market, and Popular Power, from
Perón’s Overthrow to the National Reorganization Process (1955–1983)
6. Democracy Devalued: Between the Promises of Democracy and Neoliberalism, from Alfonsín to Macri (1983–2019)
Epilogue. Argentine History over the Long Term
Selected Bibliography
Index
Reviews
“A
rich and ambitious work that covers multiple historical dimensions—from
economic structures and sociopolitical processes to ethnicities and
sexuality—Ezequiel Adamovsky’s A History of Argentina
is a magnificent contribution to the English bibliography on Argentine
history. In a landscape dominated by thematic monographs focused on
short time periods, Adamovsky offers a conceptually solid and
narratively engaging synthesis of current scholarship encompassing the
entire country’s history.”―Pablo Palomino, author of, The Invention of Latin American Music: A Transnational History
“With
this translation, English readers have access to the best single-volume
history of Argentina, written by one of the country’s most innovative
and influential historians. Ezequiel Adamovsky draws on a wide range of
interdisciplinary scholarship to highlight the experience and agency of
ordinary people. Accessible to readers encountering Argentine history
for the first time, this engaging account nonetheless has much to teach
more experienced students and scholars; it surprises and illuminates on
every page.”―Matthew B. Karush, author of, Musicians in Transit: Argentina and the Globalization of Popular Music
"A magisterial historical summary (...). Adamovsky’s history of Argentina offers enlightening and candid
insights into the currents that course beneath the surface of this
complex and misunderstood country, which in some ways is unique in Latin
America yet in others reflects all the region’s psychoses. If
you have struggled so far to understand it—and I confess to being one of
the many who has—reading this history is the best way to start." Gavin
O'Toole, Latin
American Review of Books (UK), 14 April 2024.
“An excellent option for those teaching a survey of
Argentine history”, John W. Sherman, Journal of Global South Studies (Gainesville, FL.,
United States), vol. 42, no. 1, Spring 2025, pp. 103-104.
"Adamovsky covers the broad sweep of Argentina’s history, from its pre-Columbian Indigenous peoples to the present. Heprovides a detailed, nuanced portrait of the national history, and every chapter contains insightful analysis and new information, even for someone familiar with Argentina’s history. Among the most interesting, and depressing, chapters are the final ones, in which he analyzes compellingly and with hard numbers Argentina’s economic decline and growing social inequality. Those chapters and the analysis of the kind of neoliberal feedback loop that Argentina has been in since the 1990s are the most original and informative of the book." James Brennan, Hispanic American Historical Review (EEUU), vol. 105, no. 1, 2025, pp. 125–126.