social organizations, these crisis diluters

The door, on the same level, remains open. In the rudimentary living room, a continuous ballet gravitates around the dining table. Daiana, the 29-year-old daughter-in-law, kneads pizza dough; Silvia, a neighbor, 28, bakes; Damian, 34, the son, goes in search of a new gas cylinder; Marcela, 44, the daughter, stirs a pot of milk; Silvia Pellegrini, 67 years old, the mother, the frank verb and the alert gaze, watches over the grain: there is too much cheese on these first pizzettas, it is necessary to ration.

Outside, the children are playing, at the edge of the railing of the train station which makes the house hum intermittently, when the train leaves this popular district of Malvinas Argentinas, in the northwestern suburbs of Buenos Aires, to return to the capital, about thirty kilometers away. “The situation is terrible, the money is lacking. I don’t give up because I like to help my neighbour”, says Silvia Pellegrini who, twice a week, cooks – at her son’s and daughter-in-law’s -, then distributes a snack to the local children. The snack, taken home, will often serve as dinner for a whole family.

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The Dean is part of Barrios de Pie – literally “standing quarters” -, a “social organization” which, under the impact of a disrupted economy, with three years of recession from 2018 to 2020, has considerably increased in power. Present throughout the territory, it now has 80,000 members, compared to 50,000 three years ago. The organization oversees 3,200 food distribution points, feeding around 400,000 people in this country of more than 47 million inhabitants (provisional data from the census conducted on May 18). If food aid is the backbone of Barrios de Pie, it also provides training, in carpentry for example, leads activities for children, participates in monitoring the health of the inhabitants of popular towns, works on a price index neighborhoods. Among others.

A surprising social calm

The model is not unique. others “social movements”Where “territorial social”, as they are sometimes also called in Argentina, make up this protean universe and “very heterogeneous, fragmented, more or less institutionalized”underlines Sebastian Pereyra, sociologist at the National Council for Scientific and Technical Research (Conicet), a research center. “Some have a political affiliation, like Polo Obrero, backed by the Partido Obrero, of Trotskyist ideology, or are more linked to the unions, like the Confederation of Workers of the Popular Economy. Others, like Movimiento Evita, bring together small neighborhood organizations,” notes the sociologist.

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