The Patagonia as innovation: scientific images and political concretions

Abstract

The present work is a synthesis of the investigation that we have developed from 1992. We centered in the ideological processes through were incorporated the space of Pampa and Patagonia, first to the Spanish colonial system and later to the Argentinean national State. Our hypothesis is that the conflict between Nation and region is observed yet, and it has the historical roots in the relationship forms developed during the mentioned century (1779-1879), which ended in a politics of incorporation of the territory and of theirs inhabitants marked by the centralist dominance and the violence. All the politics directed from the administrative centers toward the frontier of Pampa and Patagonia, has been founded in scientific studies about the space, the resources and the inhabitants of the region. We demonstrate it through the analysis of an extensive series of documented sources.