On November 20, 2023, libertarian Javier Millei won Argentina’s presidential elections in a run-off against Sergio Massa, the economic minister of the ruling coalition. His victory is widely attributed to his ability to capitalize on the population’s widespread dissatisfaction with elites. After inheriting a dire economic situation, his presidency has been focused on reforms to tackle inflation, the fiscal deficit, modernization of the labor market, and privatizing important sectors of the economy. He has achieved an impressive correction of the fiscal accounts and of inflation. His proposals have faced pushback from different sectors, including members of Congress and significantly students and educators who voted for him. However, some of his reforms have made it through to implementation, although somewhat diluted from their original forms.
What is the future of Milei’s reforms and the ideas he represents? What does it mean to be a centrist in Argentina's current political landscape? Will centrism be able to build an attractive political alternative in the future? Based on what kind of ideas/proposals? To discuss these key issues the Georgetown Americas Institute (GAI) was pleased to host Horacio Rodriguez Larreta, the former chief of government of the city of Buenos Aires, for a conversation with Alejandro Werner, founding director of the Georgetown Americas Institute.
The Georgetown Global Cities Initiative heldr an additional dialogue with Rodriguez Larreta on the power of urban leadership on the global stage in conversation with Uwe Brandes, Global Cities faculty director.
This event was livestreamed to the GAI YouTube Channel.
Featuring
Horacio Rodríguez Larreta was the mayor of the city of Buenos Aires from 2015 to 2023 and a presidential candidate in 2023 for PRO (Propuesta Republicana), a leading national political party part of the Juntos por el Cambio coalition. As mayor, he conducted several modernizing reforms and expanded the city’s international profile, hosting the G20 in 2018 and the C40 World Mayors Summit in 2024. Before his election as mayor he served as chief of staff under then-mayor of Buenos Aires Mauricio Macri through his two terms in office between 2007 and 2015. Previous to Rodríguez’s time in city politics he founded the Grupo Sophia, led the National Undersecretariat for Social Development, and was general manager of Argentina’s National Social Security Administration. He holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from the Universidad de Buenos Aires and a master’s degree in business administration from Harvard Business School.
Alejandro Werner is the founding director of the Georgetown Americas Institute and a non-resident senior fellow at the Peterson Institute. He recently completed almost nine years as director of the Western Hemisphere Department at the International Monetary Fund. Prior to that appointment, he was undersecretary of finance and public credit in Mexico’s Finance Ministry and held several positions in that ministry and the Central Bank. He also taught at leading universities in Mexico, Spain, and the United States. He holds a Ph.D. in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a B.A. in economics from ITAM.