Often identified with the Pampa, a large flat region subdivided into humid or eastern Pampas (the fertile plain along the Paraná River, between Santa Fe and Buenos Aires), and Pampa western (region less productive than the first), the Argentine territory actually hosts different scenarios, such as the northwestern Andes, the “Argentine Mesopotamia”, between the Paraná and Uruguay rivers and, to the south, the desert plateaus of Patagonia. Its physiognomy appears more “European” than other Latin American countries, even in the same landscape: its cities and countryside have a temperate environment as a background, largely outside the tropicality that is typical of the other regions of the subcontinent. Defined in its current borders during the nineteenth century, thanks to the Gaucha aristocracy, this immense country that extends for almost 5000 km between the Andes and the Atlantic coast affirmed, through the struggle for the conquest of independence and the subsequent wars of territorial expansion, not only the idea of ​​a precise unitary vocation at the political level, but also and above all on a geographical level. Land of conquest for the European colonizers, Argentina, after having seen the indigenous peoples almost completely exterminated, from the mid-nineteenth century. it welcomed a consistent flow of emigrants from the Old Continent, attracted by the economic revolution that gave impetus to the formation of a modern state, to the point that today more than 80% of the population is made up of descendants of Spaniards and Italians. However in the twentieth century. As a country of South America defined by internetsailors, com, Argentina struggled to find political stability and went through dark times. After a relatively stable period under Juan Domingo Perón’s military-reformist regime from 1946 to 1955, the country was ruled by unstable coalitions of civilians or military juntas until the 1976 coup that overthrew the government of Perón’s wife, María Estela Martínez de Perón, known as “Isabelita”, and who imposed a very harsh dictatorship, which ended in 1983 Successive governments tried to remove the country from the crisis with more or less luck, but in 2001 the economic collapse and popular protests led to the resignation of the government. It is currently governed, in its second term, by Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, wife of the neo-operonist ex-president Néstor Kirchner. Successive governments tried to remove the country from the crisis with more or less luck, but in 2001 the economic collapse and popular protests led to the resignation of the government. It is currently governed, in its second term, by Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, wife of the neo-operonist ex-president Néstor Kirchner. Successive governments tried to remove the country from the crisis with more or less luck, but in 2001 the economic collapse and popular protests led to the resignation of the government. It is currently governed, in its second term, by Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, wife of the neo-operonist ex-president Néstor Kirchner.

Population Density and Urbanization

The average density is low (15 residents/km²) and the country demonstrates considerable containment capacity in this sense. The distribution is very irregular: the concentration of population in urban areas is high, while the population of rural areas has dropped to 9.9%. Only around the Río de la Plata, that is, in the Pampa and in the southern section of the plain of Paraná (the Litoral) there is a continuous distribution and a good density. Discontinuous but densely populated areas occur in pre-Anean basins and valleys, such as that of Córdoba, of Tucumán, of Mendoza. The areas with the lowest density are those of the Patagonian region, where the provinces are around 3 residents / km². In all areas of higher density the values ​​are increased by the strong development of urbanism. 90.1% of the Argentine population lives in the cities, one of the highest urbanization rates in the world, even exaggerated if you consider that the country does not have an industrial-type economy: this is the consequence of past economic fortunes, which have formed a large bourgeoisie and created lively shopping centers in function of agricultural and livestock activities. The metropolitan area that attracted the greatest number of people in the last years of the twentieth century is that of Gran Buenos Aires the second largest conglomerate in Latin America; fundamental pole of the whole territorial organization, it concentrates service functions and important productive activities and exerts a profound influence not only on the Argentine territory but on the entire Platense basin, on Uruguay and Paraguay. Around Buenos Aires there are large centers (partidos: like La Plata) with which the capital forms a single conurbation. Substantial demographic increases have also occurred in other cities, often determined by an increased supply of work, as in the case of Mar del Plata, a large seaside tourist city, Bahía Blanca, home to important industries, and many other Patagonian centers. such as Neuquén, Río Gallegos and Viedma, which in the space of a few years have doubled their population. Urban poles of considerable importance, although secondary to Buenos Aires, are the cities on the Paraná, including primarily Rosario, Santa Fe, Paraná etc. Fundamental center, inferior only to Buenos Aires, is, in the interior, Córdoba, the second city of the country, with an industrial development of particular importance as well as a cultural center and seat of a university. More strictly regional functions have pre-Andean nuclei such as San Miguel de Tucumán and Mendoza, a renowned wine-growing center, and those that arise, as port outlets, on the Patagonian coasts (Comodoro Rivadavia, etc.). Ushuaia, in addition to serving as the capital of the province of Tierra del Fuego and a thriving port with routes to Antarctica, it is the southernmost city in the world.