josedanielaromi/Arg1993 · Datasets at Hugging Face

Unnamed: 0 int64 0 1.66k	text stringlengths 76 552
1,500	<s>[INST] In 1979, when they were on the verge [/INST] of war over the Beale Channel, Pope John Paul II was the arbitrator. </s>
1,501	<s>[INST] Today, the hope of growing richer [/INST] together is helping them to let old grudges die. </s>
1,502	<s>[INST] Argentina's President Carlos Menem, recognising that his country needs capital and know-how from abroad to [/INST] help it recover from the hyperinflation of the late 1980s, and impressed by Chile's remarkable economic growth, has set aside decades of nationalism and put out the welcome mat. </s>
1,503	<s>[INST] Chile's President Patricio Aylwyn, aware that his own country's market is small (it [/INST] has only 13m people and a GDP of $38 billion, compared with Argentina's 32m and $72 billion), has encouraged Chilean businessmen to respond. </s>
1,504	<s>[INST] This has led to [/INST] dramatic results in the field of energy. </s>
1,505	<s>[INST] The two countries are beginning work on a pipeline that will [/INST] carry oil 425 kilometres from Argentina's oil fields at Neuquen to San Vicente in Chile, and supply 40% of Chile's needs. </s>
1,506	<s>[INST] They are working together to develop [/INST] oil deposits on the Argentine side of the Magellan straits. </s>
1,507	<s>[INST] A $1 billion joint venture will provide [/INST] 8m cubic metres of Argentine natural gas a day to Chile. </s>
1,508	<s>[INST] For their part, Chilean firms, having bought part of [/INST] a privatised Argentine utility company, now help to provide Buenos Aires with much of its electricity. </s>
1,509	<s>[INST] Argentines watch with fascination as Chileans, having learnt in their own country how [/INST] to overhaul unwieldy state firms, use their management expertise and customised computer software to trim overstaffing and modernise billing in some of Argentina's bloated companies. </s>
1,510	<s>[INST] In one of these, the new Chilean managers, suspecting that the [/INST] payroll was fattened by phantom employees, told everybody to turn up in person to collect his monthly pay packet. </s>
1,511	<s>[INST] In the retail trade Chileans are setting [/INST] up high-tech supermarkets, complete with barcode scanners, to compete with Argentina's corner-shops. </s>
1,512	<s>[INST] Several Chilean credit-risk agencies have joined their [/INST] Argentine counterparts to feed information to and fro across the Andes. </s>
1,513	<s>[INST] Argentina's parliament recently provided tax breaks [/INST] to pull foreign investors into the country's tiny mining industry. </s>
1,514	<s>[INST] Chilean companies, which invest $500m a year [/INST] in mining at home, are scrambling to take advantage of them. </s>
1,515	<s>[INST] Over the past three years Chilean investment in Argentina has [/INST] soared tenfold, to $500m last year; Argentine investment in Chile was not even a tenth of that. </s>
1,516	<s>[INST] Over the same period trade between the [/INST] two countries has doubled, to more than $1 billion in 1992. </s>
1,517	<s>[INST] Argentina's long-running surplus with its neighbour has [/INST] eroded, because Chile's exports have risen more than twice as fast as Argentina's. </s>
1,518	<s>[INST] Even Argentina's new peso [/INST] coins are minted by a Chilean company. </s>
1,519	<s>[INST] But as Argentina's economy continues to grow, and the privatisation [/INST] of its big state firms draws to a close, the economic relationship will probably become a more equal one. </s>
1,520	<s>[INST] Chile's army is still [/INST] ready to blow up several mountain passes. </s>
1,521	<s>[INST] Some proposed joint mining ventures on Argentina's side of the Andes [/INST] have started badly, as foreign prospectors are warned off by regional and military authorities, despite signed permits from the central government. </s>
1,522	<s>[INST] The two countries' producers of wine [/INST] and fruit, long rivals, are suspicious of the new links. </s>
1,523	<s>[INST] Chilean fruit farmers do not want to let Argentine merchant ships into [/INST] Chile's Pacific ports, partly because they fear that Argentine farmers will use access to the ports to compete in "their" markets in Asia. </s>
1,524	<s>[INST] Growing Chilean imports could cause trouble for Mr Menem in [/INST] the presidential election of 1995, coming as they do on top of a surge of imports from Brazil. </s>
1,525	<s>[INST] Chilean exporters are unlikely to hold back, because they [/INST] need to make up for falling world prices for the country's copper, pulp and fish meal. </s>
1,526	<s>[INST] Chile is expected to have a trade deficit [/INST] this year of $500m, after surpluses of $750m in 1991 and $1.6 billion last year. </s>
1,527	<s>[INST] All the same, the two [/INST] economies look like becoming ever more intertwined. </s>
1,528	<s>[INST] And Chile wants to show that it can [/INST] be a beachhead for the world's trade to South America, starting with Argentina. </s>
1,529	<s>[INST] Both countries are learning that [/INST] it pays to be nice to your neighbour. </s>
1,530	<s>[INST] ___ Document 221 of 400 Latin American [/INST] trade: Patchwork Publication info: The Economist 327.7811 (May 15, 1993): 85-86. </s>
1,531	<s>[INST] accountid=28034 Abstract: While America, Canada, and Mexico equivocate over the [/INST] North American Free Trade Agreement, there is a new enthusiasm about open trade among countries in Latin America. </s>
1,532	<s>[INST] A hotchpotch of alliances that were [/INST] once little more than symbols of neighborly intent suddenly matter. </s>
1,533	<s>[INST] Full text: In 1990 George Bush proclaimed [/INST] his dream of a free-trade area "from Anchorage to Tierra del Fuego". </s>
1,534	<s>[INST] While America, Canada and Mexico equivocate over the North [/INST] American Free Trade Agreement, there is a new enthusiasm about open trade among countries to the south. </s>
1,535	<s>[INST] A hotch-potch of alliances that were [/INST] once little more than symbols of neighbourly intent suddenly matter. </s>
1,536	<s>[INST] Since the mid-1980s Latin America [/INST] has pursued economic reform and rediscovered democracy. </s>
1,537	<s>[INST] From the beginning, trade liberalisation--cutting import tariffs [/INST] and abolishing import licences--has had a central place in most Latin reform programmes. </s>
1,538	<s>[INST] Prosperous Chile, the region's star performer, has [/INST] built its growth on exports--and has signed a raft of trade agreements. </s>
1,539	<s>[INST] A treaty with Mexico doubled [/INST] the (admittedly modest) trade between the two. </s>
1,540	<s>[INST] Chile has also signed mutual tariff-cutting agreements with Argentina and [/INST] Bolivia, last year doubling its exports to one and increasing them by a third to the other. </s>
1,541	<s>[INST] The transformation is affecting the whole [/INST] region--though the results are not always quite so striking. </s>
1,542	<s>[INST] "We have experienced a 180deg turn [/INST] in our mentality," says Colombia's trade minister, Juan Manuel Santos. </s>
1,543	<s>[INST] Colombia used to hide isolated behind [/INST] high tariffs; a former president compared his country to Tibet. </s>
1,544	<s>[INST] Last year it broadened [/INST] an earlier agreement with Venezuela and Ecuador. </s>
1,545	<s>[INST] These countries once welcomed only each [/INST] other's goods, while imports from non-members were severely discouraged. </s>
1,546	<s>[INST] Now, any product can be sold whatever its [/INST] origin; the only barrier is a common external tariff ranging between 5% and 20%. </s>
1,547	<s>[INST] As a result of open borders, trade [/INST] between Colombia and Venezuela increased from $525m in 1990 to $932m last year. </s>
1,548	<s>[INST] Trade between Colombia and Ecuador, which joined [/INST] the agreement last September, increased by about 30% in the fourth quarter. </s>
1,549	<s>[INST] Venezuela recently issued $100m-worth [/INST] of government bonds in the Colombian stockmarkets. </s>
1,550	<s>[INST] Colombia and Venezuela are jointly negotiating [/INST] a free-trade agreement with the three Central American countries. </s>
1,551	<s>[INST] The prospect of such a deal may [/INST] have helped to boost Colombian exports to Mexico by 27% last year. </s>
1,552	<s>[INST] An enthusiastic Mr Santos claims that, of [/INST] all the developing countries, Colombia will soon be the "best positioned, commercially". </s>
1,553	<s>[INST] But it is a sign of the [/INST] times that a Latin American minister even wishes to make such a boast. </s>
1,554	<s>[INST] Whether the region's liking for [/INST] liberal trade will last remains to be seen. </s>
1,555	<s>[INST] One reason to think it may is [/INST] that the new agreements have turned national tariff-cutting programmes into international commitments. </s>
1,556	<s>[INST] The evidence for this is that, [/INST] in the past, such agreements helped to entrench protectionist policies. </s>
1,557	<s>[INST] For instance, in the 1960s a common market of five [/INST] Central American countries sheltered over-priced local goods behind high tariffs, putting an international stamp on import substitution. </s>
1,558	<s>[INST] This year four of them [/INST] agreed to set a low common external tariff instead. </s>
1,559	<s>[INST] For the moment international collaboration [/INST] is on the side of liberal trade. </s>
1,560	<s>[INST] Despite their success in boosting [/INST] trade within the continent, these deals have drawbacks. </s>
1,561	<s>[INST] They have created genuinely new trading opportunities, but [/INST] they have also diverted trade from established patterns with Europe and the United States. </s>
1,562	<s>[INST] (How much is not known, and trade [/INST] with Europe and North America may still be growing in overall terms. </s>
1,563	<s>[INST] ) When regional deals divert more trade than they [/INST] create, economists regard them as harmful overall: such arrangements tend to shift production to less efficient producers. </s>
1,564	<s>[INST] There is also the danger that small, [/INST] local agreements spin out of control as trade imbalances grow among their signatories. </s>
1,565	<s>[INST] An expanding Colombian trade surplus [/INST] with Venezuela and Ecuador threatens to cause an upset. </s>
1,566	<s>[INST] Brazil's surplus with its partners [/INST] in Mercosur (Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay) already has. </s>
1,567	<s>[INST] Although Brazil is wallowing in stagflation, Brazilian exports to its partners [/INST] have risen from $1.3 billion in 1989 to $4.1 billion in 1992, while imports were unchanged at $2.2 billion. </s>
1,568	<s>[INST] The imbalance is mostly due to the vigour of [/INST] Brazil's export industries, its sickly demand for imports and, with respect to Argentina, an under-valued exchange rate. </s>
1,569	<s>[INST] Recently Argentina's economics minister went to Brazil [/INST] and asked the Brazilians to buy more Argentine wheat to help restore balance. </s>
1,570	<s>[INST] Even in the new Latin America, [/INST] it seems, the commitment to free trade goes only so far. </s>
1,571	<s>[INST] Author: Anonymous Publication info: [/INST] The Economist 327.7807 (Apr 17, 1993): 44. </s>
1,572	<s>[INST] accountid=28034 Abstract: Argentina's President Carlos Menem and his ministers have slashed inflation, restored economic growth, and brought a [/INST] steadiness to daily life that most Argentines had never known, Yet because Argentina limits its 6-year presidential post to one term, the chance of Menem remaining president for a 2nd term is slim. </s>
1,573	<s>[INST] Full text: They do not [/INST] trust their leaders in Argentina, and with good reason. </s>
1,574	<s>[INST] For 50 years, leadership has tended to [/INST] mean being first in line to plunder the treasury and wreck the economy. </s>
1,575	<s>[INST] But even his fiercest critic [/INST] would concede that President Carlos Menem is different. </s>
1,576	<s>[INST] He and his ministers have slashed inflation, restored [/INST] economic growth and brought a steadiness to daily life that most Argentines had never known. </s>
1,577	<s>[INST] Yet when Mr Menem asks to be trusted beyond [/INST] the six-year term laid down by the constitution, even some of his warmest admirers say No. </s>
1,578	<s>[INST] His term is due to end in 1995, and [/INST] several members of his Peronist party have already said they are running to succeed him. </s>
1,579	<s>[INST] But Mr Menem's future is [/INST] what people talk about when they discuss politics. </s>
1,580	<s>[INST] He asks why it is all right for the United [/INST] States, France, Britain and Germany to allow their leaders more than one term, but not for Argentina. </s>
1,581	<s>[INST] He wants to stay on, [/INST] he says, because he still has lots to do. </s>
1,582	<s>[INST] When he took over in 1989, Argentina [/INST] had an economy stifled by controls and a political system riddled with patronage. </s>
1,583	<s>[INST] The changes need consolidating and some of the [/INST] trickiest reforms (eg, to the state pension scheme) will take time to achieve. </s>
1,584	<s>[INST] To get a second term, [/INST] Mr Menem has a steep hill to climb. </s>
1,585	<s>[INST] He would need a two-thirds majority in both houses of [/INST] Congress, and even that would mean only that a special assembly would be established to consider constitutional change. </s>
1,586	<s>[INST] If its deliberations were favourable, [/INST] the issue itself would then go to a referendum. </s>
1,587	<s>[INST] At the moment, Mr Menem's party [/INST] does not have enough votes in Congress to begin the climb. </s>
1,588	<s>[INST] Its chance will come in September, with [/INST] elections for a third of the seats in the lower house. </s>
1,589	<s>[INST] Unfortunately for Mr Menem, those are the [/INST] seats that were last contested in 1989, when the Peronists were popular. </s>
1,590	<s>[INST] To do better than that [/INST] this time would be a remarkable feat. </s>
1,591	<s>[INST] If that disappoints the [/INST] president, he shows no sign of it. </s>
1,592	<s>[INST] His closest supporters hope that a strong showing on a big [/INST] turn-out will persuade Argentina's politicians to listen to the people and begin the process that would change the constitution. </s>
1,593	<s>[INST] He was an outsider--an Arab, from [/INST] a backwater province--who nonetheless won his party's nomination for president. </s>
1,594	<s>[INST] He is a Peronist who has [/INST] got rid of almost every populist folly that Juan Peron cherished. </s>
1,595	<s>[INST] He is popular; more unusual, [/INST] despite a flamboyant style, he is respected. </s>
1,596	<s>[INST] As Mr Menem tries to pull off [/INST] another surprise, he might contemplate one of the lessons of his difficult task. </s>
1,597	<s>[INST] So far, many of his economic measures have [/INST] been brought in by presidential decree; getting them through Congress would have taken too long. </s>
1,598	<s>[INST] But decrees can be undone with a stroke of [/INST] the next president's pen, which is why few of Mr Menem's achievements can be counted as permanent. </s>
1,599	<s>[INST] For one of them, [/INST] though, the president insisted on congressional approval. </s>

1,500

<s>[INST] In 1979, when they were on the verge [/INST] of war over the Beale Channel, Pope John Paul II was the arbitrator. </s>

1,501

<s>[INST] Today, the hope of growing richer [/INST] together is helping them to let old grudges die. </s>

1,502

<s>[INST] Argentina's President Carlos Menem, recognising that his country needs capital and know-how from abroad to [/INST] help it recover from the hyperinflation of the late 1980s, and impressed by Chile's remarkable economic growth, has set aside decades of nationalism and put out the welcome mat. </s>

1,503

<s>[INST] Chile's President Patricio Aylwyn, aware that his own country's market is small (it [/INST] has only 13m people and a GDP of $38 billion, compared with Argentina's 32m and $72 billion), has encouraged Chilean businessmen to respond. </s>

1,504

<s>[INST] This has led to [/INST] dramatic results in the field of energy. </s>

1,505

<s>[INST] The two countries are beginning work on a pipeline that will [/INST] carry oil 425 kilometres from Argentina's oil fields at Neuquen to San Vicente in Chile, and supply 40% of Chile's needs. </s>

1,506

<s>[INST] They are working together to develop [/INST] oil deposits on the Argentine side of the Magellan straits. </s>

1,507

<s>[INST] A $1 billion joint venture will provide [/INST] 8m cubic metres of Argentine natural gas a day to Chile. </s>

1,508

<s>[INST] For their part, Chilean firms, having bought part of [/INST] a privatised Argentine utility company, now help to provide Buenos Aires with much of its electricity. </s>

1,509

<s>[INST] Argentines watch with fascination as Chileans, having learnt in their own country how [/INST] to overhaul unwieldy state firms, use their management expertise and customised computer software to trim overstaffing and modernise billing in some of Argentina's bloated companies. </s>

1,510

<s>[INST] In one of these, the new Chilean managers, suspecting that the [/INST] payroll was fattened by phantom employees, told everybody to turn up in person to collect his monthly pay packet. </s>

1,511

<s>[INST] In the retail trade Chileans are setting [/INST] up high-tech supermarkets, complete with barcode scanners, to compete with Argentina's corner-shops. </s>

1,512

<s>[INST] Several Chilean credit-risk agencies have joined their [/INST] Argentine counterparts to feed information to and fro across the Andes. </s>

1,513

<s>[INST] Argentina's parliament recently provided tax breaks [/INST] to pull foreign investors into the country's tiny mining industry. </s>

1,514

<s>[INST] Chilean companies, which invest $500m a year [/INST] in mining at home, are scrambling to take advantage of them. </s>

1,515

<s>[INST] Over the past three years Chilean investment in Argentina has [/INST] soared tenfold, to $500m last year; Argentine investment in Chile was not even a tenth of that. </s>

1,516

<s>[INST] Over the same period trade between the [/INST] two countries has doubled, to more than $1 billion in 1992. </s>

1,517

<s>[INST] Argentina's long-running surplus with its neighbour has [/INST] eroded, because Chile's exports have risen more than twice as fast as Argentina's. </s>

1,518

<s>[INST] Even Argentina's new peso [/INST] coins are minted by a Chilean company. </s>

1,519

<s>[INST] But as Argentina's economy continues to grow, and the privatisation [/INST] of its big state firms draws to a close, the economic relationship will probably become a more equal one. </s>

1,520

<s>[INST] Chile's army is still [/INST] ready to blow up several mountain passes. </s>

1,521

<s>[INST] Some proposed joint mining ventures on Argentina's side of the Andes [/INST] have started badly, as foreign prospectors are warned off by regional and military authorities, despite signed permits from the central government. </s>

1,522

<s>[INST] The two countries' producers of wine [/INST] and fruit, long rivals, are suspicious of the new links. </s>

1,523

<s>[INST] Chilean fruit farmers do not want to let Argentine merchant ships into [/INST] Chile's Pacific ports, partly because they fear that Argentine farmers will use access to the ports to compete in "their" markets in Asia. </s>

1,524

<s>[INST] Growing Chilean imports could cause trouble for Mr Menem in [/INST] the presidential election of 1995, coming as they do on top of a surge of imports from Brazil. </s>

1,525

<s>[INST] Chilean exporters are unlikely to hold back, because they [/INST] need to make up for falling world prices for the country's copper, pulp and fish meal. </s>

1,526

<s>[INST] Chile is expected to have a trade deficit [/INST] this year of $500m, after surpluses of $750m in 1991 and $1.6 billion last year. </s>

1,527

<s>[INST] All the same, the two [/INST] economies look like becoming ever more intertwined. </s>

1,528

<s>[INST] And Chile wants to show that it can [/INST] be a beachhead for the world's trade to South America, starting with Argentina. </s>

1,529

<s>[INST] Both countries are learning that [/INST] it pays to be nice to your neighbour. </s>

1,530

<s>[INST] ___ Document 221 of 400 Latin American [/INST] trade: Patchwork Publication info: The Economist 327.7811 (May 15, 1993): 85-86. </s>

1,531

<s>[INST] accountid=28034 Abstract: While America, Canada, and Mexico equivocate over the [/INST] North American Free Trade Agreement, there is a new enthusiasm about open trade among countries in Latin America. </s>

1,532

<s>[INST] A hotchpotch of alliances that were [/INST] once little more than symbols of neighborly intent suddenly matter. </s>

1,533

<s>[INST] Full text: In 1990 George Bush proclaimed [/INST] his dream of a free-trade area "from Anchorage to Tierra del Fuego". </s>

1,534

<s>[INST] While America, Canada and Mexico equivocate over the North [/INST] American Free Trade Agreement, there is a new enthusiasm about open trade among countries to the south. </s>

1,535

<s>[INST] A hotch-potch of alliances that were [/INST] once little more than symbols of neighbourly intent suddenly matter. </s>

1,536

<s>[INST] Since the mid-1980s Latin America [/INST] has pursued economic reform and rediscovered democracy. </s>

1,537

<s>[INST] From the beginning, trade liberalisation--cutting import tariffs [/INST] and abolishing import licences--has had a central place in most Latin reform programmes. </s>

1,538

<s>[INST] Prosperous Chile, the region's star performer, has [/INST] built its growth on exports--and has signed a raft of trade agreements. </s>

1,539

<s>[INST] A treaty with Mexico doubled [/INST] the (admittedly modest) trade between the two. </s>

1,540

<s>[INST] Chile has also signed mutual tariff-cutting agreements with Argentina and [/INST] Bolivia, last year doubling its exports to one and increasing them by a third to the other. </s>

1,541

<s>[INST] The transformation is affecting the whole [/INST] region--though the results are not always quite so striking. </s>

1,542

<s>[INST] "We have experienced a 180deg turn [/INST] in our mentality," says Colombia's trade minister, Juan Manuel Santos. </s>

1,543

<s>[INST] Colombia used to hide isolated behind [/INST] high tariffs; a former president compared his country to Tibet. </s>

1,544

<s>[INST] Last year it broadened [/INST] an earlier agreement with Venezuela and Ecuador. </s>

1,545

<s>[INST] These countries once welcomed only each [/INST] other's goods, while imports from non-members were severely discouraged. </s>

1,546

<s>[INST] Now, any product can be sold whatever its [/INST] origin; the only barrier is a common external tariff ranging between 5% and 20%. </s>

1,547

<s>[INST] As a result of open borders, trade [/INST] between Colombia and Venezuela increased from $525m in 1990 to $932m last year. </s>

1,548

<s>[INST] Trade between Colombia and Ecuador, which joined [/INST] the agreement last September, increased by about 30% in the fourth quarter. </s>

1,549

<s>[INST] Venezuela recently issued $100m-worth [/INST] of government bonds in the Colombian stockmarkets. </s>

1,550

<s>[INST] Colombia and Venezuela are jointly negotiating [/INST] a free-trade agreement with the three Central American countries. </s>

1,551

<s>[INST] The prospect of such a deal may [/INST] have helped to boost Colombian exports to Mexico by 27% last year. </s>

1,552

<s>[INST] An enthusiastic Mr Santos claims that, of [/INST] all the developing countries, Colombia will soon be the "best positioned, commercially". </s>

1,553

<s>[INST] But it is a sign of the [/INST] times that a Latin American minister even wishes to make such a boast. </s>

1,554

<s>[INST] Whether the region's liking for [/INST] liberal trade will last remains to be seen. </s>

1,555

<s>[INST] One reason to think it may is [/INST] that the new agreements have turned national tariff-cutting programmes into international commitments. </s>

1,556

<s>[INST] The evidence for this is that, [/INST] in the past, such agreements helped to entrench protectionist policies. </s>

1,557

<s>[INST] For instance, in the 1960s a common market of five [/INST] Central American countries sheltered over-priced local goods behind high tariffs, putting an international stamp on import substitution. </s>

1,558

<s>[INST] This year four of them [/INST] agreed to set a low common external tariff instead. </s>

1,559

<s>[INST] For the moment international collaboration [/INST] is on the side of liberal trade. </s>

1,560

<s>[INST] Despite their success in boosting [/INST] trade within the continent, these deals have drawbacks. </s>

1,561

<s>[INST] They have created genuinely new trading opportunities, but [/INST] they have also diverted trade from established patterns with Europe and the United States. </s>

1,562

<s>[INST] (How much is not known, and trade [/INST] with Europe and North America may still be growing in overall terms. </s>

1,563

<s>[INST] ) When regional deals divert more trade than they [/INST] create, economists regard them as harmful overall: such arrangements tend to shift production to less efficient producers. </s>

1,564

<s>[INST] There is also the danger that small, [/INST] local agreements spin out of control as trade imbalances grow among their signatories. </s>

1,565

<s>[INST] An expanding Colombian trade surplus [/INST] with Venezuela and Ecuador threatens to cause an upset. </s>

1,566

<s>[INST] Brazil's surplus with its partners [/INST] in Mercosur (Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay) already has. </s>

1,567

<s>[INST] Although Brazil is wallowing in stagflation, Brazilian exports to its partners [/INST] have risen from $1.3 billion in 1989 to $4.1 billion in 1992, while imports were unchanged at $2.2 billion. </s>

1,568

<s>[INST] The imbalance is mostly due to the vigour of [/INST] Brazil's export industries, its sickly demand for imports and, with respect to Argentina, an under-valued exchange rate. </s>

1,569

<s>[INST] Recently Argentina's economics minister went to Brazil [/INST] and asked the Brazilians to buy more Argentine wheat to help restore balance. </s>

1,570

<s>[INST] Even in the new Latin America, [/INST] it seems, the commitment to free trade goes only so far. </s>

1,571

<s>[INST] Author: Anonymous Publication info: [/INST] The Economist 327.7807 (Apr 17, 1993): 44. </s>

1,572

<s>[INST] accountid=28034 Abstract: Argentina's President Carlos Menem and his ministers have slashed inflation, restored economic growth, and brought a [/INST] steadiness to daily life that most Argentines had never known, Yet because Argentina limits its 6-year presidential post to one term, the chance of Menem remaining president for a 2nd term is slim. </s>

1,573

<s>[INST] Full text: They do not [/INST] trust their leaders in Argentina, and with good reason. </s>

1,574

<s>[INST] For 50 years, leadership has tended to [/INST] mean being first in line to plunder the treasury and wreck the economy. </s>

1,575

<s>[INST] But even his fiercest critic [/INST] would concede that President Carlos Menem is different. </s>

1,576

<s>[INST] He and his ministers have slashed inflation, restored [/INST] economic growth and brought a steadiness to daily life that most Argentines had never known. </s>

1,577

<s>[INST] Yet when Mr Menem asks to be trusted beyond [/INST] the six-year term laid down by the constitution, even some of his warmest admirers say No. </s>

1,578

<s>[INST] His term is due to end in 1995, and [/INST] several members of his Peronist party have already said they are running to succeed him. </s>

1,579

<s>[INST] But Mr Menem's future is [/INST] what people talk about when they discuss politics. </s>

1,580

<s>[INST] He asks why it is all right for the United [/INST] States, France, Britain and Germany to allow their leaders more than one term, but not for Argentina. </s>

1,581

<s>[INST] He wants to stay on, [/INST] he says, because he still has lots to do. </s>

1,582

<s>[INST] When he took over in 1989, Argentina [/INST] had an economy stifled by controls and a political system riddled with patronage. </s>

1,583

<s>[INST] The changes need consolidating and some of the [/INST] trickiest reforms (eg, to the state pension scheme) will take time to achieve. </s>

1,584

<s>[INST] To get a second term, [/INST] Mr Menem has a steep hill to climb. </s>

1,585

<s>[INST] He would need a two-thirds majority in both houses of [/INST] Congress, and even that would mean only that a special assembly would be established to consider constitutional change. </s>

1,586

<s>[INST] If its deliberations were favourable, [/INST] the issue itself would then go to a referendum. </s>

1,587

<s>[INST] At the moment, Mr Menem's party [/INST] does not have enough votes in Congress to begin the climb. </s>

1,588

<s>[INST] Its chance will come in September, with [/INST] elections for a third of the seats in the lower house. </s>

1,589

<s>[INST] Unfortunately for Mr Menem, those are the [/INST] seats that were last contested in 1989, when the Peronists were popular. </s>

1,590

<s>[INST] To do better than that [/INST] this time would be a remarkable feat. </s>

1,591

<s>[INST] If that disappoints the [/INST] president, he shows no sign of it. </s>

1,592

<s>[INST] His closest supporters hope that a strong showing on a big [/INST] turn-out will persuade Argentina's politicians to listen to the people and begin the process that would change the constitution. </s>

1,593

<s>[INST] He was an outsider--an Arab, from [/INST] a backwater province--who nonetheless won his party's nomination for president. </s>

1,594

<s>[INST] He is a Peronist who has [/INST] got rid of almost every populist folly that Juan Peron cherished. </s>

1,595

<s>[INST] He is popular; more unusual, [/INST] despite a flamboyant style, he is respected. </s>

1,596

<s>[INST] As Mr Menem tries to pull off [/INST] another surprise, he might contemplate one of the lessons of his difficult task. </s>

1,597

<s>[INST] So far, many of his economic measures have [/INST] been brought in by presidential decree; getting them through Congress would have taken too long. </s>

1,598

<s>[INST] But decrees can be undone with a stroke of [/INST] the next president's pen, which is why few of Mr Menem's achievements can be counted as permanent. </s>

1,599

<s>[INST] For one of them, [/INST] though, the president insisted on congressional approval. </s>