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TrendsPublications and Reports
The next few months will be decisive in Argentina. The country faces a long electoral cycle that will mark its future. The key date will be October 22, when the presidential elections will be held, which, according to opinion polls, will be one of the most competitive in the country’s recent history. The second round, if necessary, will be held on November 12. During those days, the Congress of the Nation will also be partially renewed. Also, throughout 2023, there will be gubernatorial elections in 21 provinces and in the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires.
Elections always generate expectations regarding the forces that will compete, the candidates, their electoral platforms, and the conformation of the new power map after the final results are published. Therefore, the Public Affairs team of LLYC Argentina has prepared the report “2023 Power map: The country’s main players, possible candidates, and top decision makers“, which aims to serve as a guide for the public opinion on how the main forces that will dispute the electoral agenda in 2023 are ordered as of today. This is a starting point to understand the keys to the next presidential elections; although, as the electoral campaign progresses, there could be announcements and modifications that will alter -sometimes substantially- the expected scenarios.
In the words of Facundo González Sembla, Public Affairs Manager at LLYC Argentina: “The government that takes office in December 2023 will face multiple economic and social challenges. Therefore, identifying the technical teams surrounding the party leaders allows us to anticipate the redesign of the map of power in Argentina and new approaches to public policies.”
Parties and candidates in the presidential elections
Several political forces will face each other in the next presidential elections, in a critical context after more than ten years of economic crisis, tense social climate and high levels of dissatisfaction with the political leadership as a whole:
First of all, the Frente de Todos (FDT), which maintains at this moment a great uncertainty about who will be the pre-candidates. The current president, Alberto Fernández, and the vice-president, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, announced that they would not run in the elections. The current Argentine ambassador in Brazil, Daniel Scioli, the head of the Cabinet of Ministers, Agustín Rossi, and the social leader of the Frente Patria Grande, Juan Grabois, have announced their candidacies. The Minister of the Interior, Eduardo “Wado” de Pedro, and the Minister of Economy, Sergio Massa, also have options.
Contrary to what is happening in the ruling party, the main opposition coalition, Juntos por el Cambio (JXC) has a great variety of referents who have confirmed their intention to compete for the presidency. Thus, within the PRO, the election is divided between the head of the Government of the City of Buenos Aires, Horacio Rodríguez Larreta; and the president of the PRO and former Minister of Security of the Nation, Patricia Bullrich. In the Unión Cívica Radical (UCR), its leaders, Gerardo Morales and Facundo Manes, have expressed on several occasions that they intend to play an important role in this election and in the next government. Four other parties are part of the coalition (Evolución, Coalición Cívica, Encuentro Republicano Federal and Republicanos Unidos), whose leaders have less chances of reaching the presidency than those already mentioned, but they assert their weight within JxC in the alliances and support they provide.The question that will persist for the coalition in the coming months is whether it will be able to ensure the cohesion and support of all its voters after months of internal electoral campaigning, at times very tense.
Finally, there are the so called “third forces”, which are those that play outside the framework of the so far hegemonic parties, and that seek to show themselves as alternatives to the ruling party and the opposition. Their behavior will be decisive for the primary and general elections due to their capacity to influence the electorate. In this space is Libertad Avanza of the economist Javier Milei, a young party that may be the surprise for the electoral year since it knows how to channel the generalized feeling of the population of disillusionment and frustration with politics. The Peronism of the governors and the Left Front are also part of these “third forces”.
“We are facing an atypical election: Argentina is moving away from the bi-coalitionism that marked the political scenario during the last eight years, to become a country of thirds -electorally speaking-. Liberalism, led by economist Javier Milei, manages to gain voting intentions and position itself as the third force, capitalizing on the discouragement and frustration of a population facing a daily degradation of its purchasing power. This fact not only forces the rest of the forces to reorganize themselves, but also generates the appearance of new players in the political arena; mapping and knowing them is key to be able to carry out a good anticipated management of public affairs”, concludes Juan Ignacio Di Meglio, Director of Public Affairs at LLYC Argentina.
Read the full report here.
