La (re)militarización policial en la Argentina post-crisis: entre intereses organizacionales e instrumentalización política en los campos policiales

Resorting to the notion of policing field—the space of agents competing for the authority over policing policies and priorities—I explain the operative and symbolic militarization of policing in the two biggestcities of Argentina, Buenos Aires and Córdoba, in the last decade. Drawing on document and interview data and questioning the impersonal mechanisms of change that historical and sociological institutionalist approaches posit, I argue that inter-police, intra-police and political struggles caused the operational and territorial expansionof the National Constabulary over the territory of the Federal Police and the Police of the Province of Buenos Aires and the operational militarization of the Cordoba Police. I close discussing the relevance of these findings to analyze the militarization of policing.