Provinces of Argentina

Argentina has 23 provinces (Template:Langx, singular ) and one autonomous city, Buenos Aires, which serves as the federal capital, as determined by Congress.Template:Sfn

The provinces and the capital have their own constitutions and exist under a federal system.

History

During the War of Independence, cities and their surrounding areas became provinces through local councils (cabildos). This process was finalized during the Anarchy of the Year XX, forming the first 13 provinces.

Jujuy seceded from Salta in 1834, and the thirteen provinces became fourteen. After seceding for a decade, Buenos Aires Province accepted the 1853 Constitution of Argentina in 1861, and its capital city was made a federal territory in 1880.Template:Sfn

A law from 1862 designated as national territories those territories under federal control but outside the frontiers of the provinces. In 1884 they served as bases for the establishment of the governorates of Misiones, Formosa, Chaco, La Pampa, Neuquén, Río Negro, Chubut, Santa Cruz and Tierra del Fuego.Template:Sfn The agreement about a frontier dispute with Chile in 1900 created the National Territory of Los Andes; its lands were incorporated into Jujuy, Salta and Catamarca in 1943.Template:Sfn La Pampa and Chaco became provinces in 1951. Misiones did so in 1953, and Formosa, Neuquén, Río Negro, Chubut and Santa Cruz, in 1955. The last national territory, Tierra del Fuego, became the Tierra del Fuego, Antártida e Islas del Atlántico Sur Province in 1990.Template:Sfn This province nominally includes Argentina's claims to the Falkland Islands and South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands and to a segment of Antarctica that overlaps with the British and Chilean claims on that continent.

Political organization

Argentina is a federation of twenty-three provinces and one autonomous city, Buenos Aires. Provinces are divided for administration purposes into departments and municipalities, except for Buenos Aires Province, which is divided into partidos and localidades. Buenos Aires City itself is divided into communes (comuna) and non-official neighbourhoods (barrios).

Provinces hold all the power that they chose not to delegate to the federal government;Template:Sfn they must be representative commonwealths and must not contradict the Constitution.Template:Sfn Beyond this, they are fully autonomous: they enact their own constitutions,Template:Sfn freely organize their local governments,Template:Sfn and own and manage their natural and financial resources.Template:Sfn Thus, each province has its own set of provincial laws and justice system, a supreme court, a governor, an autonomous police force, and a congress; in eight provinces, the legislature is bicameral, comprising an upper chamber (the Senate) and a lower chamber (the House of Deputies), while in the remaining fifteen provinces and in Buenos Aires City, it is unicameral.Template:Efn-ua

In case of sedition, insurrection, territorial invasion, or any other emerging threats against the laws of the nation on any province or the federal capital, the Congress has the authority to declare a federal intervention on the compromised district,Template:Sfn even in the absence of a formal request by the affected part.Template:Sfn When Congress is in recess and thus unable to intervene, the President is entitled to decree such intervention, but this executive order is subject to Congressional override upon the Houses' immediate reassembly.Template:Sfn Once the intervention is declared the compromised district's government is immediately dissolved—in whole or in part depending on Congressional decision—and the President appoints a representative or intervenor, who will serve for a short time until the emergency is solved. Since 1983 four provinces were intervened, namely Catamarca, Corrientes (twice), Santiago del Estero (twice), and Tucumán.

During the 20th century, some provinces have had governments that were traditionally controlled by a single family (i.e. the Saadi family in Catamarca, or the Sapag family in Neuquén); in one case, it is still the same situation as of 2009: the province of San Luis was ruled almost without a break by the Rodríguez Saá family since December 1983.

Article 61 of the Constitution of the city of Buenos Aires states that "Suffrage is free, equal, secret, universal, compulsory and not accumulative. The foreign residents enjoy this right, with the correlative obligations, on equal terms with Argentine citizens registered in this district, in the terms established by the law."

List of provinces

Provinces of Argentina

Flag	Province	Capital	Secondary capitalTemplate:Efn-ua	HASC subdivision code	Population (2022)	Area	Density per km2
Template:Country data Buenos Aires	Autonomous City of Buenos Aires	Buenos Aires	N/A	DF	3,121,707		15,161.3
Template:Flagicon	Buenos Aires	La Plata	La Matanza and General Pueyrredón	BA	17,523,996		57.3
Template:Flagicon	Catamarca	San Fernando del Valle de Catamarca	Tinogasta	CT	429,562		4.2
Template:Flagicon	Chaco	Resistencia	Presidencia Roque Sáenz Peña	CC	1,129,606		11.3
Template:Flagicon	Chubut	Rawson	Comodoro Rivadavia	CH	592,621		2.6
Template:Flagicon	Córdoba	Córdoba	Río Cuarto	CB	3,840,905		23.3
Template:Flagicon	Corrientes	Corrientes	Goya	CN	1,212,696		13.6
Template:Flagicon	Entre Ríos	Paraná	Concordia	ER	1,425,578		18.2
Template:Flagicon	Formosa	Formosa	Formosa	FM	607,419		8.0
Template:Flagicon	Jujuy	San Salvador de Jujuy	San Pedro de Jujuy	JY	811,611		15.2
Template:Flagicon	La Pampa	Santa Rosa	General Pico	LP	361,859		2.5
Template:Flagicon	La Rioja	La Rioja	Chilecito	LR	383,865		4.2
Template:Flagicon	Mendoza	Mendoza	Guaymallén	MZ	2,043,540		13.7
Template:Flagicon	Misiones	Posadas	Oberá	MN	1,278,873		42.8
Template:Flagicon	Neuquén	Neuquén	Cutral Có	NQ	710,814		7.5
Template:Flagicon	Río Negro	Viedma	San Carlos de Bariloche	RN	750,768		3.7
Template:Flagicon	Salta	Salta	San Ramón de la Nueva Orán	SA	1,441,351		9.3
Template:Flagicon	San Juan	San Juan	Caucete	SJ	822,853		9.3
Template:Flagicon	San Luis	San Luis	Villa Mercedes	SL	542,069		7.2
Template:Flagicon	Santa Cruz	Río Gallegos	Caleta Olivia	SC	337,226		1.4
Template:Flagicon	Santa Fe	Santa Fe	Rosario	SF	3,544,908		26.6
Template:Flagicon	Santiago del Estero	Santiago del Estero	La Banda	SE	1,060,906		7.7
Template:Flagicon	Tierra del Fuego	Ushuaia	Río Grande	TF	185,651*	*	8.8*
Template:Flagicon	Tucumán	San Miguel de Tucumán	Monteros	TM	1,731,820		76.7

* Derived from multiple values

See also

• Comparison between Argentine provinces and countries by GDP (PPP) per capita
• Demographics of Argentina
• ISO 3166-2:AR, the ISO codes for the provinces of Argentina.
• List of Argentine provinces by gross regional product
• List of Argentine provinces by Human Development Index
• Conference of Governors of National Territories

Bibliography

Legal documents

Books

External links

• Provinces of Argentina at statoids.com
• Argentine Provinces since 1973 at World Statesmen