Service Capacity: The Provision of Public Services in Argentina in the Context of the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic once again put the state’s capacitiesof local governments to manage life in society at the center of discussion. Based on the PISAC project “State capacities in a post-pandemic municipal agenda”, we propose to deepen the concept of prestacional capacity as an aptitude for the provision of essential public services by local governments. From a quantitative approach, the prestacional capacity is addressed from its three modalities (direct, indirect, and mixed) in Argentine municipalities in 2021-2022 and in relation to two variables: population size and geographic region. As results, the predominance of the indirect modality is observed in the prestacional capacity of the public services analyzed. This indicates the validity of the impact of the privatization process of public companies in the 1990s, which the re-nationalization wave of the 2000s has not been able to reverse (evidenced in the weak prominence of the direct modality), and implies that the State must deploy its performance capacity also through a regularity role. In addition, the scarce presence of the mixed modality accounts for a low capacity of the State to articulate with private actors, an action that supposes the construction and deployment of political capacities.