Ideology and law: human rights vs. pro-market principles in light of Argentine subnational restructurings 2020/1

Abstract

There is no international bankruptcy law for States, so soft law arranges play a key  role in organizing their debt restructurings. When Argentinean provinces activated their  restructurings in 2020, there were two guiding-rules in the country: the UN and the CBPA  Principles; the latter ones created by a creditor coalition. The article compares their content,  highlighting similarities and contrasts over four predefined dimensions, for understanding  their ideological basis. The analysis shows that the CBPA Principles promoted, to a greater  extent than the UN's Principles, the interests of dominant financial agents, something that  they hide behind the use of particularly technical language. More importantly, the article  reveals the ideological logic that enables them to culturally reproduce their dominance,  discursively linking the protection of these interests to those of the debtor State and, 
ultimately, to those of the society as a whole. The paper contrasts this logic with the counter hegemonic perspective of the UN's human rights approach, which proposes a materially  different distribution of losses and benefits during financial crises.