¿Qué hacer con la calle? La definición del espacio público porteño y el edicto policial de 1932

Abstract

Since at least the 1850s, the streets of Buenos Aires have served as a complementary space for voters’ involvement, which was considered valid under certain circumstances. However, the right of assembly was not the subject of a constitutional and legislative definition until 1949. This situation generated a relative conceptual and normative uncertainty with respect to its legitimacy and specific provisions. In May 1932, a police edict on public meetings, driven by the executive branch of government, tried to define and prescribe the rules of the political game in the streets of Buenos Aires. We shall, therefore, take this regulation on the right of assembly, promoted by the government of A. P. Justo, as a way to enter a much longer process whose conflicts were condensed and reformulated in the early 1930s.