Since we started Fundar in 2020, this has been our obsession: to understand Argentina's problems to propose sustainable solutions. We are sure of one thing: the pendulum is not solved by choosing one of the sides. The problem of the hegemonic standoff, we believe, is that neither of these two sides in dispute has the key to promote development. This lies, rather, in a resolution that is as technical as it is political, which contrasts with the predominant practices of the national government, which is now in its first year of office.

We believe that development requires a broad and plural dialogue with different strategic actors, which is also a dialogue with the present and with a radically changed state of the world, but which has to take into account the different ideological traditions of Argentina. In Fundar we are convinced that the future comes from the overcoming synthesis of what has been built. For this reason, we review our history and the best projects of the country we were able to build, separating the wheat from the chaand ff, what works from what does not. This is the origin of the research and policy lines that we promote.

From the progressive tradition, we take up the sensitivity that connects with the popular sectors, with the processes of upward social mobility, as well as the continuous expansion of citizens' rights. We share their vocation to build a welfare state that morigrates the impacts of the life cycle beyond the market.

From the liberal tradition, we take the active concern for the health of public accounts (the fiscal realism) and the mandate to connect with the world, to think of an intelligent international insertion that takes us out of the parochial view of living with what is ours. We also take from liberalism the importance of the concept of efficiency: not only in terms of productive development but fundamentally concerning the State.

Finally, from developmentalism, we recovered the idea that the complexity of the productive matrix is central to generating wealth and, therefore, a condition for the possibility of social welfare, which is the ultimate goal of all our efforts. This bet, this productive transformation, requires the intervention of the State, because market forces alone are not enough. But we know that it is a very demanding and precise intervention.

We feel a bit like children of these traditions, yes, but not to light candles for them. To a great extent, it was extreme visions of these positions that brought us here and explained the comings and goings we were talking about at the beginning. The other thing that seems to require our attention is the courage, the intellectual daring, and the ambition to establish this synthesis. From Fundar we are encouraged to touch on the issues that are not touched because they affect sensitivities and interests, because they became taboo with time. We know that there are very diverse interlocutors who are willing to reestablish this broad and honest dialogue on the development of our country. For this reason, our doors are always open to meet with technical, academic, trade union, business and political leaders alike. We do this by trying to provide answers that are not always what is expected. With rigor and consistency, we show up where we are wanted and where we are not, to provide the best evidence, the best arguments, and a sustainable and achievable plan for the future.

There is Argentina and its volatility. There is the frustration of society, of many of us, the anger of a country that goes back and forth from one point to another. Argentina today does not have a clear place, nor does it seem to be going in the direction of the world to come. The world is presented to us as a pure threat (which leads us to have to shut ourselves up to live with the little we have) or as the caboose of a destiny that is decided in the Global North and relegates us to a pure enclave economy. We can either make do with the crumbs of what we have today or relegate ourselves to what the global powers will give us tomorrow. These cannot be the only options.  

Against this false antinomy, Fundar is postulated as a programmatic powerhouse of what to do: we seek to build a productive way out of the quagmire. But a development plan is not just a more or less articulated set of public policies written in a series of documents, however precise and refined they may be. It is something more: it is the construction of a community of ideas that shares a diagnosis and builds an alternative. The invitation for the future is to continue working in this direction. To build trust. To exchange knowledge, frustrations, opinions and plans. That we become more and more. And to start now because, once again, the world demands precisely what Argentina has. To live up to that opportunity requires a lot of innovation, a lot of creativity, and from all of us.