Radical economic policies in Argentina offer lessons – but not a blueprint – for South Africa

In Argentina corruption and failing public services sit alongside heavy reliance on the state. pexels rrodriguesim , CC BY Economic reform is usually judged by its numbers: inflation, deficits, growth.

Less attention goes to the beliefs and habits that decide whether people will accept those numbers, and for how long.

Based on my research on comparative political economy and strategy in Africa, Asia and Latin America, there’s an argument to be made that Argentina under President Javier Milei offers an unusually clear view of that psychology at work as well as useful insights into South Africa’s economic path.

Javier Milei took office in December 2023 , promising a set of libertarian policies.

Libertarian doctrine holds that individual freedom and free markets work best when government is kept to a minimal role, largely limited to protecting property, contracts, personal safety and free market forces.

Milei was true to his promise.

His policies included spending cuts, removing a raft of business rules and restrictions, making the peso officially worth less against the dollar, and stopping the central bank from printing new money to cover the government’s budget gaps.

Together, these steps were meant to end the habit of overspending and money-printing that fuelled runaway inflation, even though they caused short-term hardship for many households.

Milei delivered Argentina’s first fiscal surplus in over a decade and brought monthly inflation down, though at the cost of recession, higher poverty in the early period, and falling real wages and pensions.

Later gains included a partial economic rebound and easing of currency controls.

A closer look into Milei’s programme reads less as a test of libertarian doctrine than an experiment shaped by Argentina’s long history of inflation, default and dependence on the state.

That history helped make radical reform possible.

Yet by August 2026, more Argentines disapproved of the Milei government than approved.

So why might support weaken even as headline indicators improve ? Inflation has fallen sharply and the budget is back in surplus.