Comprising almost the entire southern half of South America, Argentina is the world's eighth largest country, covering an area of 2.8 million square km. Argentina possesses some of the world's tallest mountains, expansive deserts, and impressive waterfalls, with the diversity of the land ranging from wild, remote areas in southern Patagonia to the bustling metropolis of Buenos Aires in the north.

The argentine Constitution, was adopted in 1853, provides for a representative, republic and federal form of government.

The federal government deals with the national matters, while the provinces have almost complete jurisdiction in the local affairs.

Voting is free, secret and compulsory; voters must be al least 18 years old; women first given right to vote in 1947.

The executive function is exerted by the President who is helped by the ministers of cabinet. The legislative power resides in the national congress of bicameral character, formed by the Senate and the House of Representatives.

In 1949 a new constitution was approved, but it was annulled in 1956. After the military coup of 1966, all the constitutional guarantees were suspended. In 1976 took place another military coup and the 1853 Constitution was abolish; but in 1983 was restored with the returning of democracy.

Nowadays the argentine government is made up of a President named Néstor Carlos Kirchner and a Vice-president who's named is Daniel Scioli.

Argentine economy is based on agriculture, and cattle dealer, although the industrial, mining and fishing sectors, have registered a noticeable growth in the last decades. It's one of the principal nations in the production of beef, wheat, oil, sheep, and wool.

The argentine industry is located in Buenos Aires. The most important industry is the nutritional product processing and packaging, followed by the textile sector. Other important industries produced rubber articles (natural and synthetic), cement, chemical agents, paper, plastics, and derivates of petroleum. The iron and steel industry has reaches a great expansion.

Of course all this was affected with the argentine crisis.

The crisis was developed during the government of Carlos Menem, but it exploded when he left. One of the causes of this was the parity of the peso with the dollar, without having the necessary back up to support the equality of the peso with the dollar. This was followed by corruption, and bad use of the internal finances.

In the cultural aspects the argentine arts have been strongly affected by Spanish, French, and Italian influences. There's an alive interest by the history of the country, symbolized specially by the culture of its traditions stays. Only in the popular art an important influence of the indigenous cultures has been registered.

The argentine culture has been also influenced by religion; more than 92% of the population is catholic. The Judaism, the Protestantism and other Christian and non Christian religions are also practice, although many sects and confessions are prohibited for being harmful to the public order. Until the 1994 constitutional reform, the President and Vice-president had to be Catholic.

Argentina