El mundo hispánico durante el Antiguo Régimen desde los circuitos mercantiles y el espacio económico rioplatense

Since the 1980’s, the questioning of the national paradigm and, to a lesser extent, of the colonial one, has led to a renewal of modern studies of the Spanish monarchy. This article discusses the emerging body of academic literature about mercantile circulation, highlighting that there is still a need to reshape the relevant units of analysis. Based on the spatial economy, it sets forth a hypothesis about the markets which might have formed the Hispanic world and its dynamics. It also synthesizes the foundations and advances of the “River Plate economic space” (espacio económico rioplatense), polarized in the direction of the region of the Río de la Plata. Our hypothesis seeks to explain the historic foundations of the establishment of the internal market of the Republic of Argentina