Argentina's populist movement, led by Juan Perón, welcomed people from a
broad range of cultural backgrounds to join its ranks. Unlike most
populist movements in Europe and North America, Peronism had an
inclusive nature, rejecting racism and xenophobia. In Peronism as a Big
Tent Raanan Rein and Ariel Noyjovich examine Peronism's attempts at
garnering the support of Argentines of Middle Eastern origins - be they
Jewish, Maronite, Orthodox Catholic, Druze, or Muslim - in both Buenos
Aires and the interior provinces. By following the process that started
with Perón's administration in the mid-1940s and culminated with the
1989 election of President Carlos Menem, of Syrian parentage, Rein and
Noyjovich paint a nuanced picture of Argentina's journey from failed
attempts to build a mosque in Buenos Aires in 1950 to the inauguration
of the King Fahd Islamic Cultural Center in the nation's capital in the
year 2000. Peronism as a Big Tent reflects on Perón's own evolution from
perceiving Argentina as a Catholic country with little room for those
outside the faith to embracing a vision of a society that was
multicultural and that welcomed and celebrated religious plurality. The
legacy of this spirit of inclusiveness can still be felt today.