Everyone in early twentieth-century Buenos Aires had brushes with crime and disorder. Some had their pockets picked on the streetcar, others were approached by a con artist, and many were simply onlookers in one of the many acts of disorder that occurred in the street, from accidents to fights. Based on police documentation and the police news in the national press, these events linked people of all classes, immigrants and natives, as well as men, women, and children. The webs of interaction that tied the protagonists in a crime with each other, their victims, any onlookers, and the police shows the interconnected nature of life in a city that was starting to assert its urban identity within the national identity. This porteño identity encompassed the cultural diversity of the growing city, and the sources related to crime and policing demonstrate the ways that interactions occurred between individuals from different groups. In the documentation, Buenos Aires comes to life as a city where people were pushing against each other (sometimes literally), creating a new identity for the city and ultimately the nation. This urban identity, which grew in importance during the early twentieth century, challenged the traditional rural conceptions of Argentine identity. Through their experiences with crime and disorder, porteños were helping to forge a new vision of what it meant to be Argentine.
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