BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — In the cozy confines of psychoanalyst Leonardo Wender's study, his patients' fears betray a new neurosis — no longer just the traditional obsessions or compulsive disorders Argentines suffer.
With the economy crumbling beneath their feet and facing the grim prospect of national bankruptcy if Argentina's debt crunch deepens, it is the country's uncertain economic future that is now many Argentines' most common worry.
But any remaining hopes for a better life are fading fast for many residents of Buenos Aires as Latin America's third-biggest economy teeters on the brink of a meltdown, paying the price for decades of endemic corruption and economic mismanagement. Argentines feel the weight of $132 billion in national debt, or $3,666 for every man, woman and child.
"Nowadays, people are desperate because they don't know what the future holds and how to live. Each family is affected as someone always knows somebody who has been sacked or some factory that's closed down," Wender said.
"Another major factor is the insecurity in the face of corruption associated with the police force, the principle Mafia after the ruling class who are running the whole situation," the psychoanalyst added.
The outwardly cool and collected people of Buenos Aires, often viewed as arrogant European wannabes by their Latin American neighbors, are increasingly on edge.
"The people no longer believe in anything," said Yanina, an accountant lunching at a small downtown cafe. "I don't like listening to the news because it's always bad. I prefer to live each day as it comes and not ask about the future."
This attitude of self-resignation is increasingly common among the residents of a city that used to boast being the "Paris of the South."
One of Argentina's top newspapers, La Nacion, chided citizens in a recent editorial for their lack of team spirit in the throes of crisis.
"Various factors have converged, forcing us Argentines to painfully recognize that we are members of a nation that has . . . lost the notion of what order, social responsibility and respect for the law means," La Nacion said.
Once considered one of the safest of Latin America's cities, Buenos Aires has seen violent crime grow in tandem with unemployment over the course of a recession now in its fourth year. People increasingly fear hailing taxi cabs amid surging robberies by unregistered drivers.
"I am scared for myself and for my family. Family outings are no longer the same as one is much more reluctant to go out into the streets for fear," said Walter Magliocchetti, an accountant at a large multinational company.
"I believe the politicians have wasted all this country's wealth. The people do not trust them. We need a total change," added Magliocchetti.
The economic and political crisis gripping Argentina has highlighted the inferiority complex that has long been an intrinsic part of the Argentine psyche, Wender said.
Argentina has one of the highest concentrations of psychologists in the world, with almost half of the 34,375 practicing clinicians located in the capital — where their services have come under increasing demand.
"The people of Buenos Aires are being made aware of their limitations and their problems, and for this reason, psychoanalysis has peaked," said Wender. "I've got a lot of work."
Even the traditionally powerful labor unions are losing muscle from their now commonplace protests as demonstrators, increasingly fed up with widespread union corruption, go it alone and set up their own roadblocks.
Such blockades are a new phenomenon in Argentina and highlight the desperation of society's most disenfranchised class, historians, political analysts and pollsters have said.
Argentina's middle class has long been proportionally the largest in Latin America, but U.N. studies suggest it has been in steady decline since the 1970s.
"Argentina is most definitely heading toward becoming a Third World country," said Yanina.
Faced with social decay from years of public mismanagement, neglect and corruption, Argentines are frustrated with the way President Fernando de la Rua's rift-riven government is dealing with their nation's economic disintegration.
A third of the electorate in Buenos Aires either voted for cartoon characters or simply left the ballot blank in mid-term elections in October to voice their weariness.
And many pessimistic Argentines don't expect their lot to improve any time soon.
"This will have to get worse before it gets better," said one high level air force officer.