Population Scale, Institutional Capacity and Local Security Governance: A Comparative Territorial Analysis of Municipalities in Buenos Aires Province

Research on local security governance has predominantly focused on large metropolitan areas, often overlooking how population scale shapes institutional capacity and preventive action in smaller jurisdictions. This article examines how population scale operates as a structural condition influencing local security governance in municipalities with fewer than 70,000 inhabitants in Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. Drawing on a comparative territorial analysis of 88 municipalities, the study classifies local governments into three population-based tranches—urban-intermediate, small structured, and rural—and analyzes variations in conflict dynamics, institutional capacity, and governance arrangements. The findings show that population scale significantly conditions both the forms of local conflict and the feasibility of preventive and governance strategies. While urban-intermediate municipalities display more diversified conflict patterns and formalized institutional structures, smaller and rural municipalities rely more heavily on proximity-based governance, community networks, and intergovernmental coordination to compensate for limited administrative capacity. The article argues that local security outcomes cannot be adequately explained by crime indicators alone, but must be understood through the interaction between territorial configurations, institutional capacity, and governance arrangements. By highlighting these scale-sensitive dynamics, the study contributes to debates on crime prevention and community safety and underscores the need for territorially differentiated security policies.