The term 'radical' in the party's name referred to its demand for universal male suffrage, which was considered radical at the time, when Argentina was ruled by an exclusive oligarchy and government power was allocated behind closed doors.

[25] The party unsuccessfully led an attempt to force the early departure of President Miguel Juárez Celman in the Revolution of the Park (Revolución del Parque).

Hardliners who opposed this agreement founded the current UCR, led by Alem's nephew, the young and charismatic Hipólito Yrigoyen.

As well as backing more popular participation, UCR's platform included promises to tackle the country's social problems and eradicate poverty.

Yrigoyen's presidency however turned out to be rather dictatorial; he refused to cooperate with the Congress and UCR in government fell short of the democratic expectations it had raised when in opposition.

The first coup in Argentina's modern history occurred on September 6, 1930, and ousted an aging Yrigoyen amid an economic crisis resulting from the United States' Great Depression.

Between 1983 and 1989, its leader, Raúl Ricardo Alfonsín, was the first democratically elected president after the military dictatorship headed by generals such as Jorge Videla, Leopoldo Galtieri and Reynaldo Bignone.

The election of Mr. Alfonsin, who campaigned hard for clean government and civil rights, represented a fundamental change toward genuine democracy in Argentina.

During major riots triggered by economic reforms implemented by the UCR government (with the advice of the International Monetary Fund), President de la Rúa resigned and fled the country to prevent further turmoil.

After three consecutive acting presidents assumed and resigned their duties in the following weeks, Eduardo Duhalde of the PJ took office until new elections could be held.

The party has subsequently declined markedly and its candidate for president in 2003, Leopoldo Moreau, gained just 2.34% of the vote, beaten by three Peronists and more seriously, by two former radicals, Ricardo López Murphy of Recrear and Elisa Carrió of ARI, who have leached members, support and profile from the UCR.

Since Nestor Kirchner's led peronist PJ switched into political left, the UCR start to alliance with center-right anti-peronists.

Deputy and UCR National Committee Secretary General Margarita Stolbizer stated that the party is virtually "broken due to the stance of the leaders who support the alliance [with Kirchner]".

Although this campaign represented the mainstream of the national UCR leadership, substantial elements backed other candidates, notably the Radicales K. Cobos was elected vice president as the running mate of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner through the Plural Consensus alliance, and several Radicals were elected to Congress as part of the Kirchners' Front for Victory faction.

However, most Radicales K support for the Kirchners ended by mid 2008, when Vice President Julio Cobos opposed the Government bill on agricultural export taxes.

He wanted to form a "broad popular, democratic, reformist and national movement"; to end privilege, authoritarianism and demagoguery and consolidate an authentic social democracy in the country.

[47] During the 1989 general election, Eduardo Angeloz promised a "red pencil" to cut public deficit spending and mentioned the possible privatization of state companies, which would later be carried out by his rival, the Peronist Carlos Menem.

[citation needed] The Unión Cívica Radical (UCR) has gradually shifted toward center-right positions since the 2005 legislative elections, due to internal divisions and the exclusion of the Alfonsinismo from its ranks.

The more progressive leaders of the autonomists, such as Carlos Pellegrini and Roque Sáenz Peña, began to support that it was necessary to make institutional changes to hold back the growth of social and political conflict.

When Roque Sáenz Peña was elected president in 1910, the UCR already was not in the position to carry out new assembled uprisings, but the general belief that existed was that a revolution was imminent.

Saénz Peña y Yrigoyen, who had been maintaining a personal friendship from childhood, they then had a private meeting in which they agreed to sanction a law of free suffrage.

On the other hand, it was also the first Argentinian political party to present a legal project for women to vote in 1919, that eventually did not pass given the conservative majority in Congress.

The electoral triumphs of radicalism caused the collapse of the parties from the prior political system to the Sáenz Peña Law.

The first presidency of Hipólito Yrigoyen promoted a series of politics of a new type, which in conjunction was signaling a transformative nationalist tendency, between that which emphasized the creation of the state-owned oil business YPF, the new rural laws, the fortification of the public railways, the Reform University, and a strongly autonomous political exterior for the greatest improvements.

The historian Halperín Donghi explains that the radical governments resolved the problem of regional equality in Argentina, but as a consequence of this, they brought social inequalities to a higher level at the same time.