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6 Economic Policy and the Rise of Hugo Chavez

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... Rafael Caldera, who had founded COPEI in the 1950s and had served as president from 1968 to 1973, had resuscitated his political career with a speech in the Senate in 1992 decrying the disproportionate burdens that economic reforms at the time were imposing on the poor. Caldera's attempt to recapture COPEI's nomination for the presidency failed, however, and he bolted the party to run with the backing of a coalition of smaller parties spanning the ideological spectrum (Buxton 2003;Di John 2005). The coalition ran under the banner Convergencia. ...
... When he was elected in 1988, AD's Pérez had, like Caldera, previously served as president-in his case, from 1973 to 1978, during an oil boom. Venezuelans associated Pérez with generous government spending, and he did little to dissuade this expectation during his 1988 campaign (Buxton 2003). Once inaugurated, however, Pérez imposed an economic austerity package described as the Gran Viraje (Great Turnaround). ...
... A scandal involving government appropriations prompted Pérez's removal from office and replacement by an interim president for the last year of his term. When he ran in 1993, Caldera excoriated the economic hardship imposed on the poor under Pérez's administration (Buxton 2003). Pérez's Gran Viraje had pulled the AD to the right, and Caldera's 1993 incarnation was an effort to move left from the traditional COPEI that Caldera himself had helped to found four decades earlier. ...
Article
What difference does it make if the state makes people vote? The question is central to normative debates about the rights and duties of citizens in a democracy, and to contemporary policy debates in a number of Latin American countries over what actions states should take to encourage electoral participation. Focusing on a rare case of abolishing compulsory voting in Venezuela, this article shows that not forcing people to vote yielded a more unequal distribution of income. The evidence supports Arend Lijphart's claim, advanced in his 1996 presidential address to the American Political Science Association, that compulsory voting can offset class bias in turnout and, in turn, contribute to the equality of influence.
... The coups failed, but Pérez was impeached on counts of corruption the following year. In the 1993 presidential elections, the abstention rate was 39%, the highest in Venezuelan history (Buxton, 2003). These events, and others to follow, served to reinforce a widespread discontent with the party system, which had caused them in the first place (Coronil, 2000). ...
... In Venezuela, social spending decreased from 8 percent of GDP to 4.3 percent (Roberts, 2003), and with the decreased national income came impoverishment and a widening income gap. Julia Buxton (2003) reports that poverty grew from 36% to 66% from the mid 80s to mid 90s, shooting from 43.9% to 66.5% in the year between 1988 and 1989. At the height of political crisis in the mid 1990s, the general poverty rate was at 86% (Buxton). ...
... The coups of 1992 and impeachment of Carlos Andres Pérez were not the only visible evidence of the decline; other events illustrated the increasing social unrest and disillusionment. In 1989, Pérez had been elected for another term by Venezuelans who opposed free-market or neoliberal reforms (Buxton, 2003;Márquez, 2003). Contrary to his social democratic platform, Pérez shocked the nation by embracing the policies he had decried in the 1970s. ...
Article
Recent years have seen increasing opposition to U.S. political and economic influence in Latin America. Venezuela is a key player in the South American economy. This project researches the country's history from the 1950s to the present and the role of the U.S. in its formation. Through political economy, this study asks if recent political changes are due to the effects of U.S. policies in Venezuela. The research examines the relationship between the two nations and the development models proposed by the Chávez government. The paper considers alternative models of economic development, independent from U.S. political hegemony.
... Das Kandidatenfeld führte mit zunehmendem Vorsprung Hugo Chávez, einer der Putschisten des Jahres 1992, an, dem es mit einer radikalen Anti-Parteien-Haltung, einem links-nationalistischen Programm und populistischen Versprechungen gelang, die allgemeine Proteststimmung auf seine Mühlen zu lenken. Chávez stand für eine Abkehr von den neoliberalen Reformen und eine institutionelle "Neugründung" der Republik, während sein stärkster Konkurrent, Enrique Salas Römer, eine konsequente Fortführung der unter Präsident Pérez begonnenen orthodoxen Wirtschaftsreformen ankündigte -weitere Deregulierungen, eine Senkung der Staatsausgaben und eine Verkleinerung der Verwaltung (Buxton 2003). ...
... Bereits im Wahlkampf des Jahres 1993 hatten die Kandidaten klar unterscheidbare Programme vorgelegt. Vor einem radikalen Bruch mit dem Status quo, wie ihn Chávez im Jahr 1998 verkörperte, waren sie aber noch zurückgeschreckt(Buxton 2003; Kestler 2009, S. 176-178). 15 Laut Latinobarómetro von 2010 gaben 49 % der befragten Venezolaner an, mit der Funktionsweise der Demokratie zufrieden zu sein -ein Wert, der über dem lateinamerikanischen Durchschnitt liegt (http://www.jdsystems.es/latinobarometro ...
... To recap, the center-left AD dominated elections during the period with compulsory voting, but the winner of the first election without compulsory voting in 1993, Caldera, was center-right.Before embracing this interpretation unconditionally, however, it is important to acknowledge that narrative accounts of Venezuelan politics in this period portray a fluid electoral environment in which ideological locations of candidacies were hard to pin down. When he was elected in 1988, AD's Carlos Andres Perez had, like Caldera, had previously served as president -in his case, from 1973 to 1978 during an oil boom.Venezuelans associated Perez with generous government spending, and he did little to dissuade this expectation during his 1988 campaign(Buxton 2003). Once inaugurated, however, Perez imposed an economic austerity package described as the Gran Virage (Great Turnaround). ...
... A scandal involving government appropriations prompted Perez's removal from office and replacement by an interim president in the last year of his term. When he ran in 1993, Caldera excoriated the economic hardship imposed on the poor under Perez's administration(Buxton 2003). Perez's Gran Virage had pulled the AD to the right, and Caldera's 1993 incarnation was an effort to move left from the traditional COPEI that Caldera himself had helped to found four decades earlier. ...
Article
Full-text available
What difference does it make if more, or fewer, people vote? What difference would it make if the state makes people vote? These questions are central both to normative debates about the rights and duties of citizens in a democracy and to contemporary policy debates in a variety of countries over what actions states should take to encourage electoral participation. To address them, this paper focuses on the phenomenon of compulsory voting – legal requirements that compel citizens to vote in elections. Specifically, by focusing on a rare case of abolishing compulsory voting in Venezuela, we show that not forcing people to vote yielded a more unequal distribution of income. Our evidence supports Arend Lijphart’s claim, advanced in his 1996 presidential address to the American Political Science Association, that compulsory voting can offset class bias in turnout and, in turn, contribute to the equality of influence.
... Indeed, oil rents had long provided a source of legitimacy upon which political hegemony was constructed. As Julia Buxton (2006) has written, "Petrodollars financed a positive-sum game, with middle-and low-income groups enjoying blanket subsidies, low taxation, and generous welfare provision" (p. 115). ...
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Since 2017, state security forces in Venezuela have been responsible for over 20% of violent deaths in the country. This represents an unprecedented period of state repression in the country’s history that demands examination. In this article, we argue that in order to understand the recent increase in violent deaths in Venezuela during the post-Chávez period, we must place at the center of our analysis the discourses and practices of an extremely privileged actor, the state, in the context of the collapse of oil prices. We propose that this upsurge of lethal violence can be understood within the historical process of militarization of citizen security. In the first phase, starting in 2009, we see an increase in carceral punitivism—the hyperreaction of the penal state. In the second, a new stage in militarized raids is launched which, over the years, gave way to a practice of systematic extralegal killings that became the fundamental strategy of social control. These raids represent a necropolitical approach to governance in a context of extreme economic and political crisis.
... Rather than renovating the traditional party and institutional structures, the neoliberal experiment weakened them. Increasing inequality and poverty rates were seen as a result of a growing disconnect between the political elite and the general population (Buxton 2003). ...
... Por otrolado,lasélitespolíticasqueyaveíanconsuspicacialaspolíticasdePérez-por considerarlas parte de una agenda personal más que de un consenso político de los partidos-cerraronfilascontralaaplicacióndemedidas"neoliberales"deajuste.La crisis del sistema político continuó hasta el juicio político contra Pérez que lo saca ría de la presidencia en 1993, pasando por sendas intentonas golpistas en febrero y noviembre de 1992, una de las cuales fue liderada por el entonces teniente coronel HugoChávez,líderdelclandestinoMovimientoBolivarianoRevolucionario200. Concomitantemente, el deterioro de la calidad de vida de la sociedad se hace más pronunciado, con vastos sectores de la población ingresando en los umbrales de la pobreza (Buxton 2003). ...
Book
Full-text available
El libro vuelve a poner en el debate teórico latinoamericano la cuestión del Estado. El testo busca poner al lector en contacto con un conjunto de perspectivas téoricas sobre la estatalidad latinoamericana, dejando de lado tanto la visión instrumental del reduccionismo de clases, como la del Estado como mero aparato de dominación legal
... Several observers argue that the Venezuelan government adopted neoliberal measures without the knowledge or support of the capitalist class (Buxton 2003;Pirela 2005;Arenas 2009). Indeed, when President Carlos Andrés Pérez signed a neoliberal adjustment plan with the IMF in 1989, the capitalist class was initially opposed (Fedecámaras 1989b). ...
... Directors recognised that they had a responsibility to encourage the formation and continuance of these bodies, as the improved well-being and development of the community their school was located in would have long-term bene fi ts for the welfare of the students they taught. It meant shifting the common image of the school as the patron for community well-being and those living within it as grateful recipients of the schools' largess, which had marked Venezuelan society for decades ( Buxton 2003 ). One director 23 readily acknowledged this shift in paradigm believing, When in dialogue with the community, you can't go in on your pedestal…you have to see yourself as the same, as a friend, a compatriot who is there to share in the care and the growth of their children…It helps to be at that level and not place yourself up high in the hierarchy… [and] even if you think you have the solution, it always pays to listen to the community as sometimes they have good reasons and rationales for their action. ...
Chapter
Citing an ancient Chinese curse, Immanuel Wallerstein (1998) frequently notes, in reference to our historical world-system and its structures of knowledge, that we are condemned to live in interesting times. Our times are indeed interesting in multiple and complex ways, as could perhaps be claimed at all times. Into the second decade of the twenty-first century, analysts like Wallerstein argue that we have, for some time, been living in world-system defining times, with heightened opportunities to influence the course of the current system’s transformation towards an uncertain alternative. Žižek (2011) concurs, asserting that ‘we are entering a new period in which the economic crisis has become permanent, simply a way of life’, coupled with multiple crises that ‘occur at both extremes of life – ecology (natural externality) and pure financial speculation – not at the core of the productive process’ (403). What Wallerstein, Žižek and other theorists have in common is their elaboration of distinctive challenges that confront global capitalism in the twenty-first century, challenges that some argue defy resolution without disrupting capitalism’s essential operating principle of the endless accumulation of capital (see, e.g. Li 2008; Wallerstein 2011a). In this renewed critique of contemporary capitalism, Alain Badiou (2008) has been central in promoting renewed discussion about the idea of communism, its historical and contemporary meanings (see also Douzinas and Žižek 2010). For Badiou (2008), the communist hypothesis for contemporary times insists that ‘a different collective organisation is practicable, one that will eliminate the inequality of wealth and even the division of labour’ (35). These challenges and possibilities open new spaces for rethinking, imagining and theorising alternatives.
... As noted in footnote 22 below, discussion of this trajectory and its causes -while an important topic -is not the focus of this paper. 17 On the economic downturn of the 1980s and its social consequences, see Buxton (2003); and on the present decade, see Nardelli et al. (2014). 18 We should note, however, that petro-rentier states are notoriously ineffective at direct taxation, and thus, theoretically, must rely on subsidization rather than fiscal capacity to affect redistribution (Mahdavy 1970, 453;Yates 1996, 33-6;Karl 1997, 58-64; see also Coronil 1997, 77-8 and passim (Ellner 2008, 112-21, 126-27;Ellner 2013, 66-70); progressively alienated much of the middle class and coalesced its main base of support among the hitherto relatively marginalized rural and urban poor (Fernandes 2010;Roberts 2006); and it made inroads into the corporatist power of privileged national oil company employees by firing 18,000 of them (of which a portion were reinstated) after the company's management led a lockout in 2002 in protest against changes to the status quo (Ellner 2008, 159). ...
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Can radical political-economic transformation be achieved by electoral regimes that have not thoroughly reconstructed the state? Contemporary Venezuela offers an optimal venue for examining this question. The Chavista movement did not replace the previous state: instead, its leaders attempted to reform existing state entities and establish new ones in pursuit of its transformation agenda. It has also used its oil wealth to support cooperatively-oriented economic activity, without necessarily fundamentally altering the property structure. Thus, the social change-oriented political economy exists alongside the traditional one. Focusing on agrarian transformation, we examine ethnographically how these factors have impacted the state's capacity to attain its goal of national food sovereignty. We find that the state's ability to accomplish this objective has been compromised by lack of agency-level capacity, inter-agency conflict and the persistence of the previously-extant agrarian property structure. These dynamics have influenced the state to shift from its initial objective of food sovereignty to a policy of nationalist food security.
... Chávez started to transform the social structure of Venezuela towards a system of inclusion by cutting down the benefits of the privileged elite and by redistributing the money coming from the oil industry to the poor and marginalized (López Maya and Lander 2009). Since the very beginning these policies have provoked heavy criticism from all former dominant camps, such as the oppositional parties, the private sector, business associations, trade unions, the church and last but not least the U.S. Department of State (Buxton 2003: 130; Zeuske 2007: 182). Therefore, only in the first seven years of Chávez's rule " Venezuelans have endured a long-lasting process of extreme polarization, a controversial constitutional reform, the dissolution of Congress, two general strikes, a failed coup d'état led by conservative businessmen and generals, many massive demonstrations, violent upheavals, the dismissal of about 18000 oil workers from the parastatal PDVSA, and dozens of deaths for political reasons " (Álvarez 2006: 24). ...
Data
The so called “Bolivarian Revolution” and the concept of “socialism of the 21st century” initiated by Hugo Chávez in Venezuela have not only polarized Venezuelan society tremendously, but also the entire hemisphere and even beyond. The question of whether the policies under the label of the Bolivarian Revolution ‐ including a number of controversial social programs ‐ can in fact be evaluated positively or negatively according to certain standards appears to be a highly ideological one. This paper focuses on who frames and constructs the Bolivarian Revolution as good or bad and how this is done. It examines different media discourses in Latin America, the US and Europe and finds that media which position themselves as rather conservative delegitimize the Bolivarian Revolution from the start, while media which position themselves as rather liberal establish it as legitimate.
... Directors recognised that they had a responsibility to encourage the formation and continuance of these bodies, as the improved well-being and development of the community their school was located in would have long-term bene fi ts for the welfare of the students they taught. It meant shifting the common image of the school as the patron for community well-being and those living within it as grateful recipients of the schools' largess, which had marked Venezuelan society for decades (Buxton 2003 ) . One director 23 readily acknowledged this shift in paradigm believing, When in dialogue with the community, you can't go in on your pedestal…you have to see yourself as the same, as a friend, a compatriot who is there to share in the care and the growth of their children…It helps to be at that level and not place yourself up high in the hierarchy…[and] even if you think you have the solution, it always pays to listen to the community as sometimes they have good reasons and rationales for their action. ...
Chapter
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Calls for increasing levels of partnership and collaboration between schools and the communities they operate in have been heavily promoted on the global stage over the past decades. This has largely been driven by neoliberal rationalities that view parents and students as self-interested ‘clients’ and ‘consumers’ of their schools. However, counter-hegemonic projects in Latin America have sought to strengthen the role of citizen-actors in state functions, including education, as a mechanism for deepening democratic deliberation and repositioning the entitlement of citizens to shape the purposes and functions of primary education. This chapter examines how reforms to school governance structures in Bolivarian Venezuela appropriated greater ‘voice’ to citizen-actors over the actions of their schools and how these changes brought about the possibility for a changed role and purpose for schools within their communities. The specific possibilities and challenges that participants within these governance bodies faced are situated in the broader political discourses, social structures and institutional histories within which they operated in 2006, when the empirical work for this chapter was conducted.
... Tal sistema de altos gastos públicos conducía ciertamente a una reducción de la pobreza absoluta (Cfr. Buxton, 2003), pero al mismo tiempo servía de mecanismo para el enriquecimiento elitario. En una entrevista con el autor (Zelik, 2003), el antiguo Viceministro de Planificación, Roland Denis, calificó este fenómeno como 'modelo venezolano de acumulación'. ...
Article
Full-text available
Las transformaciones políticas en Venezuela polarizan los debates, no sólo en Colombia. Lo que para unos es una dictadura comunista, para otros representa una esperanza de democratización y justicia social. En realidad, un análisis serio de la �Revolución Bolivariana� muestra un panorama mucho más complejo y contradictorio. Por un lado, hay importantes avances en la política social: con la recuperación de los ingresos petroleros �que antes no salieron de la empresa estatal PDVSA� el Gobierno venezolano ha logrado disminuir la desigualdad social. Numerosas misiones en las áreas de salud, educación y vivienda han mejorado notablemente las condiciones de vida de los más pobres. Paralelamente, la nueva Constitución ha abierto espacios de participación ciudadana, permitiendo la inclusión política de grupos tradicionalmente marginados. Por otro lado, sin embargo, hay un liderazgo cada vez más personalizado del presidente Chávez y el país apenas ha avanzado en la transformación de su modelo económico rentista. A pesar de una retórica alternativa e importantes esfuerzos en políticas de desarrollo, Venezuela sigue dependiendo completamente de las exportaciones petroleras y de las importaciones agrarias. El autor sostiene que Venezuela necesita superar este impasse si realmente quiere convertirse en una alternativa para América Latina. Para ello, no obstante, sería necesaria la apertura de un debate abierto y autocrítico en el país.
... Directors recognised that they had a responsibility to encourage the formation and continuance of these bodies, as the improved well-being and development of the community their school was located in would have long-term bene fi ts for the welfare of the students they taught. It meant shifting the common image of the school as the patron for community well-being and those living within it as grateful recipients of the schools' largess, which had marked Venezuelan society for decades (Buxton 2003 ) . One director 23 readily acknowledged this shift in paradigm believing, When in dialogue with the community, you can't go in on your pedestal…you have to see yourself as the same, as a friend, a compatriot who is there to share in the care and the growth of their children…It helps to be at that level and not place yourself up high in the hierarchy… [and] even if you think you have the solution, it always pays to listen to the community as sometimes they have good reasons and rationales for their action. ...
Book
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For some, socialism is a potent way of achieving economic, political and social transformations in the twenty-first century, while others find the very term socialism outdated. This book engages readers in a discussion about the viability of socialist views on education and identifies the capacity of some socialist ideas to address a range of widely recognized social ills. It argues that these pervasive social problems, which plague so-called ‘developed’ societies as much as they contribute to the poverty, humiliation and lack of prospects in the rest of the world, fundamentally challenge us to act. In our contemporary world-system, distancing ourselves from the injustices of others is neither viable nor defensible. Rather than waiting for radically new solutions to emerge, this book sees the possibility of transformation in the reconfiguration of existing social logics that comprise our modern societies, including logics of socialism. The book presents case studies that offer a critical examination of education in contemporary socialist contexts, as well as reconsidering examples of education under historical socialism. In charting these alternatives, and retooling past solutions in a nuanced way, it sets out compelling evidence that it is possible to think and act in ways that depart from today’s dominant educational paradigm. It offers contemporary policy makers, researchers, and practitioners a cogent demonstration of the contemporary utility of educational ideas and solutions associated with socialism. Preface, Professor Mark Ginsburg.- Introduction. Ch.1 Discovering and negotiating socialist educational logics under post-socialist conditions, Tom G. Griffiths, Zsuzsa Millei.- Negotiating the present: twenty-first century socialism. Ch.2 Decolonising Bolivian education – ideology versus reality, Mieke T.A. Lopes Cardozo.- Ch.3 Teaching ‘Valores’ in Cuba: A Conversation Among Teacher Educators, Illana Lancaster, Anita Sanyal. Ch.4 Soviets in the Countryside: The MST’s Re-making of Socialist Educational Practices in Brazil, Rebecca Tarlau. Ch.5 Community participation in schooling redefined in Bolivarian Venezuela? Ritesh Shah. Ch.6 Higher Education and socialism in Venezuela: Massification, development and transformation,Tom G. Griffiths.- Discovering aspects of socialist institutions and thinking for transformation. Ch.7 Slovene socialist early childhood education: Retuning, surpassing and reinterpreting history, Marcela Batistič Zorec. Ch.8 ‘Peoples Education for Peoples Power’: The Rise and Fall of an Idea in Southern Africa, Martin Prew Ch.9 Democratic aspects of communist and post-communist schooling in central and eastern Europe, Laura Perry. Ch.10 The Comprehensive School and Egalitarianism: From Demystification and Discreditation to Global Ascendance?, Olga Bain.
... In office, Chávez showed policy restraint and even endorsed some conservative macroeconomic policies, while he continued to launch philippics against oligarchs (Buxton, 2003). So in 2000, he was hardly the candidate favored by the market, but bondholders had a better idea of how to separate the rhetoric from the policies. ...
Article
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Partisan theories of political economy expect that bondholders will panic with the election of a left-wing presidential candidate. The latter seems to be what happened in Brazil in the 2002 presidential elections. However, quantitative analysis of perceptions of sovereign credit risk in Argentine, Brazilian, Mexican, and Venezuelan presidential elections from 1994 until 2007 shows no real evidence of a link between partisanship and perceptions of risk, even if the left-right divide is further broken down into left, center-left, center-right, right. Instead, international and domestic economic fundamentals have a stronger influence on risk evaluations. Qualitative analysis of the individual presidential elections shows the importance of policy uncertainty in explaining why certain electoral periods seemed more critical than others and how bondholders select between multiple equilibria. This research helps shift political analysis away from partisanship and more in the direction of policies and articulation.
... When Hugo Chávez became President in 1998, he inherited a deeply impoverished and highly polarised country. However, the government did not break away from prudent economic management (Buxton, 2003: 124). Instead, the government stabilised the economic situation and designed a new constitution, the Bolivarian Constitution of 1999. ...
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This article analyses Venezuelan antipoverty programmes under the presidency of Hugo Chávez, the leader of the ‘Bolivarian Revolution’ (1998–present). Support for poor people has become the government's trademark since the creation in 2002–03 of a series of emergency social programmes, the Missions. These programmes attend to the basic needs of low-income individuals in terms of nutrition, health and education. The Missions are characterised by a pattern of institutional bypassing which makes their long-term institutionalisation difficult. Do the Missions really introduce a break with previous social policies? To answer this question, we first analyse the evolution of the Venezuelan social state. Second, we review the development of the Missions, especially the Mission Vuelvan Caras, now Che Guevara, an active labour market programme. Third, we provide an assessment of the Social Missions and identify ruptures and continuities with past social assistance policies. The main contention is that the Missions exhibit a strong pattern of path dependency, despite the ideological and discursive ruptures that have attended the presidency of Hugo Chávez.
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The year 2024 marks 25 years since ‘ Chavismo ’ took office in Venezuela. Commencing with Hugo Chávez in 1999, and continuing with Nicolás Maduro (2013–), the Bolivarian revolution has challenged local and foreign elites by retaking control of the country’s oil industry, rejected US hegemony, and promoted greater political and economic independence through the integration of Latin America and the Caribbean. While Chávez and Maduro’s populist rhetoric has been evident during both presidencies, both leaders have differed in the effectiveness of their speeches and media presence. Also, while Venezuela’s push for regional integration has continued in recent years despite serious setbacks to such projects as the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America – People’s Trade Treaty (ALBA–TCP), Petrocaribe, the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), the effectiveness of Caracas’ foreign policy has diminished under Maduro due to the impact of US economic sanctions, a decline in global oil prices from 2014 onwards and changing administrations in Brasilia from the progressive presidencies of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Dilma Vana Rousseff (2003–16) to the hard-right governments of Michel Temer and Jair Bolsonaro (2016–23). Analysing these developments and the rift between Caracas and Brasilia over the 2024 presidential election result in Venezuela, this article will explore some of the trajectories of Caracas’ foreign policy towards the promotion of regionalism in the Americas while seeking to contrast some of the successes and failures between the Chávez and Maduro administrations.
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What is the relationship between populism and the environment? Existing research answers this question by identifying empirical patterns emerging from the positions of specific populist parties. These patterns, however, are not leveraged to propose an overall framework for how populism itself relates to environmental positions. We adopt a deductive approach that draws from populism's essence to articulate what we should expect. Populism is an ideologically 'thin' discursive approach centered on people-centrism and anti-elitism. The environment, as other substantive matters, is therefore a second-order issue. Given this, we should expect considerable variations across populists in their environmental positions. At the same time, we should expect the consistent anchoring of those positions in people-centrism and anti-elitism-in conso-nance with the specific factors pertinent to those parties that ultimately define their environmental positions. Our approach systematizes analytically the literature's observations, corrects some of its empirical limitations, and allows for reflection on the environmental commitment of any one populist party. We undertake a cross-regional analysis of four cases to illustrate our argument:
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The Populist Logic on the Environment provides a framework that draws from populism’s essence to explain populist politicians’ approaches to the environment. Over the past few decades, populism has spread across the world – particularly in Europe, but also notably in the US, South America, and Asia. Its essential features – especially its ideological 'thinness' – mean that we can observe considerable variations across populists in their environmental stances. This holds across the political spectrum from the left to the right, despite the traditional tendency of right-wing parties to be skeptical of pro-environmental positions and of left-wing parties to subscribe to them. Regardless of variations, however, ‘true populists’ can be expected to consistently anchor environmental stances in people-centrism and anti-elitism – in ways linked to additional party-specific factors. This book systematizes analytically what the literature observes, corrects some of its empirical limitations, and allows for reflection on the commitment by any one populist party to the environment. The authors undertake a cross-regional analysis of four case studies to illustrate their argument: Marine Le Pen’s National Rally in France, the US Republican Party led by Donald Trump, Spain’s Podemos led by Pablo Iglesias, and Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro’s socialist regime in Venezuela. This book will appeal to scholars and students of political science, public policy, environmental studies, sociology, and geography, as well as a general audience interested in populism and the environment.
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Bu çalışma, nitel araştırma yöntemiyle yürütülen tekli vaka analizi çalışmasıdır. Nicolas Maduro'nun Cumhurbaşkanlığı döneminde (2013 –) Venezuela'da demokrasinin kalitesi, demokrasinin üç ana kavramı çerçevesinde analiz edilmektedir. Bu üç ana kavram; seçim rejimini, yatay hesap verebilirlik kurumlarını ve sosyoekonomik boyutları kapsamaktadır. Seçim rejimindeki zedelenmelerle seçimlerin adaleti ve güvenilirliği sorgulanır hale gelmiştir. Yatay hesap verebilirlik kurumlarındaki zayıflamalar sonucu ülke başkanı dâhil seçilmiş yetkililerin siyasi gücünün demokratik kurumlarla sınırlandırılamadığı bir ortam yaratmıştır. Son olarak, yüksek enflasyon, yoksulluk, eşitsizlik, yüksek suç oranları, yolsuzluk, kayırmacılık ve yüksek göç gibi önemli gelişmeleri içeren sosyoekonomik çöküş ile Venezuela halkının demokrasiye doğrudan katılımını engellemektedir. Bu üç ana kavramın analiziyle ortaya konan bulgular, Venezuela eski Devlet Başkan Hugo Chávez'in 2013 yılındaki ölümünün ardından başlayan Maduro Döneminde Venezuela'nın demokratik kalitesinin hızla bozulduğunu açıkça ortaya koymaktadır.
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How do elected autocrats come to power? Prominent explanations point to distributive conflict. We propose instead that some candidates advertise democratic deconsolidation as “deepening democracy,” which can have cross-cutting appeal. We evaluate this proposal through the election of Venezuela's Hugo Chávez, an emblematic elected autocrat. Using original data, we find that historical voting patterns and political rhetoric are consistent with our proposal: Chávez came to power with the cross-class support of voters from across the traditional political spectrum, and his campaign emphasized rather than obscured his plan to remake political institutions.
Article
The „Bolivarian Process“ in Venezuela is the result of a profound crisis of representation that affects the Venezuelan society since the economic crisis of the 1980s. The election of officer Hugo Chávez in 1998 has brought, through the years, an important change of government policies, but it is not identical to the radical social processes that overthrew the old system. To understand what is going on in Venezuela, it might be useful to discuss Deleuzes/Guattaris concept of rhizomes and machines. The French philosophers argued that changes (in society and elsewhere) should not be understood as “evolutions”, but as complex combinations of singularities. The Venezuelan transformation in the last years can be analyzed in this sense as a process without central leadership, representation, and subject – in spite of the overwhelming figure of president Chávez.
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This chapter presents a comparative analysis of four cases of populism found in Venezuela and the United States: Betancourt’s Acción Democrática (AD) (1945–1948), McCarthyism, the Chávez administration, and the Tea Party. Populism is here defined as a discourse containing a symbolic structure that demonizes the “enemy” as the disruption of the legacy traced to a glorified “founding moment.” This sense of nationalism represented in the relationship between the “founding moment” and the demonization of the “enemy” is reinforced through the attempt to define the enemy within a spectrum of linked internal and external threats to the nation. The symbolic discursive structure, which is found in all four cases, reveals further similarities between the anti-leftist content of McCarthyite and the Tea Party discourse and the Bolivarian/social reformist content of AD and Chavista discourse. The key difference, however, between the cases of populism in the immediate postwar period (AD and McCarthyism) and the present cases (Chávez and the Tea Party) is the relative success of the latter concerning their ability to institutionalize populist discourse within stable systems of democratic politics. This chapter attempts to account for the emergence of these new forms of institutionalized populism in historical perspective by revealing how the relationship between the Manichean structure of discourse and corresponding reductive economic platforms provides for clear-cut methods of implementing policy initiatives within democratic politics.
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This chapter presents a comparative qualitative analysis of Venezuelan political discourse in the immediate postwar period and the present in order to argue that although the political and economic ideological contents of Venezuelan populist discourse have changed over time, there is an essential structure to this discourse, which has remained constant. Through an examination of newspaper articles propagated during the rule of Acción Democrática (AD) presided over by Rómulo Betancourt (1945–1948) as well as articles and websites covering the Chávez administration, this chapter reveals the role of the “opposition” as a trope, a representation, and an explanatory mechanism for the persistence of social conflict, thus comprising a key feature of populist discursive structure. In the discourses of AD and Chávez, this construction of the “opposition” is posed in an antagonistic relationship against references to a “founding moment of the social,” which serves as a collective memory of the origins of democracy and the strive for equality. Thus, from the postwar period to the present, despite the ideological shift from Betancourt’s liberal democratic, pro-capital stance to Chávez’s social democratic, anti-capitalist stance, the populist formations of the reactionary “opposition” and the “founding moment” remain starkly intact. This understanding of Venezuelan populist discourse initiates a historical comparison between the AD and Chávez administrations, which reveals further similarities in their economic policies and international relations than have been previously accounted for. With a historical account of the crisis of institutionalized politics in Venezuela, an explanation emerges of why these comparisons have not been made and argues for their necessity.
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Cristóbal Rovira Kaltwasser is currently a post-doctoral fellow at the Social Science Research Center Berlin (WZB). He is the recipient of the Marie Curie Intra-European Fellowship for a two-year research project on populism in Europe and Latin America, which he will undertake at the University of Sussex during the 2011–2013 academic years. With research interests that include populism, democracy, and Latin American politics, he has published in Democratization and the Latin American Research Review, among others. He holds a PhD from the Humboldt University of Berlin (2009). the two anonymous reviewers. Of course, all errors are ours alone.
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