[News] Venezuela’s Fragile Revolution: From Chávez to Maduro
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news at freedomarchives.org
Fri Oct 6 12:34:08 EDT 2017
https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/13416
Venezuela’s Fragile Revolution: From Chávez to Maduro
By Steve Ellner - October 5, 2017
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The Venezuelan experience of nearly two decades of radicalization,
extreme social and political polarization, and right-wing insurgence
offers valuable lessons for the left. The country’s current crisis
should be an occasion for constructive debate around the struggles,
successes, and failures of the Bolivarian Revolution. By pinpointing
strategic errors–especially in the context of unrelenting hostility by
powerful forces on the right–Chavismo’s supporters and sympathizers can
offer a corrective to the sweeping condemnations of the government of
Nicolás Maduro now coming from both right and left.
This article thus has two aims: to shed light on the major lessons of
the years of Chavista rule, and to put some of the government’s more
questionable actions in their proper historical and political context.
The common perception of the Chavista leadership as incompetent
administrators who disdain democracy ignores the complexity of achieving
socialism through democratic means, a process whose dangers and demands
have shaped the government’s decisions, for better and worse. Only by
reckoning with that complexity can we understand both Venezuela’s
current situation and its turbulent recent history.
Taking Sides
In recent months, as the nation’s political conflict has intensified,
increasing numbers of both Venezuelan leftists, such as the group Marea
Socialista, which withdrew from the governing United Socialist Party
(PSUV), and foreign observers have broken with the Chavista camp. Many
now defend a “plague on both your houses” attitude toward both the
Maduro government and the right-wing opposition.^1
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en1>
Whatever the merit of some of their objections, by censuring the
government and opposition in equal terms, the ex-Chavistas obscure the
vital fact that the latter is the aggressor, while the former has been
relentlessly attacked, compelling it to take emergency measures, with
damaging long-term effects.
This phenomenon is of course not new: Chavista governments have been
under near-continuous assault from the time Hugo Chávez first took
office in 1999. Few elected governments in recent history have faced
such sharp confrontation and polarization over such a prolonged period,
or met with such a multitude of powerful and hostile forces. The
adversaries include Venezuela’s major corporations and business groups,
the U.S. government and the Organization of American States (OAS), the
Catholic Church hierarchy, university authorities, and the news media,
in addition to the traditional political establishment and labor unions.
A brief list of hostile actions includes an attempted coup in 2002,
promoted by business interests and backed by the United States; a
two-month national lockout in 2002–03; waves of paramilitary urban
violence from 2002 to the present; and the refusal of the opposition and
its allies to recognize official electoral results, even those certified
by international observers.
The belligerence has only become more pronounced under Maduro, who lacks
Chávez’s charisma, and whose government has been buffeted by ongoing
crises of debt, inflation, and low oil prices. On the day of Maduro’s
election in April 2013, losing candidate Henrique Capriles called on his
followers to express their wrath (/arrechera/), resulting in the killing
of ten Chavistas, including a policeman. The paramilitary political
violence known in Venezuela as the /guarimba/ dates to 2003, but has
escalated under Maduro: the three-month street protests in 2014 included
armed private brigades, whose tactics have since become still more
militarized.
Meanwhile, Washington’s aggression against the governments of Chávez and
Maduro demonstrates that in terms of foreign policy, little
distinguishes Republicans and Democrats. The Bush administration
wholeheartedly supported the coup and general strike in 2002–03. Obama
inspired great expectations early in his presidency with his warm
encounter with Chávez, who handed him a copy of Eduardo Galeano’s /Open
Veins of Latin America/, but ended up twice issuing an executive order
characterizing Venezuela as an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to
national security. And under President Trump, who has spoken casually of
employing a “military option” against Maduro, newly appointed CIA
director Mike Pompeo admitted to having worked with the governments of
Mexico and Colombia to promote regime change in Venezuela.
Although the scale and duration of these threats make Venezuela unique
among contemporary constitutional democracies, their lessons are
universal. The same challenges facing Venezuelan leftists in power lie
in store for any democratic government committed to socialism,
especially one that goes as far as Chávez did. In this sense, the
Venezuelan experience, with all its disappointments and achievements, is
more instructive for leftists in liberal-democratic nations than
twentieth-century revolutions in Russia, China, and Cuba.
Most important, the Venezuelan experience has demonstrated the need for
socialists who reach power by electoral means to walk a tactical
tightrope. On one side, in the name of pragmatism and in the face of
ruthless adversaries, Chavista governments have found it necessary to
make concessions: tactical alliances with business leaders—whose support
has often proved self-serving—and populist policies, including generous
social spending, some of which have fostered corruption and squandered
vital resources. On the other side, Chavista governments have mobilized
large numbers of their rank-and-file supporters and allied social
movements by demonstrating commitment to radical change and socialist
ideals. As I will argue, the revolution has too often tilted in the
former direction, at the expense of the latter.
This is not to suggest that Chavista governments have been motivated by
sheer opportunism or short-term considerations. The key point is rather
that in conditions as unfavorable as those now prevailing in Venezuela,
the left’s options are severely limited. Under better circumstances,
such as have existed at various junctures under both Chávez and Maduro,
the government must act aggressively to deepen the process of change and
achieve other objectives. As I discuss below, timing is essential.
The key issues currently being debated within the Chavista movement boil
down not to differences over long-term goals, but how to ensure the
viability of specific policies. Any analysis that focuses only on the
end results of the revolutionary process, such as socialist democracy,
while ignoring the constraints imposed by social and political
realities, can only mislead. The disillusionment of many former Chávez
sympathizers both in Venezuela and abroad likely stems in part from this
privileging of grand goals over immediate challenges. Too much of the
Bolivarian Revolution’s energy depended on the vision and charisma of
Chávez himself, who unfortunately failed to prepare his followers for
the difficulties, sacrifices, and thorny contradictions that the process
of radical change entails. The following issues, then, will be analyzed
from the perspectives of viability, feasibility, and timing.
Realism and the Bourgeoisie
Chávez and the Chavista movement were always characterized by a mix of
realism and idealism.^2
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en2>
Chávez declared that Venezuelan socialism was based on the principle
of “to each according to their needs.” Not even Soviet leaders went that
far: like Marx, they defined socialism as “to each according to their
contribution.” But Chávez was first and foremost a realist and
strategist, traits derived from his military background. Just days after
a two-month business-promoted lockout aimed at toppling his government
in 2002–03, Chávez announced he would exclude the
/golpistas/ (putchists) from the system of “preferential dollars”
(dollars sold at lower exchange rates to pay for imports). In subsequent
years, Chávez followed a tacit and at times explicit policy of giving
preferential treatment to those businesspeople who had defied the
traditional bourgeoisie by refusing to participate in the two-month
shutdown. In doing so, he weakened the traditional bourgeoisie that had
played the leading role in ongoing efforts to undermine the government.
The government’s distinction between the hostile traditional bourgeoisie
and a “friendly” emerging one has remained largely unchanged under
Maduro. The former, grouped in Fedecámaras, the Venezuelan chamber of
commerce, has grown savvier politically, maintaining a distance from the
parties of the opposition and even negotiating with the Maduro
government at a time when the opposition refused to do so, all to avoid
the appearance of partisan struggle. Nevertheless, Fedecámaras has been
anything but impartial. Not only did it join the opposition to denounce
and boycott the government’s election to select delegates to a
Constituent Assembly this past July; it also indirectly supported
opposition-called general strikes during the preceding weeks. As a show
of solidarity with the opposition, member companies of Fedecámaras
excused their employees from work during the “strike.”
The Chavista leadership’s reasoning for favoring “friendly”
businesspeople over those represented by Fedecámaras is compelling: why
grant credit or contracts for public works projects to those who will
use public money to finance destabilizing activity? Nevertheless, the
relationship between the government and friendly businesses who are
awarded contracts has become too cozy. In 2009, after insiders began to
manipulate several financial institutions resulting in a banking crisis,
Chávez ordered the arrest of several dozen of them. Ricardo Fernández
Barrueco, the richest pro-Chavista business executive, and Arné Chacón,
brother of Chávez’s right-hand man, and a veteran of the abortive 1992
coup linked to Chávez, spent three years in jail as a result.
But unethical behavior in Venezuela hardly came to a halt. One of
Chávez’s most trusted ministers, Jorge Giordani, revealed in 2013 that
$20 billion had been sold the previous year at the preferential exchange
rate to finance bogus imports. Maduro failed to act on the allegation,
despite promises to the contrary. But under his presidency, a Chavista
governor, a mayor of the city of Valencia, and a president of a major
state company were arrested on charges of corruption, and in 2017
several executives from the state oil company, PDVSA, in eastern
Venezuela faced a similar fate. In early 2017 the ex-governor received
an eighteen-year jail sentence. These actions, however, have done little
to contain corruption, which has become routine and highly visible.
Relations with the Private Sector
Two opposing camps on the left fault the Chavista government for its
ties to “friendly” businesspeople. Those to the left of the Chavista
leadership see these relations as naïve or, worse yet, as tantamount to
a sellout. Argentine writer Luis Bilbao, a supporter of both Chavista
governments, has expressed skepticism toward what Chávez called a
“strategic alliance” with the private sector, and his meetings with some
of its representatives who were, for the most part, outside the
Fedecámaras fold. Bilbao particularly criticized the “stage-based”
approach of the Venezuelan Communist Party (PCV). According to Bilbao,
the PCV sees the government’s alliance with supposedly non-monopolistic
businesspeople as a necessary stage designed to achieve a “truce” with
the bourgeoisie prior to moving ahead with socialist construction.^3
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en3>
On the other flank are those leftists who favor closer ties with the
bourgeoisie. Víctor Alvarez, a former Minister of Basic Industry and
Mining, is among the most prominent advocates of prioritizing national
private production by limiting imports and downsizing the state sector.
Alvarez decried Maduro’s removal in 2016 of Miguel Pérez Abad as
Industry and Commerce Minister, the only businessman in the cabinet,
claiming that Pérez Abad irritated Chavista “dogmatists” by calling for
the privatization of expropriated firms that incur heavy losses.^4
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en4>
Both sides overstate their case. It seems fair to say that ties with the
private sector are necessary, but that their deleterious long-term
effects must be anticipated and at some point countered. On the one
hand, few of the capitalists who have cooperated with the Chavista
governments fit the old Comintern-promoted bill of a “progressive
bourgeoisie,” which was said to support the nation’s economic
independence and even to oppose imperialism. The government’s alliance
with members of the private sector should not be considered
strategic—defined as a long-term coordination based on mutual
confidence—but rather tactical, with the goal of securing enough
political and economic stability to sustain the process of change.
Chavista activists have often warned that at the earliest sign of the
possibility of regime change, pro-government businesspeople would be the
first to abandon ship, and recent events have proved them right. Pork
industry magnate Alberto Cudemus, for instance, one of Chávez’s most
trusted allies, whom Chávez supported in his bid to head Fedecámaras,
has become a harsh critic of Maduro. The president has responded in kind.
On the other hand, it is clear that objective conditions have not
allowed for mass expropriations or all-out confrontation with
capitalists. If capitalism in Chavista Venezuela will remain a reality
for some time, the government has two options: ignore distinctions among
the capitalists and treat them as one and the same, or take advantage of
fissures within the business class. Given Fedecámaras’s sudden
switch—from decades as a supposedly apolitical body to a staunch enemy
of Chávez, even before his 1998 election—the government would be foolish
not to cultivate relations with those businesspeople who reject the
organization’s hostile line.
In addition to ex-minister Pérez Abad, now president of a major state
bank, Oscar Schemel can be considered a reliable business ally. Schemel,
the owner of a prominent public polling firm whose surveys are
frequently cited by Chavistas, was elected as a business-sector delegate
to the National Constituent Assembly (ANC) in the elections held on July
30, 2017. To mitigate the country’s economic crisis, Schemel has urged
the government to sell off highly subsidized state companies. The
proposal (also supported by veteran leftist Eleazar Díaz Rangel, the
Chavista editor of a major newspaper, /Ultimas Noticias/) touches a raw
nerve among Chavista stalwarts, who see it as a betrayal of Chávez’s
legacy. In a speech at the ANC on August 9, 2017, Schemel called for
recognition of the importance of the market and the lifting of price
controls. The latter proposal, however, would be untenable for the
popular classes, whose purchasing power has declined precipitously in
recent years. Nevertheless, Schemel is right to point out that given the
fundamentally capitalist structure of the Venezuelan economy, the
government cannot ignore the reality of the market.
Close relations with “friendly” businesspeople may be a necessary part
of a democratic and peaceful socialist strategy, but their damaging
effects, most visibly corruption and cronyism, must be expected and
combated. If the Venezuelan experience is any indication, such scourges
are inevitable: for example, efforts to enforce transparent bidding
procedures for public works contracts, meant to safeguard against
overpriced projects, have often been sidetracked. Chavistas argue
privately that the traditional bourgeoisie, while no ally of the
government, wins the lion’s share of such contracts by virtue of its
greater capital and experience compared to those of “emerging,”
“friendly” businesspeople. Evidently for that reason, the government
granted lucrative contracts to the Brazilian conglomerate Odebrecht,
with close ties to Lula da Silva’s Workers Party, for megaprojects such
as bridge and rail construction, while pointing out that smaller
“emerging” Venezuelan businesses were unequipped for such large
undertakings. The infamous scandal that has since enveloped Odebrecht
and other firms, as well as the Workers Party, implicates leading
political figures throughout the continent, including Venezuelan
politicians of many political stripes. All of this underscores the
urgent need for effective popular and institutional controls, as I
discuss below.
Party and State
In early 2007, Chávez created the PSUV, which soon signed up 7 million
members throughout the nation. As a mass-based party committed to
bottom-up participation and building links to social movements, the PSUV
held great promise as the foundation for Venezuela’s new political model
of participatory democracy, embodied in the constitution of 1999. The
PSUV was designed to allow revolutionaries to navigate the old state,
which was penetrated by forces of reaction, and at the same time to
build a new state through gradual, non-violent means.
Throughout his presidency, Chávez lashed out at bureaucrats, including
those in his own party, who held back popular participation and
efficient execution of policies and programs. Toward the end of his
life, he told his inner circle that the scourge of bureaucratism had to
be aggressively confronted: “Prepare yourselves. I am directing this
initiative at my own ranks, my own government.” To Maduro, he demanded
“a hundred inspection teams or more if necessary. If I have to remove
someone, bring them to trial, or order a probe, then that’s what I’ll
do.”^5
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en5>
Chávez himself, however, shared responsibility for the bureaucratic
morass. Given the inability of the existing state to establish effective
checks and balances, the PSUV was in an ideal position to independently
monitor and combat inefficiency, obstruction, and corruption. But from
the outset, Chávez in effect made the party an appendage of the state,
with most of its leaders at all levels also serving in the government.
Now, ten years later, the party’s president, vice president and
twenty-two national committee members are nearly all ministers,
governors, legislators, and others connected to the state.
While long on rhetoric about “participatory democracy,” the PSUV
leadership nevertheless discourages criticism from the rank and file. As
in past party primaries, the campaign for the National Constituent
Assembly elections on July 30, 2017, saw the PSUV leadership use its
influence and resources to favor certain candidates and trusted
supporters. Critical Chavista candidates should have been given greater
opportunities, such as increased airtime on the TV channel Venezolana de
Televisión and other state media outlets, or public forums open to all
candidates.
One such reliable but critical candidate, elected to the ANC, was Julio
Escalona, an iconic guerrilla of the 1960s, who raised the key issue of
corruption and called for the seizure of all assets obtained by illicit
means. Escalona also warned against PSUV control of the ANC: “The
government will be well represented in the ANC and that is logical.… But
the government and the parties have a tendency to control everything.
For the sake of the people and including the government and the PSUV,
the ANC should not be dominated by a sectarian current.”^6
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en6>
Providing opportunities and opening space for Chavista activists and
grassroots leaders who are committed but not beholden to the party
machine would be an intelligent strategy, both to restore some of the
popular energy of the Chávez years and to counter the right’s recent
offensive. Such an approach would stop short of a “revolution in the
revolution,” involving a thorough shake-up of the bureaucracy—an
unfeasible approach in the current moment of acute political
confrontation. In this sense, the reinvigoration of Chavismo through
relaxed controls on bottom-up participation represents the same
tightrope-walking strategy, based on a realistic assessment of objective
conditions and of the relative strength of hostile forces, that has
informed the movement from the beginning.
Democracy and Government
Chavista rhetoric envisions a new type of democracy, based on direct
popular participation in decision-making, that supersedes old models of
representative government. Chavista leaders invoked this model to
encourage participation in the ANC elections. In a May Day speech,
Maduro justified his decision to convene the ANC as an effort to
strengthen and deepen the participatory provisions of the constitution
of 1999. As proof of the feasibility of these “new forms of direct
democracy,” Maduro pointed to such initiatives as the system of
community distribution of basic food items (known as the Local
Distribution and Production Committees, or CLAPs) and the communes,
which organize and direct economic activity within cities and neighborhoods.
Although the CLAPs and communes suggest the great potential of direct
participation, both are in an incipient stage. Similarly, the system of
“social controllership,” another example of direct participation, has
not come to full fruition. Under this arrangement, the community,
through the communal councils first created in 2006, monitors public
works projects to ensure that public money is properly allocated and
spent. Social controllership, and the communal councils in general, have
encouraged the participation of large numbers of formerly marginalized
Venezuelans and engendered a sense of empowerment, but their performance
at the national level has been uneven.^7
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en7>
Given this reality, the system of institutional checks and balances
conventionally associated with liberal or constitutional democracy
cannot be readily discarded. Accountability is particularly important
because Venezuela’s political system has always been skewed in favor of
executive power, and even more so under the Chavistas. In addition, with
the loosening of rules for bidding on public contracts, discussed above,
other types of institutional checks and guarantees need to be developed.
In one example of a failed effort to tighten controls, legislation in
2009 allowed the National Controllership to review the finances of the
communal councils, but the provision has been a dead letter.
As long as direct democracy remains a work in progress, old
institutional controls should be retained and, where necessary,
modified, but not abandoned. The central challenge remains “to walk a
fine line between grassroots movements and state institutions,” which,
in the words of George Ciccariello-Maher, Chávez was uniquely able to
do.^8
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en8>
Inside the PSUV itself, direct democracy is not just a guiding vision
but an immediate imperative. Even improved institutional controls within
the state would not guarantee transparency and accountability. The
effort to combat corruption requires that the governing party become
internally democratic, participatory, and semi-autonomous in its
relations with the government.
Loyalty and Sectarianism
The experience of the general strike of 2002–03 taught the Chavista
leadership the importance of loyalty, but the incident may have been a
case of “overlearning.” After the strike, Chávez fired 17,000 technical
and professional oil company employees who had paralyzed production in
the industry to spur regime change. Their replacements, most of whom
lacked their predecessors’ expertise, succeeded in restarting
production. To many of the president’s supporters, the episode suggested
that skill was dispensable, but loyalty, which became a Chavista
catchword, was not. Chávez’s and Maduro’s frequent rotation of cabinet
ministers, who often lacked any background in the ministries they were
appointed to serve, appeared to affirm this disregard for technical ability.
The overemphasis on loyalty has also fomented sectarianism and
intolerance, and political fealty can serve as a cover for corruption. A
favorite slogan of both Chávez and Maduro, “Unity, Unity and More
Unity,” is often used to exhort followers to close ranks and set aside
internal criticism to focus on facing down a ruthless enemy. This call
for unity above all else appears especially relevant after the recent
defection of several leading Chavistas from the PSUV. One such figure is
Giordani, who since Chávez’s death has been sharply critical of Maduro’s
government. But a distinction should be drawn between leftist
adversaries of the government, such as Giordani and the group Marea
Socialista, and leftists who give it critical support, such as former
commerce minister Eduardo Samán. The latter, who was removed from office
by Chávez and later again by Maduro, has made clear that revolutionaries
cannot always air their criticisms publicly, and that party discipline
must take precedence. However, the PSUV’s failure to recognize Samán’s
leadership prompted him to leave the party in June to join an allied
group, Patria Para Todos, and then run as a candidate for the ANC. At
the same time, Samán chided Giordani for his excessive condemnations of
the party, adding: “I also have my criticisms but I am not going public.
At this moment we have to prioritize unity because the whole
[revolutionary] process is on the line.” Samán’s exit from the PSUV
confirms that Maduro, much more than Chávez, has been overly hostile to
critics on the left, both within and beyond the movement. One Chavista
activist I interviewed faulted Maduro for being at times “sectarian,”
and pointed to Mao’s “On the Correct Handling of Contradictions among
the People” as a guide for resolving the movement’s internal
differences.^9
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en9>
Social Justice and Productivity
There were sound political reasons for Chávez to prioritize social
programs over economic objectives during his first years in office. Had
he not, the country’s poor and working-class populations might not have
rallied so actively to his cause during the two attempts to topple his
government in 2002. Not surprisingly, the government’s flagship social
programs date back to the aftermath of the 2002–03 general strike. In
his later years, Chávez gave greater weight to policies to promote
economic development, as has Maduro, who responded to the economic
downturn in 2014 by prioritizing efforts to transform the nation’s
rentier, oil-based economy. If Venezuela is typical of what can be
expected when leftist governments in the global South take power by
electoral means, the sequence will be first the prioritization of social
objectives in response to political perils, and then a shift to a
strategy designed to face economic challenges. Thus consolidation of
power and stability is the initial task, requiring an emphasis on social
provision in order to buttress the left’s mass base of support.
But in certain respects, Chávez went overboard in his focus on social
goals at the expense of economic ones in the early years of his
presidency. His constitutional reform proposal of 2007, for example,
included a reduction of the legal work week from forty-four to
thirty-six hours. Such a drastic cut threatened to stunt Venezuela’s
economic growth, as it would that of any industrializing country.
Likewise, at the level of discourse, Chávez’s liberal use of slogans
such as “the sea of happiness” and “humanistic socialism” failed to
prepare Venezuelans for the toil and struggle that lay ahead,
particularly when international oil prices declined. Indeed, the
overriding need to overcome the nation’s dependence on oil may not have
been an immediate priority in Chávez’s early years, but from the outset
the challenge had to be faced, albeit not privileged. There is a lesson
to be learned: stages whereby certain objectives are prioritized over
others have to be defined for each period, but at the same time, future
stages need to be anticipated, both at the level of policy and discourse.
A particularly thorny problem of strategy and timing arises from the
drive for social justice and equality. Both are guiding ideals of the
Chavista movement, and account for much of the support it enjoys among
the country’s non-privileged and marginalized populations, such as
members of the informal economy. In itself, this “humanistic” aspect of
socialism is not a point of contention within the Chavista movement.
Internal debate, however, has centered on the need for collective
discipline and sacrifice, and on the poor administrative and economic
performance of the state sector. Within any socialist government,
tension sometimes arises between efforts to achieve equality and social
justice on the one hand, and efficiency, productivity, and labor
discipline on the other, even as the two sets of goals are reconcilable
and in some ways interrelated.^10
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en10>
A case in point is the practice of outsourcing, which Chávez decried.
His opposition to outsourcing in part prompted him to nationalize the
foreign-owned steel company SIDOR in 2008, and to expropriate contractor
companies in the oil industry, and eventually to outlaw the practice
altogether in the Organic Labor Law of 2012. The issue in Venezuela,
however, is not always cut and dried. On the one hand, the incorporation
of tens of thousands of outsourced workers by state companies is an
inspiration for labor movements around the world. On the other, some
workers who have raised the banners of social justice associated with
Chávez and demanded to be added to the payroll of the state oil company,
PDVSA, are not permanently employed in the oil industry. Since 1998,
PDVSA’s workforce has more than tripled, from 40,000 to over 150,000.
The tension between social justice and socialist efficiency plays out on
other fronts. One issue is the widespread practice of granting free or
excessively low-priced goods and services to poor and working-class
communities. The case for the policy is compelling, namely that the
government has a responsibility to pay what Chavistas call the “social
debt” owed to the most exploited sectors. Yet such artificially low
prices on goods produced by state companies undermine their ability to
achieve self-sufficiency, and are partly responsible for the chronic
scarcity of many products and the emergence of an exploitative black
market. This dilemma partly explains why companies that Chávez
expropriated after 2007 to achieve “food sovereignty” have been unable
to fill the gap left by politically motivated disinvestment by the
private sector in recent years.
When to Act
If the aggression and intransigence of Venezuela’s opposition has
limited the government’s options and forced it to make concessions, then
those moments when the Chavistas have the upper hand represent special
opportunities for progress and reform. In such situations, four
objectives—all of which come at a price, but only in the short run—stand
out as achievable: economic transformation; combating corruption and
inefficient bureaucracies; internal democratization; and the weakening
of adversaries. Chávez took advantage of the favorable juncture after
his triumph in the 2006 presidential elections, when he won 63 percent
of the vote, the largest in modern Venezuelan history. Not only did he
nationalize strategic industries, but he created the PSUV and delivered
a heavy blow to his adversaries on the right.
In contrast, Maduro missed a valuable opportunity in mid-2014, when the
Chavistas were in an ideal position after defeating the opposition’s
three-month /guarimba/ protests and winning municipal elections by an
impressive margin. At the time, Maduro vowed to undertake a
“revolutionary shakeup” of his cabinet, prompting expectations that
fresh faces would be brought in and new policies initiated. The
announcement of these changes, however, was postponed several times, and
when, on September 2, the appointments were finally made official, they
amounted to merely a musical-chairs reshuffling of cabinet ministers.
Concurrently, oil prices began to plunge, and a golden opportunity was lost.
The convening of the ANC may provide another favorable juncture for the
Chavistas. At the time of this writing, in August 2017, the opposition
has been worn down after three months of /guarimba/ protests even more
violent than those of 2014. In addition, opposition leaders are divided
over whether to participate in upcoming gubernatorial and municipal
elections. Finally, given their sheer number, the 550 delegates to the
ANC may be less subject to party control than are National Assembly
deputies. Consequently, they may be more inclined to speak out against
corruption and bureaucracy and in favor of initiatives to revive the
economy.
Summing Up
The failure of the numerous attempts to topple the Maduro government is
due largely to the support the Chavistas still enjoy among the country’s
popular sectors and the armed forces. The campaigns of violence in 2014
and 2017 have been predicated on the assumption that disruptions in
wealthy municipalities run by opposition mayors would spread to the
barrios, or trigger a military coup. Neither has happened. With a few
exceptions, the working classes and the poor have refrained from joining
the /guarimba/, despite considerable discontent at the country’s
economic crisis and the long tradition of barrio political
resistance.^11
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en11>
In formulating a strategy toward the armed forces, Chávez assimilated
the century-long experience of earlier Latin American progressive
governments, whose lack of an organized following in the military left
them without a counterweight to right-wing officers.^12
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en12>
Recognizing this reality, Chávez promoted “Bolivarian” officers, who
identified with the movement, to commanding positions, with the result
that the military now defines itself as anti-imperialist, socialist, and
Chavista.
Maduro has played hardball in the face of the latest campaign to unseat
his government. Not only has he jailed opposition leaders for inciting
violence, but he has mobilized his own supporters to counter
opposition-led street protests. In doing so, Maduro breaks with a
tradition of sorts among Latin American progressive governments, which
historically have put up little resistance to right-wing insurgencies:
notable examples include Rómulo Gallegos in Venezuela in 1948, Jacobo
Arbenz in Guatemala in 1954, Juan Domingo Perón in Argentina in 1955,
João Goulart in Brazil in 1964, and Salvador Allende in Chile in 1973.
Maduro’s perseverance is inherited from Chávez, who realized long before
his election as president that state power is of central importance in
the struggle for socialism, and its achievement must take precedence
over other considerations. Maduro is thus at odds with those on the left
and beyond who argue that the Chavistas should be willing to relinquish
power now that the government’s popularity is well under 50 percent.
But gaining and keeping power is not enough to make a revolution.
According to the Chavista strategy, an old state and a new one will, in
the words of Marta Harnecker, an unofficial advisor to Chávez, “coexist
for a long time.” This approach contrasts with Lenin’s classic “dual
power” strategy, in which the old state is considered enemy territory.
Nevertheless, Harnecker recognizes that while it is legitimate for
leftists to work within the old state, it has a corrupting influence.
The only solution is for the “organized movement…[to] exert pressure on
the inherited state.”^13
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en13>
Greek Marxist Nicos Poulantzas, who theorized along similar lines,
pointed to autonomous social movements as the essential element exerting
that pressure.^14
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#en14>
In Venezuela, however, social movements—for indigenous rights, gender
equality, environmental justice, and more—have traditionally been weak.
This distinguishes it from a country like Bolivia, where the governing
Movement toward Socialism party of Evo Morales emerged from such
movements. In the absence of strong and independent grassroots groups,
the key element in the Venezuelan process is thus the party. To combat
bureaucracy, corruption, and inefficiency, the PSUV must become more
independent of the state and more internally democratic.
Two fundamental challenges face the governing party in this drive for
greater autonomy and internal participation by a committed and
well-informed membership. First, if left unchecked, the government’s
relationship with sectors of the bourgeoisie will solidify and continue
to undermine the leadership’s socialist commitments. Second, if it is
necessary to walk a tactical tightrope when the left finds itself on the
defensive, the specifics of that strategy require input from those
closest to the mood of the people. Decision-making cannot be the
exclusive preserve of the party’s national leadership, still less of the
president’s inner circle. A truly democratic party is essential in
Venezuela not only as a matter of principle, but because the very
survival of the country’s revolutionary process depends on it.
Notes
1. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn1>Jacobin andNACLA:
Report on the Americas have each published articles both for and
against the “plague on both your houses” position. For a
representative “for” argument, see Gabriel Heitland, “Why Is
Venezuela Spiraling out of Control?
<https://www.jacobinmag.com/2017/05/venezuela-crisis-maduro-opposition-violence-elections-economy>”Jacobin,
May 14, 2017. Marea Socialista worked as a faction within the PSUV
from the party’s founding in 2007. In 2014, after taking an
increasingly critical stance toward the government, MS announced its
intention to become a separate political party.
2. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn2>Ignacio
Ramonet, “One Hundred Hours with Chávez,” in Hugo Chávez with
Ramonet,My First Life(London: Verso, 2016), xxxiv.
3. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn3>Luis
Bilbao,Venezuela en Revolución: Renacimiento del Socialismo (Buenos
Aires: Capital Intelectual, 2008), 182, 195–96.
4. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn4>Víctor
Alvarez, “Cambio en el gabinete,”El Mundo, August 5, 2016.
5. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn5>“Chávez:
Tengo moral para exigirle a mi equipo eficiencia,” YouTube, November
5, 2012. In his last famous speech, Chávez also scolded those in
charge of implementing policy for failing to promote direct
democracy through the establishment of communes. Chávez,Golpe de
Timón (Caracas: Edición Correo del Orinoco, 2012), 17–21. See also
John Bellamy Foster, “Chávez and the Communal State: On the
Transition to Socialism in Venezuela
<http://dx.doi.org/10.14452/MR-066-11-2015-04_1>,”Monthly Review 66,
no. 11 (April 2015): 1–17.
6. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn6>Julio
Escalona, “¿Una Asamblea Nacional Constituyente para la Simple
Negación, para la Venganza?
<https://www.aporrea.org/ideologia/a249218.html>” Aporrea, July 14,
2017, http://aporrea.org
<https://www.aporrea.org/ideologia/a249218.html>.
7. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn7>For
a brief discussion of the uneven performance of the communal
councils and communes, see Steve Ellner, “Social Programs in
Venezuela under the Chavista Governments
<https://thenextsystem.org/learn/stories/social-programs-venezuela-under-chavista-governments>,”
Next System Project, August 7, 2017, http://thenextsystem.org
<https://thenextsystem.org/learn/stories/social-programs-venezuela-under-chavista-governments>.
8. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn8>George
Ciccariello-Maher,Building the Commune: Radical Democracy in
Venezuela (London: Verso, 2016), 77.
9. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn9>Felipe
Rangel, interview with the author, Puerto La Cruz, July 11, 2017.
10. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn10>Jorge
Arreaza, interview with the author, Barcelona, Venezuela, July 14, 2017.
11. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn11>For
a vivid history and analysis of protests in Caracas’s famed 23 de
Enero barrio in recent decades, see Alejandro Velasco,Barrio Rising:
Urban Popular Politics and the Making of Modern Venezuela (Berkeley,
CA: university of California Press, 2015).
12. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn12>Before
1998, it was a notorious fact that most high-ranking officers were
sympathizers of one of the two establishment parties, Democratic
Action and Copei. Not even the moderately leftist Movement toward
Socialism (MAS) was allowed any influence within the military.
13. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn13>Marta
Harnecker, “Latin America and Twenty-First Century Socialism:
Inventing to Avoid Mistakes
<http://dx.doi.org/10.14452/MR-062-03-2010-07_2>,”Monthly Review 62,
no. 3 (July–August 2010): 42.
14. ↩
<https://monthlyreview.org/2017/10/01/venezuelas-fragile-revolution/#fn14>For
a discussion of the application of Poulantzas’s thinking to the
Chavista experience, see Steve Ellner, “Implications of Marxist
State Theories and How They Play Out in Venezuela,”Historical
Materialism 25, no. 2 (2017): 29–62.
--
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