Breakdown of Venezuelan Democracy - Research Paper Example

Breakdown of Venezuelan Democracy Introduction Venezuela has undergone major transformations in its political, economic, and social aspects. Although the country comes from a past of persistent corruption and poor governance, things began to take a positive change in the mind 20th century. This began in the 1960s when Venezuela got democratic presidents who steered the country on a path of democratic reforms (Levine, “Transition” 49). During this period, Venezuela emerged as a model democracy in the Latin America region, which was plagued with undemocratic governments and weak social policies. The democratic presidents that served Venezuela between the 1960s and the 1990s placed Venezuela on a path for growth of democracy as well as the economy (Golinger 23). During this period, the people of Venezuela enjoyed better incomes because of the effective policies and governance that was in place. However, the period of Venezuelan democracy was short-lived. The crumbling of the democracy in Venezuela started showing in the 1970s and 1980s when corruption became rife. This corruption was mainly fuelled by the growing revenues from the country’s main resources, oil. This growing corruption adversely affected the gains made in the previous years and led to the decline of President Carlos Andrés Pérez’s credibility, which led to his impeachment and imprisonment (Golinger 24-25). A new president, Rafael Caldera took over power but did not make any major positive changes to the country. This ultimately led to his defeat in the 1998 elections by Hugo Chávez., who was president until his death in 2013. The rise of Hugo Chávez into Venezuela’s presidency marked a major period in the country’s political, economic, and social landscape. Initially, Hugo Chávez was perceived as a true reformer that would transform the country and end the corruption that had become so rampant (Radu 279). Additionally, Chávez was seen as part of the larger Venezuelan community comprised of ordinary people. Hence, his victory was partly based on the fact that he was seen as a man of the people. This perception developed when Chávez was jailed in 1994 for orchestrating a coup to oust the then president Carlos Andrés Pérez. Before going to prison, Chávez was given an opportunity to address the nation, which he utilized well such that he became a darling of the people. His imprisonment did not last long because he was released two years later when Rafael Caldera tool office as President and kept his campaign promise of releasing Chávez. The tenure of president Chávez has been one of the most interesting in terms of how it has shaped the democracy, economy, and social structure in Venezuela. President Chávez seemed to portray two different personas. In his early days as president, he appeared as a good person who was keen on enhancing democracy, tackling corruption, and improving the economy of the country. However, this later changed when he started displaying autocratic leadership and extending his tenure beyond the two-term period that he had put in place when he took office (Sullivan 4). It is no wonder that he died in office after ruling the country for over a decade. His successor, the current president Nicolás Maduro Moros, is seen to be upholding the policies of Chávez. This should be not be a major surprise considering that he had been a close ally of Chávez and had even served in his cabinet for about six years. This paper presents a breakdown of Venezuelan democracy. The paper specifically focuses on the major regimes that have ruled Venezuela since the early 20th century. The paper will be organized into three main parts starting with this introduction, which provides an overview of the Venezuelan democracy. The next section will be the main body. This will form the main section of the paper and will present the main discussions. The main body will be divided into different sub-sections. The final section will be the conclusion. This will present the overall summary and identify main differences between the current regime and the classic authoritarian populism of Juan Domingo Peron. Venezuela’s Political History Venezuela has a long political history. After gaining independence and becoming an independent republic in the first quarter of the 20th century, Venezuela’s started building its political history. This political history has been marked by three major and distinct periods including the early period of dictatorship, the democratic rule, and the breakdown of the democracy. Each of these periods is distinct in the sense that the political leaders adopted different styles of leadership and introduced or pushed for certain policies that shaped the country in all spheres. It is worth noting that each of the three periods is marked with certain famous presidents as will be discussed below. Early 20th Century – Dictatorship The period after Venezuela attained independence up to the mid 20th century was marked with dictatorial regimes (Levine, “Transition” 48). The country had several presidents who exercised authoritarian leadership including the use of military dictatorship. This was not unique to Venezuela. In fact, such classical military dictatorships dominated Latin America. The most popular authoritarian populism regimes were Peronismo, which was established by Argentina’s Juan Domingo Peron and Varga’s regime that was established by Getúlio Vargas in Brazil in the early 20th century. Both Peron and Vargas played major roles in building strong military dictatorships that became models to other Latin American countries such as Venezuela.According to Olstein (12), Peron’s and Varga’s dictatorial regimes were spurred the emergence of military dictatorships even after their falls. For instance, Peronismo outlived its founder Peron (Dix 31). To understand Venezuela’s classical military dictatorship, it is important to consider one the main classical authoritarian presidents, Marcos Perez Jimenez. Marcos Perez was president of Venezuela between 1952 and 1958. Before becoming president, Perez was long-serving military officer who had moved up the ranks to the rank of colonel by the time he organized a military coup that drive him to power. The military regime of Perez was different from previous military regimes because it introduced unparalleled institutional decay and brutal repression (Galván 64). After rising to power, Perez embarked on a mission to silence all his opponents through assassinations and imprisonments. Additionally, Perez obliterated all political parties and consolidated power to himself and instituted constitutional reforms to increase his power and authority. As these were not enough, the Perez regime instigated press censorship and breakdown of labor unions (64-65). Despite the unprecedented oppression and obliteration of political institutions, the Perez regime embarked socio-economic policy reform, The New National Ideal, which emphasized material improvements in areas such as infrastructure development (Ellner100). In terms of foreign policy, Perez established closer ties with the Capitalist America. He awarded major oil contracts to American companies and in return won the support of the American government. The American government turned a blind eye on the atrocities committed by the dictator and even awarded him a medal (Marcos Perez Jimenez n.p.). Towards the end of his military authoritative regime, there was growing opposition to Perez. The opposition was spearheaded by discontented military personnel, women, and workers who accused Perez of atrocities, corruption, and growing poverty levels (Galván 62). He was ousted through a military coup in 1958, which forced him to flee into exile in the US. This marked the beginning of the Venezuelan democracy period. It is important to note that Perez’ regime was similar in many ways to previous military regimes before him. For example, Juan Vincent Gomez, who ruled Venezuela between 1908 and 1935, was a ruthless dictator who surprised any opposition and led to the collapse of Venezuela’s economy. He is considered to be a loner who rarely appeared in public and did not connect with the Venezuelan population. In fact, he is considered to have betrayed the interests of the nation and favoring foreign companies in controlling the country’s economic backbone, oil (Ellner 94). Therefore, we can draw many similarities in the different classic authoritarian regimes that prevailed in Venezuela and the larger Latin America in the first half of the 20th century. Mid 20th Century – Democratic Leadership Although democratic leadership has first emerged in Venezuela just before Perez came to power, it was short-lived. However, the real transition to democracy began in 1958 when Perez’s autocratic regime was ousted. Since then, Venezuela experienced six democratic elections until the 1980s when the democratic gains realized started fading away (Levine, “Transition” 49). The period of building Venezuelan democracy was challenging. This was mainly because Venezuela had a long history of authoritarian populism. This system had taken root in the country and it was not easy to introduce radical changes. Moreover, Venezuela was surrounded by authoritarian populism in other Latin American countries, which made it more difficult to institute radical changes that would create a democratic system. At first, the new democratic leaders needed to challenge the powerful authoritarian leaders. For example, the new breed of democratic leaders had to overthrow the authoritarian regime of Carlos Perez because Perez was not willing to step down (Levine, “Transition” 49). The removal of the authoritarian regime required the involved of the masses. Mass demonstrations and strikes were organized across the country to pressurize the military regime to cede power (Coronil 67). Although the coup de tat was successful in bringing down the military regime, the main challenge was to establish democracy. According to Coronil (68), the primary challenge for the democratic opposition after successful ousting Carlos Perez was to transform the widespread discontent with dictatorship into popular support for democracy. The democratic opposition decided to embrace democracy by organizing and holding democratic elections where all parties would have a chance to participate and a share in the democratic government that would be formed (69). The transition to democracy had major implications on Venezuela. The new democratic system led to the return of civilian rule and the end to the military rule. This meant that the civilians could participate in elections to elect their political leaders and that the government was led by civilians from different sectors including the private sector and the elites. Additionally, there transition led to the emergence of political stability in the country, which was instrumental in supporting economic development. In fact, major economic developments were realized in this era. For example, oil revenues grew, which enabled the government to support social welfare projects in education and health among other areas (Ottaway 73). The transition to democracy also borrowed lessons from the short-lived period of democracy between 1945 and 1948 that had suffered from partisan political conflicts. This time round, the democratic leaders formed pacts to reduce partisan conflict (Levine, Religion67). This implies that there were major political changes to enhance democracy. This is evident in the democratic elections that were held in 1958, 1963, 1968, 1973, 1978, and 1983. Since the 1968 elections, Venezuela also experience peaceful handing over of power (Levine, “Transition” 48). This was not the case during the classical authoritarian period before. In terms of foreign policy, the democratic period also led to certain changes. Specifically, the democratic governments promoted Betancourt Doctrine, which implied that Venezuela would not recognize of form foreign relations with government that were formed undemocratically through coup de tats (Villa 154). This meant that Venezuela turned away from the authoritarian regimes in other Latin America countries that and shifted focus to other regions and countries such as the US, which supported the democratic policies in the country. With regards to issues of corruption especially in the oil sector, the democratic governments instituted transparent systems that reduced loopholes that had allowed corruption to prevail in previous authoritarian regimes. For example, the democratic governments increased the oil taxes charged on foreign-based oil companies and started nationalization of the industry (Monaldi et al. 60). Late 20th – Breakdown of Democracy The Venezuelan democracy that began in 1958 started experiencing challenges in the 1980s. This marked the beginning of a new transition that would lead to emergence of a new era of democracy breakdown. This era began with the emergence of Hugo Chavez, who won the elections of 1998 and become president until 2013 when he died. Before Chavez won the elections, he had been imprisoned for two years for organization a coup de tat to topple the regime of Rafael Caldera. Chavez was a radical political figure. He rose to power on the promise that he would make major political, economic, and social reforms to address some of the problems affecting Venezuelans such as poverty and corruption. Early in his tenure, Chavez appeared to be on course as far as his promises were concerned. For example, he ensured that a new constitution was developed and adopted. In what Partlett (1) refers to as Chavez’s constitutional legacy, Chavez was very committed to giving Venezuela a new constitution shortly after ascending to power. Apart from facilitating the adoption of a new constitution that set presidential time limits to two terms among other reforms, Chavez also introduced and led to Bolivarian revolution. This was a leftist ideology of social movement that supports nationalism and opposes imperialism. This Bolivarian revolution affected Chavez’s foreign policy. At the core of his Bolivarian revolution was the unification of Latin America (Gott 183).With regard to the relationship between Venezuela and the US, which had been existent for a long time, Hugo Chavez felt that the US was not a good ally considering its capitalist and imperialist policies. During his tenure, relationships with the US deteriorated because Chavez felt that the US was trying to exert neocolonialist policies in Venezuela (Sullivan 3). Chavez also instituted a series of social welfare policies to help the poor. Chavez provided social support programs to the poor that saw the transfer of finances from oil to support social programs such as education, health, and housing (Coronel Para 2-3). He also introduced land reforms to give land ownership rights to poor people living in poor environments. Despite the positive contributions of the Bolivarian Revolution led by Chavez, his leadership started being criticized. He was criticized for killing democracy, limiting press freedom, and applying authoritarian leadership. He survived a coup de tat in 2002. Although the coup was short-lived, it inspired Chavez to adopt more oppressive policies. He filled the military, the cabinet, and the judiciary with his supporters (Sullivan 4). His hitherto good constitution legacy started turning bad. Chavez tried as much as possible to remove the presidential term limits in the constitution, which he had supported earlier, so as to remain in power. Thanks to his supporters in government, congress, and judiciary, he succeeded and remained in power until his death. Even when the health worsened, Chavez still selected the current President, Maduro, as his successor. To many Venezuelans, especially those from the opposition, these factors showed the breakdown of democracy in the country under Chavez’s rule. Considering that Maduro was a close ally of Chavez, the same policies that Chavez implemented are still prevalent today. Generally, there is controversy regarding the role of Hugo Chavez in the breakdown of Venezuelan democracy. However, what is clear is that the current political, economic, and social environment in Venezuela is worse than it was in the democracy period. Conclusion There are several differences between Peron’s authoritarian populism and the current regime in Argentina, which is still influenced by Hugo Chavez’s Bolivarian policies. To understand these differences, the paper will focus on five main areas including structure of government, military influence, economic development, corruption, and constitution. Structure of Government There are no major differences between the authoritarian populism of Peron and the current regime in Venezuela. The incumbent President, Nicolas Maduro, applies the same structural policies as his predecessor (Ellner n.p.). However, Maduro is not as radical and populist as Peron or Chavez. Peron and Chavez were populist authoritarians who balanced social, economic, and political reforms with authoritarian styles. For example, Chavez used the social policies to appeal to the public but used authoritarian style to prevent any opposition by for example appointing his supporters and limiting press freedom. However, the current regime is not a strong authoritarian populism. Military Influence Military involvement was a core feature of Peron’s authoritarian populism. He got into power through a military coup. When he got into power, he had to protect the interests of the military Junta, which was essential to maintaining his power. However, the current regime in Venezuela does not have such as high level of military involvement. The regime did not use the military to come to power, which means that the regime has not political obligation to the military. It is also important to recall that Hugo Chavez was ousted for three days through a military coup, which adversely affected his relationship with the military. Economic Development Economic development is also a common feature in Peron’s authoritarian populism and the current regime in Venezuela, which is a continuation of Chavez’s Bolivarian revolution. Just like Peron, Chavez brought about economic policies that resulted in increased revenues and support for social welfare. However, such economic developments were short-lived because of the levels of corruption and bureaucracies. The only difference between Peron’s regime and the current regime in Venezuela is that in the latter, poor economic policies and economic slow down have not caused the regime to fall. Corruption Corruption is a common feature in Peron’s authoritarian populism and the current regime in Venezuela. Corruption was so prevalent in Peron’s regime that it largely contributed to his ouster by the military. In Venezuela, corruption was prevalent in Chavez’s regime. The same has been transferred to Maduro’s regime. In fact, some have argued that corruption is more prevalent and intense in under Maduro than it was under Hugo Chavez (Ellner n.p.). Constitution Finally, although Peron introduced constitutional reforms when he took over power, his reforms were not as intense as those instituted by Chavez. The current regime in Venezuela is applying the constitution that Hugo Chavez left, which underwent several changes over the years. 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