Borneo Jimmy posted:

Yes lets just ignore the fact that these jailed opposition leaders have been involved in multiple violent attempts to overthrow the government.

El Hefe posted:

A couple months ago a member of the Policia Nacional Bolivariana murdered a 14 year old boy in broad daylight in the middle of the street during a protest and Maduro still blamed it on the opposition.

Azran posted:

MOTHERFUCKER. You know, I never bothered to check this piece of news, but my local Kircherista party in the University I attend said it had been a newspaper's mistake, and it actually happened on Brazil. No surprise, had an argument the other day where these assholes argued that the Venezuelan Armed Forces have NEVER acted against the Pueblo Unido's interest.

Rent-A-Cop posted:

Will the PSUV actually hand over power if they lose a close election?

Adventure Pigeon posted:

What would be the consequences if they didn't?

kapparomeo posted:

The late and lamented Eternal Commander Of The Revolution was involved in two violent attempts to overthrow the democratically-elected government back in 1992, but no-one seems to hold it against his sacred memory.

beer_war posted:

Chuck Boone posted:

Camarada, you've been gravely misinformed. Those weren't coups: they were "acts of dignity".

kapparomeo posted:

I'm curious about this actually. I'm aware that PSUV members will automatically start beating anyone from the opposition (regardless of origin) over the head with the 2002 putsch whenever Chavez was or Maduro is questioned about their democratic credentials - how often did people try to come back at Chavez with his own failed putsches, and how well did that go down with the Leader?

El Hefe posted:

Imagine if he had succeeded with the 1992 coup

El Hefe posted:

Imagine if he had succeeded with the 1992 coup

M. Discordia posted:

Probably would have been for the best, compared to what happened. Oil prices were flat through the 90s, so there would have been no artificial insulation from the disastrous economic policies of Chavismo followed by the catastrophic crash we're having now. Also, the 1990s were a low ebb for left-wing movements since the actual realities of Communism and its failure were an event of recent memory, so Chavez would not have benefited from the regrouped idiot propaganda brigade abroad. There would have been successful international pressure to return to democracy by the late 1990s, followed by the election of some reasonable candidate, and Venezuela would currently be in far better shape economically and in its democratic institutions now. It would probably look a lot like other countries that became relatively normal places around 2000 like Peru or pre-narcostate Mexico, with the added benefit of Venezuela's longer democratic tradition and oil reserves.

quote:

With the Middle East in flames, NATO trying to start World War III in Ukraine while the European Union’s economy stagnates, Africa torn by low-level wars, and China re-entering the world stage in an assertive manner, there’s one region of the world that is relatively quiet: South America. (Oops—Obama just blew that by declaring Venezuela a “national security threat” to the US. But, never mind.) Yet some of the most interesting and far-reaching changes in the world are taking place in this region. And these two books are excellent entries into understanding current developments in the region

....

So much of recent Venezuelan history has been viewed through the lens of the late president, Hugo Chávez. Chávez, a progressive, former military leader was democratically elected into the presidency in 1998, taking office the next year. But the coup attempt in April 2002—where Chávez was removed from office and detained by right wing putschists until he was freed through a revolt of the people of Caracas and military forces that remained loyal—and an amazing film by an Irish film company of the coup, “The Revolution Will Not be Televised,” brought Chávez to world attention.

The film company was in Venezuela to try to understand Chávez and what was happening in the country, and found itself inside the National Palace “Miraflores” during the coup and, despite not knowing whether they would even survive, kept the cameras rolling. Showing Chavez as a very charismatic and popular president, strongly supported by the poor and traditionally disenfranchised of the country before the coup, and then showing the coup from the inside Miraflores—as well as presenting the arrogance of the coup leaders during their brief “moment in the sun”—and then Chávez’ return to Miraflores, the film introduced this revolutionary to the world.

And Chávez kept progressing, moving from a limited to more a radical vision of what could be done in Venezuela—based on radical ideas of popular, grassroots democracy—eventually putting forth the concept of “socialism for the 21st century” in the mid-2000s. And his willingness to challenge the US Empire brought him many followers from outside and well as inside the country.

Ciccariello-Maher seeks to understand what is behind Chávez: as he explained to one interlocutor, who asked why he was there, “We had come to understand the revolutionary collectives that constitute Venezuelan Hugo Chávez’s most radical support base, to grasp their political vision and their often tense relationship with the processes of political transformation known as the Bolivarian Revolution.”

To understand this book, then, we have to recognize it is not about Chávez.

Then who is the book about? The book is about “the people,” but that is not just anyone. Building off of the writings of Argentine-Mexican philosopher of liberation, Enrique Dussel, “the Latin American pueblo is instead a category of both rupture and struggle, a moment of combat in which those oppressed within the prevailing social order and those excluded from it intervene to transform the system, in which a victimized part of the community speaks for and attempts to radically change the whole” (emphasis in original). In other words, whether included within the system or excluded from it, the author focuses on those who have been oppressed and who have stood up to transform the system: it honors not those oppressed, but the oppressed who have chosen to fight.

To understand this, however, Ciccariello-Maher presents a very sophisticated understanding of the Venezuelan “process”: “the goal here is to avoid the twin dangers that plague contemporary discussions of revolutionary change in Latin America in particular: the tendency to fetishize the state, official power, and its institutions, and the opposing tendency to fetishize antipower.”

Ciccariello-Maher tells the story—actually, it’s many stories—of people’s struggles against oppression, going back to 1958 and the end of the last dictatorship in Venezuela. He talks about the guerrilla struggle, when people took to the hills and alleys of the cities to fight. While that failed, people learned from those experiences, and then went back into the barrios and reconnected with the people therein, although some continued military operations. They survived tremendous police repression over the years—repression is just limited to dictatorships. He talks of a barrio, 23 de Enero (January 23), on the west side of Caracas, and a center of organizing.

The author talks about the economic devaluation of the bolivar in 1983. The government turned to the International Monetary Fund for relief: “As the macroeconomic crisis deepened, the Venezuelan government would respond in the increasingly strict neoliberal terms of the International Monetary Fund, and with both its capacity and willingness to provide for the population in free fall, the country became a veritable tinderbox of resistance.” And the government responded to this resistance by widespread repression as compared to the targeted repression it had used against the guerrillas. Ultimately, however, “this broad offensive against the masses pushed barrio residents toward the new organizational forms oriented around self-government, the elimination of the drug trade, and armed self-defense … which remains central to the Bolivarian Revolution.”

This gets one to the heart of the Venezuelan revolutionary process as it has developed, the “proceso.” The fact is that the revolutionaries, and probably most activists, do not trust the state, yet they support Chávez. How can that be explained? There is a difference, too, between the present and the future: the distinction between Chávez, as head of state, and the proceso. In the first case, Chávez has won their personal support, although that’s not necessarily true for those around him. However, that trust is not a blank check: the proceso is more important than the individual. So, in other words, when Chávez acts progressively, they support him; when he acts in reactionary manner, they challenge him and the state apparatus in general: the second position “maintains the possibility of moving decisively beyond the president if conditions warrant it.”

Yet in trying to understand the development of the proceso, Ciccariello-Maher disorients the “traditional” story of Chávez and his rise to power: instead of focusing on Chávez’ attempted coup attempt in 1992 and then jumping forward to his election to the presidency in 1998, this account focuses first on the “Caracazo,” an urban uprising centered in Caracas that exploded in February 1989. This was the time, “one of the rare and explosive instance in which the force of the people appears as the decisive actor,” and he argues that 1992 and 1998 grew out of events in 1989. Further, he sees the next crucial moment when the masses of people of Caracas streamed out of their shacks to converge on Miraflores to demand Chávez’ return, overturning the coup attempt, on April 13, 2002.

And because of the support of the people—as I quickly came to understand during a short trip to Venezuela in 2006 that Chávez didn’t have the organization to get these people out to support the president—Chávez not only became more radical himself personally and escalated the proceso, but the proceso was able to withstand the economic sabotage by the elite in late 2002-early 2003 that threatened to undermine all that had been done. And that the proceso has continued to advance to this date.

It is this recognition—that it is el pueblo that is the heart of the revolutionary process, not an elected leader, not even as one as charismatic as Hugo Chavez—that makes Ciccariello-Maher’s account so important. And this is a tremendously inspiring account, which became even more important upon the death of Chávez in March 2013: by understanding the role of the mobilized people in the proceso, one would know that the proceso was not dependent on Chávez and would continue, although obviously whoever succeed Chávez would propel or hinder the process.

There is a limitation that must be commented upon: despite the excellent account developed by the author, and it seems to be fairly applicable throughout many of the barrios surrounding Caracas, there is simply no way to tell how widespread this phenomena is across the country. That might be considered “small potatoes” by some, but Venezuela is more than just Caracas, the capital, although it is the largest urban concentration. Are these projects, so well explicated by Ciccariello-Maher, common throughout the rest of the country, and especially in other major cities?

It is important to raise this issue, as the opposition in Venezuela has opposed and challenged “Chavismo,” the ideology officially established by Hugo Chávez, sometimes more effectively and sometimes less, but still fairly consistently. This opposition is led by members of the elites, but it extends at least somewhat into the higher echelons of the military, and it certainly includes students who have stayed within the traditional, private higher educational system—and as the government has not been able to overcome crime, or the subversion of commercial interests who often limited goods on shelves in the stores, it has won some support among working people and the poor. Additionally, we know the US Government has long acted to support the opposition, giving them much more power and potential than could be won on their own.

One of the things learned by Chávez and his allies is the need to use the state apparatus to devolve power downward into the masses. The project of communal councils and support for radical trade unionism—training “ordinary” people to make decisions and take power over their collective lives—is an extension of the proceso. Based on what’s been done previously, it is what gives me hope that the opposition can be kept to the margins, and the Eagle from landing in Venezuela.

My Imaginary GF posted:

Venezuela would be even worse than it is now?

I can't see PSUV handing over power peacefully. I can, however, see a civil war occuring as PSUV attempts to retain power despite popular opinion being against them due to the continual decline of economic opportunity in Venezuela. If Maduro isn't responsible for anything, maybe a responsible leader should take charge in Venezuela.

quote:

Third world countries need to unite and fight against first world injustices, disrespect for international law, discrimination and wars. The third world countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America should form an alliance in order to “end imperialist domination,” according to the Venezuelan vice-president, Jorge Arreaza. Arreaza made the proposal for a third world alliance during a speech at the Asia-Africa Summit in Indonesia Saturday. Speaking as a special Latin American representative, Arreasa told the audience that the alliance was necessary to overthrow imperialism and end the unipolar system imposed on southern nations throughout the years.

“The alliance between Asia, Africa and Latin America today is not only necessary, it is indispensable,” said Arreaza. “From the South, we will determine, freely, the future of the world for the people.” The vice president also reminded the audience that former Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez also advocated strongly for a need for the three continents to unite in order to fight against harmful western policies and forms of control. “Today is not, as then, simply about not being aligned with power and a sphere of influence. Today, the challenge is much greater... That is, to not be aligned with injustice, ... and to fight against wars, disrespect for international law, and to fight against colonialism in all its forms, combat hunger, to not be aligned with discrimination nor domination in all its forms,” said Arreaza. As an example of third world unity, Arreaza reiterated Venezuela's solidarity with Palestine, which has experienced significant oppression under Israel's expansionist policies.

Borneo Jimmy posted:

Here's another reason why so many in the global North are looking for a violent reversal of the Bolivarian Revolution
http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Venezuela-Calls-for-Third-World-Alliance-20150425-0010.html

Wikipedia, Economy of Venezuela posted:

Buoyed by a strong oil sector in the 1960s and 1970s,Venezuela's governments were able to maintain social harmony by spending fairly large amounts on public programs including health care, education, transport, and food subsidies. Literacy and welfare programs benefited tremendously from these conditions.[29] Because of the oil wealth, Venezuelan workers "enjoyed the highest wages in Latin America."[30] This situation was reversed when oil prices collapsed during the 1980s. The economy contracted, and the number of people living in poverty rose from 36% in 1984 to 66% in 1995.[31] The country suffered a severe banking crisis (Venezuelan banking crisis of 1994).

When world oil prices collapsed in the 1980s, the economy contracted and inflation levels (consumer price inflation) rose, remaining between 6 and 12% from 1982 to 1986.[32][33] In the late 80s and early 90s inflation rose to around 30 - 40% annually, with a 1989 peak of 84%.[33] The mid-1990s saw annual rates of 50-60% (1993 to 1997) with an exceptional peak in 1996 at 99.88%.[33] Subsequently inflation then remained in a range of around 15% to 30% until the end of Hugo Chávez's presidency.[33]

By 1998, the economic crisis had grown even worse. Per capita GDP was at the same level as 1963 (after adjusting 1963 dollar to 1998 value), down a third from its 1978 peak; and the purchasing power of the average salary was a third of its 1978 level.[34]

Borneo Jimmy posted:

Today is not, as then, simply about not being aligned with power and a sphere of influence. Today, the challenge is much greater... That is, to not be aligned with injustice, ... and to fight against wars, disrespect for international law, and to fight against colonialism in all its forms, combat hunger, to not be aligned with discrimination nor domination in all its forms

M. Discordia posted:

Truly we have to listen to the mass voice of the Venezuelan people, and that is why the 78% of Venezuelans who currently want Maduro out of office are all fascist CIA plants.

Helsing posted:

The Chavezista's have been in power for a long time so obviously they have no excuses for not doing more to reduce the country's dependency on oil but if this information is accurate then it seems to suggest that the PSUV are just the latest in a long string of incompetent economic managers rather than the party that single handedly derailed the economy. If anyone with more knowledge of the history of Venezuela's economy can comment on what the economy / economic policies of the 1980s and 1990s was I'd really appreciate it.

El Hefe posted:

Imagine if he had succeeded with the 1992 coup

Borneo Jimmy posted:

Many are dissatisfied with the current situation but that doesnt mean they want a reversal of the Bolivarian revolution and for the right wing oligarchs to return to power.

Chuck Boone posted:

I unfortunately don't know enough about economics to answer your question, but I think the situation on the ground today supports your idea that the PSUV has turned out to be just another failure in a long list of failures. There's no denying that the Venezuelan economy was in trouble when Chavez took office, but the fact that the country is suffering as much as it is today (with widespread scarcity of basic food staples and medicine) after a decade of some of the highest oil prices we've ever seen is only evidence that the country's wealth has, once again, been grossly mismanaged.

To get an idea of the situation the country faced through the 1990s, all you have to do is remember that Chavez easily won the 1998 election. Think about that for a moment: something like 56% of Venezuelans thought that the man who headed a violent coup attempt against the government seven years earlier was a better choice to run the country than any of the other candidates. Desperate times call for desperate measures, and the times were desperate. I'm lucky to say that I didn't miss any meals growing up, but what forced my family to leave the country in '97 was that, as my father put it, "My salary was buying less and less food each day".

Ardennes posted:

I think most people want economic stability and a predictable standard of life. I don't know how many Venezuelans really support the Bolivarian revolution any more, but at the same time, I don't think everyone wants what social programs and subsidies that didn't exist before 1998 to disappear either.

Ultimately the question is where the opposition is going to if they win at this point. Will they go a moderate course or will the boot be back on the other foot? Will the government change but the situation still fluctuate with oil prices as it has for decades? I disagree that if you simply getting rid of the PSUV that everything would necessarily be fixed with Venezuela, especially since new government isn't going to be able to control the price of oil either.

An example of this is the currency under a new government. If they went with dollarization, it has its own drawbacks especially if the government doesn't hold dollars itself. (Argentina got into a similar issue when it pegged the Peso.) If a country doesn't have dollars and doesn't control its own currency, it has to borrow them. Venezuela with its a poor credit rating would likely have to go to the IMF and then you another series of issues. (I am guessing Venezuela's credit rating probably wasn't great in the 1990s either).

As for hypothetical history, if Chavez won and then was kicked out, there is always the possibility that in 2008 or 2014/2015 there could have been another change in power as the new government faced the same issues. Ultimately at the heart of the matter is the lack of diversity in Venezuela's economy, and that is something that a lot of other countries are struggling with

Helsing posted:

It seems like the problem facing the opposition is that there isn't really a liberal economic solution to what's happening in Venezuela that doesn't involve imposing a lot of economic pain to bring down inflation and return the government to fiscal solvency. It's not for nothing that MIGF talks about the need for a military coup: the kind of neoliberal reforms that other countries have used to try and escape a situation like this one are often too painful to be imposed democratically.

I wish it was realistic to say that Venezuela could always try to chart a new economic course but it's hard to imagine what that would actually look like given the condition the country is in right now. The time to experiment was probably in the midst of the oil boom, not afterwards.

Helsing posted:

It's a really tragic situation because all of that oil wealth should be a guarantee of prosperity, but not for the first time I guess we're seeing how possessing an extremely valuable commodity can create real economic and political head aches.

Ardennes posted:

I think most people want economic stability and a predictable standard of life. I don't know how many Venezuelans really support the Bolivarian revolution any more, but at the same time, I don't think everyone wants what social programs and subsidies that didn't exist before 1998 to disappear either.

Chuck Boone posted:

PDVSA just released some figures for last year, including a 4.4% drop in earnings from 2013. PDVSA also says that its profits dropped from $15.835 billion in 2013 to $9.074 billion in 2014.

I don't believe that PDVSA has posted revenue information, so Reuters has a nifty calculator that lets you figure it out for yourself. Reuters figures free/subsidized oil deals with China and the Caribbean region cost the country somewhere around $24.21 billion in 2014 alone.

quote:

To give you a recent example, the Ministry of Health announced a day or two ago that it was unveiling a medical registry program called SIAMED. The program is supposed to be an answer to the chronic scarcity of medicine the country is suffering from. The program will work by having people register with the pharmacy closest to their home. They will tell the pharmacy what medicine they need, and the system will send them a text message when the medicine arrives at the pharmacy. The head of the Venezuelan Pharmaceutical Association said yesterday that he wasn't opposed to the system, but that it would do absolutely nothing to alleviate the scarcity crisis, since the industry owes $4 billion to foreign suppliers and continues to have problems acquiring dollars.

In other words, SIAMED is a textbook case of the PSUV mentality when it comes to tackling the crisis: that is to say, you don't tackle it, but instead create a new system that does nothing to address the root causes of the issue, give it a fancy name, blame the private sector for waging an economic war against the people, and call it a day.

Years of toxic rhetoric towards the opposition (terrorists, enemies of the state, greedy oligarchs, murderers) have made it impossible for the PSUV to move anywhere but in the wrong direction on virtually every issue.

Ardennes posted:

Ultimately, the issue is down to money, but like I said above it is unclear if the oil that Venezuela is sending abroad is simply vanishing or that there are other obligations that are attached if not indirectly. This is a situation that wouldn't be helped by dollarization to be clear since it is simply a matter of reserves at this point, the only way to acquire dollars to buy them and you need something to buy them with.

Chuck Boone posted:

Like you've said (I think) and like Helsing has pointed out, it's an incredibly complex situation with no clear solution. It's all the more unfortunate because the people in power now seem to be completely incapable (and perhaps unwilling) of working towards a meaningful, lasting solution.

Adventure Pigeon posted:

One thing I've been wondering, we hear a lot about how Venezuela and Caracas are unsafe, but are there any areas of the country that are still reasonably safe and well run?

Ardennes posted:

I think part of it is that the PSUV seems to like fighting the wrong battles. I don't know if this is out of stubbornness or intellectual laziness but they really need to take a second look at their import subsidy system and at how PDVSA operates. It doesn't have to involve giving up ideologically on the idea of socialism, but I guess if they their leadership thinks if they step back from one policy it is going to be a domino effect that will end them. Ultimately, you can't be that rigid in crisis, and if thing they are emboldening their worst fears.

Borneo Jimmy posted:

lol people in this thread are actually advocating forcing disaster capitalism and economic shock therapy on Venezuela. If anything justifies the armed revolutionary collectives it's this.

Chuck Boone posted:

One of the problems with where Venezuela is today/where it is headed is that Maduro and the PSUV are so far gone that their answer to the crisis is always to "radicalize the revolution" (whatever that means). Back in December when things were looking really gloomy and Maduro started to hint about economic announcements, there were hopes that he might take steps to ease restrictions to the access to foreign currency, for example, to help private industry import goods into the country. Then, as has been the case a few more times since, Maduro said, "No". To Maduro, the answer cannot be anything but a deepening of the policies that led to this situation in the first place. Anything less than another step towards a more "radical" Bolivarianism would mean admitting that he/Chavez were wrong. He's been saying recently that he's going to unveil his new "economic plan" on May 1, and there is no way that it's going to be anything but the kind of thing that doesn't help.

To give you a recent example, the Ministry of Health announced a day or two ago that it was unveiling a medical registry program called SIAMED. The program is supposed to be an answer to the chronic scarcity of medicine the country is suffering from. The program will work by having people register with the pharmacy closest to their home. They will tell the pharmacy what medicine they need, and the system will send them a text message when the medicine arrives at the pharmacy. The head of the Venezuelan Pharmaceutical Association said yesterday that he wasn't opposed to the system, but that it would do absolutely nothing to alleviate the scarcity crisis, since the industry owes $4 billion to foreign suppliers and continues to have problems acquiring dollars.

In other words, SIAMED is a textbook case of the PSUV mentality when it comes to tackling the crisis: that is to say, you don't tackle it, but instead create a new system that does nothing to address the root causes of the issue, give it a fancy name, blame the private sector for waging an economic war against the people, and call it a day.

Years of toxic rhetoric towards the opposition (terrorists, enemies of the state, greedy oligarchs, murderers) have made it impossible for the PSUV to move anywhere but in the wrong direction on virtually every issue.

Borneo Jimmy posted:

lol people in this thread are actually advocating forcing disaster capitalism and economic shock therapy on Venezuela. If anything justifies the armed revolutionary collectives it's this.