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The Political Communication of Hugo Chávez: the Evolution of Aló Presidente

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The Political Communication of Hugo Chávez: the Evolution of Aló Presidente Kent Academic Repository Full text document (pdf) Citation for published version Constantini, Sunthai (2014) The Political Communication of Hugo Chávez: The Evolution of Aló Presidente. Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) thesis, University of Kent,. DOI Link to record in KAR https://kar.kent.ac.uk/48023/ Document Version UNSPECIFIED Copyright & reuse Content in the Kent Academic Repository is made available for research purposes. Unless otherwise stated all content is protected by copyright and in the absence of an open licence (eg Creative Commons), permissions for further reuse of content should be sought from the publisher, author or other copyright holder. Versions of research The version in the Kent Academic Repository may differ from the final published version. Users are advised to check http://kar.kent.ac.uk for the status of the paper. Users should always cite the published version of record. Enquiries For any further enquiries regarding the licence status of this document, please contact: [email protected] If you believe this document infringes copyright then please contact the KAR admin team with the take-down information provided at http://kar.kent.ac.uk/contact.html THE POLITICAL COMMUNICATION OF HUGO CHçVEZ: THE EVOLUTION OF ALî PRESIDENTE BY SUNTHAI CONSTANTINI THESIS Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Kent September 2014 (Word count: 95,320) Sunthai Constantini [Company Name] 2 Abstract Al Presidente was a weekly television programme anchored and produced by Hugo Chvez during his presidency in Venezuela. The show, a version of a phone-in, was broadcast live on national television at 11am on Sundays and lasted on average six hours. It followed the presidential agenda to a new location every week, where Hugo Chvez would inaugurate factories, read Latin American poetry, interview Fidel Castro, and sing llanero songs. This thesis investigates the role that Al Presidente played in the making of the “Bolivarian Revolution”, Hugo Chvez’s political project. Through a critical reading of the transcripts of the show, it explores the 378 episodes, or 1656 hours, that aired between 1999 and 2012. Al Presidente was the cornerstone of Chvez’s political communication, replacing press conferences and interviews. Chvez was known for his continuous presence on radio and television and his daily presidential addresses. However, only on the Sunday show could the audience phone the president and share their ideas, emotions and everyday life concerns. This thesis reviews the narratives that underlined the relationship between the audience/electorate and the host/president on Al Presidente. It is argued that Al Presidente played a fundamental role in articulating the identity of a public that shared the values and ideas of Chvez’s hegemonic project. Moreover, it is argued that the show Al Presidente and the ideological process called the “Bolivarian Revolution” can be read as two co-related arms of a same project, and that they informed and defined each other throughout Chvez’s presidency. In this context, this thesis assesses the evolution of the programme in light of the political events taking place in Venezuela during that time. Al Presidente is thus seen as a repository, or “black box”, of the discourses that articulated the Bolivarian identity and constructed the legitimacy of Hugo Chvez as the leader of a populist movement in Venezuela. Finally, the core of this thesis is that the co-relation between the show and the hegemonic project evolved over time to strengthen the authoritarian tendencies of Hugo Chvez’s regime. Following the activities of Al Presidente over 13 years, the investigation charts that evolution in three different stages: 1) participation, 2) education, and 3) obedience, arguing that what started as a seemingly participatory space, progressively became a platform that presented Hugo Chvez’s figure as the ideologue of a populist movement, and ultimately secured his position as the indisputable leader and sole authority of Venezuela’s “Bolivarian Revolution”. 3 Table of Contents Chapter 1: Introduction ............................................................................................................... 9 Chapter 2: The Production and Genre of Aló Presidente ...............................................30 Introducing Aló Presidente ................................................................................................................................... 30 The Genre of Aló Presidente ................................................................................................................................. 38 Aló Presidente as a Talk ShoW Hybrid.............................................................................................................. 46 Conclusion..................................................................................................................................................................... 58 Chapter 3: The Role of Television: Discourse, Identity and Public Formation .......62 Discourse, Subjectivity and Group Formation .............................................................................................. 63 Television, Everyday Life and Identity............................................................................................................. 76 Conclusion..................................................................................................................................................................... 90 Chapter 4: Designing the Analysis: Research Methods ...................................................92 Chapter 5: Aló Presidente 1999­2002: Articulating Participation........................... 105 Historical Context: From Representative to Participatory Democracy............................................108 Defining Participation............................................................................................................................................124 Conclusion...................................................................................................................................................................141 Chapter 6: Aló Presidente 2002­2007: Educating the Public in the Face of Opposition................................................................................................................................... 142 The Political Context of the Middle Years .....................................................................................................143 Policymaking and Public Support: the Misiones........................................................................................150 Constructing the Bolivarian Identity...............................................................................................................154 The Socialist Turn....................................................................................................................................................171 Conclusion...................................................................................................................................................................177 Chapter 7: Aló Presidente 2006­2012: Demanding Obedience................................. 179 The Bolivarian Revolution and Socialism of the 21st century...............................................................180 Reducing Pluralism .................................................................................................................................................193 From Centralisation to Legitimacy...................................................................................................................201 Conclusion...................................................................................................................................................................212 Chapter 8: Conclusion.............................................................................................................. 214 Appendices.................................................................................................................................. 254 Appendix 1: List of Interviews ........................................................................................................254 Appendix 2: The Venezuelan Political Landscape: a Brief Timeline of Historical Events ...................................................................................................................................................................256 4 List of Tables Figure 1- Evolution of audience phone calls in Al PresidenteÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉÉ.107 Figure 2- Comparative chart of participation and episode duration between Episodes 1 and 40 on Al Presidente......................................................................................................127 5 Acknowledgements Not one argument, sentence, or even footnote of this thesis would have been possible without the incredible number of people that participated to the process with their impressions, ideas and support. Every conference, interview, train ride and pub conversation has contributed to these pages, constantly reinventing my universe and shedding light onto the work. To all the people who generously shared their time with a curious stranger: thank you. I am grateful to my supervisors Suzanne Franks, Ruth Blakeley and Geoffrey Craig for their guidance, patience and unwavering faith in this project. Their encouragements and kind
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