Venezuela's Political Party System on the Eve of National Elections

No. 44 by Howard Handelman Venezuela's Political Party South America [HH-3-'781 System on the Eve of National Elections On January 23,1978, Venezuelan parties and popular mobilization had a range of activities and to meet President Carlos Andres Perez not existed prior to the 1930s. When demands from competing sectors of opened the doors of Miraflores, the President Betancourt took office in society in a manner that other Latin nation's presidential palace, to the 1958, then, democratic institutions American governments cannot public. Throughout the day, for expressing popular will had afford. While relative affluence is no thousands of housewives, scarcely been established. guarantor of democracy, businessmen, workers, and Venezuela's economic growth has shantytown-dwellers poured In December of this year the nation been supplemented by the through the building's ornate halls. will hold its fifth democratic national development of popular democratic "Today," proclaimed the election since 1958, for the institutions. government's television and press presidency and both houses of advertisements, "Miraflores belongs Congress. Shortly thereafter, Yet, it is well to remember that to the people." The President's President Perez will become the Venezuelan democracy is still open house marked the twentieth fourth consecutive Venezuelan chief young. As the January 23 anniversary of a critical date in executive to serve out his anniversary approached, movie modern Venezuelan history, the constitutional five-year term and theaters in Caracas showed brief abdication of the nation's dictator, peacefully hand over power to his news documentaries on the 1958 General Marcos Perez Jimenez, and successor.2 Moreover, unlike many popular uprising. Television and the birth of contemporary (other developing nations where other news media featured Venezuelan democracy. In the days apparently democratic elections are advertisements contrasting the preceding Perez Jimenez's fall, merely a charade or a competition nation's long history of dictatorship thousands of Caracas citizens had between nonrepresentative elites, to its recent democratic stability. taken to the streets in a political parties in Venezuela are These government-sponsoredads spontaneous uprising against the fairly responsive to popular interests ended with a single message, dictatorship. They were soon joined and demands. On two occasions "Democracy, the only path" by much of the Armed Forces. In (1968 and 19731, presidential ("Democracia, el unico camino"). December 1958, after a brief interim authority had passed from one News programs on the government government, Romulo Betancourt political party to another without television stations (two of Caracas' was elected to a five-year trauma. While military governments four channels) are often followed by presidential term. seized power throughout the the statement "only in a democratic hemisphere and crushed society is such a show possible." Few would have predicted in 1958 long-standing democracies in Chile The government seems to be that Venezuela would emerge in the and Uruguay, Venezuela has thus reassuring both its constituents and coming years as the foremost developed during the past 15 years itself that current political symbol of democracy in Latin from an entrenched military regime institutions are viable. One is ~merica?Until the overthrow of to South America's most stable reminded of a patient taking the first Perez Jimenez, the country had democracy. steps after a long illness. Even when been ruled almost continuously by a the walk is no longer wobbly, a series of military dictators and Undoubtedly the country's task has certain sense of insecurity remains. caudillos (strong men). Indeed, only been eased by its extensive during three years of its history petroleum wealth. Substantial tax As an alternative development (1945-1948) had the nation ever revenues from the recently model to the bureaucratic- enjoyed a popularly elected, civilian nationalized oil industry have authoritarian regimes now prevalent government. Modern political enabled the government to invest in throughout Latin America, Venezuelan democracy has power of regional strongmen and Marxists of either an orthodox or consequences that transcend its centralize power in the national revisionist type; others were more national borders, suggesting that Armed Forces and bureaucracy. inclined to a nationalist reformism liberal democracy has some future modeled after both the Mexican in the region. Its Social Democratic The initiation of extensive petroleum Revolution and the Peruvian Aprista (Accion Democratica) and Social extraction in 1922, however, set movement. Christian (COPED Parties are loosely social and economic forces in linked, through international motion that were to change the face The death of Juan Vicente Gomez in organizations, to parallel parties in of Venezuelan politics. By 1929, the December 1935 permitted Chile, Costa Rica, the Dominican country had become the world's the return of exiled student activists Republic, and Peru. Even before the leading oil exporter and petroleum and a more tolerant, if Carter administration's efforts, revenues helped finance the first unpredictable, government policy Venezuela had taken the lead in stages of industrialization. As toward popular political supporting human rights and peasants moved to the cities in participation. The Venezuelan democratic elections in Latin search of jobs, a country whose Communist Party, the National America. During the past months it population had been over two-thirds Democratic Party (PDN), and the has dramatically exerted pressure, rural in the 1930s became more than Venezuelan Labor Congress (CTV) independently and through the half urban by 1950. To be sure, became important vehicles for mass Organization of American States regressive government policies mobilization. (OAS), to establish democratic often inhibited development. As late governments in the Dominican as 1945, the country still had only In 1941, the PDN was legalized and Republic and in Nicaragua. seven public secondary schools. reorganized into the Acci6n Despite such policies, urbanization Democratica (AD). Led by Romulo This Report examines the origins of and economic expansion combined Betancourt, one of the generation of contemporary Venezuelan to augment the power of two '28, AD was a direct outgrowth of democracy, the nature of groups that began to play an the underground student-mass democratic governments since important role in the nation's politics movement of the 1930s. In 1937, 1958, the major political and for the first time: the urban middle Betancourt's colleagues had socioeconomic problems still facing class and the industrial-petroleum renounced Marxism to form a the nation, and the position of working class. Through the close of multiclass, populist movement. The Venezuela's major political parties the 1930s, neither group had any hallmark of Acci6n Democr6tica as the country entered its current institutional base-unions, political then, and ever since, has been electoral campaign. A subsequent parties, or interest groups-to vigorous and tireless organization. Report, The Making of a Venezuelan express their political demands. Throughout the country, AD President- 1978, will analyze the Eventually, however, their voices organizers went to the universities, mood of the electorate, the parties' had to be heard. factories, urban middle-class selection of presidential candidates, neighborhoods, and the countryside and the campaign through August The first rumbles of discontent to establish a popular base matched 1978. came, as they so often do in Latin by few other parties in Latin America, from the nation's America. Betancourt's marching The Origins of Venezuela's Modern universities. In 1928, demands for order to the party cadre was "not a Political system3 greater political freedom from single district, not a single From its original colonization by the Venezuelan Central University municipality without its party Spanish through the early twentieth students led to mass ~r~anization."~Student century, Venezuela was demonstrations, clashes with the associations, labor unions, peasant socioeconomically underdeveloped. police, and extensive arrests. federations, and other vertical and Its capital city, Caracas, compared Student leaders who escaped horizontal organizations formed the to such major commercial and imprisonment were forced into base of a party machine that has cultural centers as Lima, Bogota, hiding or exile. Spurred by signs of served AD until today. and Mexico City, was a secondary popular support, others began to colonial center. During the organize the middle class, industrial Four years after Acci6n post-independence era of the workers, and peasantry. From DemocrAtica's foundation, party nineteenth century, continued among these student activists (at leaders conspired with junior warfare between local military chiefs home and in exile) came the leaders, military officers to overthrow the inhibited political development. A known as "the generation of '28," government of General Isaias series of caudillo dictators- Antonio who were to shape Venezuelan Medina Angarita. The October 1945 Guzman Blanco (1870-18881, political development for the next 40 coup was later followed by popular Cipriano Castro (1899-19081, and years. Essentially, they were election of a Constitutional Juan Vicente Gomez (1908-1935)- motivated by two alternative Assembly and, in 1947, the first did little

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