Venezuela: The Chávez Era

The Chávez Era

Venezuela's economy sagged and its budget deficit grew as oil prices fell again in the late 1990s. Relations with Colombia, long strained over control of offshore oil reserves and the illegal movement of many Colombians into Venezuela to work, deteriorated in the 1990s as Venezuela claimed that Colombian guerrillas were trafficking drugs and arms across the border. In 1999, Hugo Chávez Frías, a former army colonel who had participated in a failed coup attempt against Pérez, became president after running as an independent. He called for a halt to privatization of state assets and approved a law enabling him to rule by decree in economic matters for six months. He also cut Venezuela's oil production to force up prices, and pushed for other OPEC members to do the same.

A referendum in Apr., 1999, called for a national constituent assembly to draft a new constitution; the assembly was elected in July and convened a month later. The assembly and Chávez engaged in a contest for power with the congress and judiciary; the assembly declared a national emergency and stripped the congress of its powers. A constitution establishing a strong president with a six-year term in office and the ability to run for immediate reelection and a unicameral National Assembly was approved in referendum in December; the new constitution also reduced civilian control of the military and increased the government's control of the economy. In the same month Venezuela experienced its worst natural disaster of the century, as torrential rains caused huge, devastating mudslides along the Caribbean coast; perhaps as many as 5,000 people were killed.

The disaster slowed plans for new elections, but the congress was replaced with a 21-member interim council. In July, 2000, Chávez won election to the presidency under the new constitution; his coalition, the Political Pole, won 99 of the 165 seats in the assembly, short of the two-thirds majority needed to rule without constraints. Chávez won approval from the assembly to legislate by decree, and won passage of a Dec., 2000, referendum that ousted Venezuela's labor leaders, a move denounced by the International Labor Organization. Chávez also revived the dormant boundary dispute with Guyana, declaring that a satellite-launching facility being built by an American company in the territory claimed by Venezuela was a cover for a U.S. military presence.

In 2001, Chávez became somewhat more unpopular with the increasingly polarized Venezuelan people, although he still retained significant support among the lower classes. His attempts to assert control over the state oil company led to strikes and demonstrations in early 2002, and in April he was briefly ousted in a coup attempt. Latin American nations refused, however, to recognize a self-proclaimed interim government under business executive Pedro Carmona Estanga, and poorer Venezuelans mounted counter-demonstrations in his support. Chávez was restored to office and called for reconciliation; a subsequent cabinet shakeup gave his government a less ideological cast.

The ongoing political turmoil, which led to a prolonged, polarizing antigovernment strike in the vital oil industry (Dec., 2002–Feb., 2003), sent the country into recession and reduced oil exports. Although Chávez outlasted his striking opponents, the crisis further eroded public support for his government. An agreement between the two sides, negotiated by the Organization of American States in May, 2003, called for an end to violence and a referendum on Chávez's presidency later in the year. An opposition petition calling for a referendum on Chávez was rejected in September, however, because of procedural errors.

A new petition for a recall referendum was presented in December, but so many of the signatures were rejected by the electoral commission that the petition was unsuccessful. Negotiations ultimately led to a compromise in which the opposition was allowed three days in May, 2004, to reaffirm disputed signatures, and the petition was validated. Also in May, a number of civilians and military officers were arrested on charges of plotting a coup against Chávez. In the referendum, held in August, 58% voted to retain Chávez, and despite opposition denunciations of the result, foreign observers strongly endorsed it. Several opposition leaders were later charged (July, 2005) with conspiring to undermine Venezuela's government because their organization, Súmate, which played a major role in the petition drive, had received U.S. funds that were alleged to have been used to fund the referendum effort.

In Jan., 2005, the president signed a decree establishing a national land commission that would begin the process of breaking up the country's large estates and redistributing the land. During the same month relations with Colombia were tense after a Colombian rebel in Venezuela was kidnapped (Dec., 2004) by bounty hunters and turned over to Colombia authorities, but the dispute was resolved by the time both nations' presidents met in Caracas in February. National assembly elections in Dec., 2005, resulted in a sweep for parties supporting the president, but only a quarter of the electorate voted. Most opposition candidates withdrew from the contest before the vote in protest against what they said were biases and flaws in the electoral process, ceding complete control of the legislature to Chávez.

Chávez used Venezuela's increased oil revenues to fund social programs, to create a large military reserve and expanded militia, and to establish programs designed to reduce the effects of high energy prices on Caribbean nations. Chávez also publicly accused the United States of planning an invasion to overthrow him, while U.S. officials accused him of supporting antidemocratic forces in Bolivia, Colombia, and Ecuador. His public support, in 2006, for one candidate in the Peruvian presidential race and criticisms of the ultimate winner, Alan García, led Peru to recall its ambassador. Venezuela was admitted to full membership in Mercosur in mid-2006 (ratifed in 2012); at the same time it withdrew from the Andean Community, whose members included Peru and Colombia.

Chávez was handily reelected in Dec., 2006, benefiting from an economic boom due to high petroleum prices and from the social programs he had instituted for the poor, but the strong win masked the continuing polarization of Venezuelan society along class lines, with the poorer classes overwhelmingly favoring the president. At the same time, however, inflation was increasing, and it continued to grow thoughout 2007 and 2008. Proclaiming “socialism or death” at his inauguration (Jan., 2007), Chávez moved to nationalize all energy and power companies and the country's largest telecommunications firm. He also moved to consolidate some two dozen parties supporting him into a unified socialist party, which was only partially successful, and secured the right to rule by decree for 18 months. Chávez subsequently won passage of constitutional amendments that would have ended presidential term limits, increased the length of the president's term, and enhanced the president's powers generally, but the changes failed (Dec., 2007) to win the voters' approval.

After a Colombian raid (Mar., 2008) against rebels based in Ecuador there were several days of tensions between Colombia and neighboring Ecuador and Venezuela, who mobilized forces to their borders. Colombia said computer files seized in the raid had evidence of ties between the rebels and Chávez's government. Though Venezuela denied that, Chávez, who had succeeded in winning the release of several hostages held by the rebels, expressed public sympathy for the Colombian rebel leader killed in the raid. (The head of the Organization of American States said the following month that no government had presented it with evidence of ties between Venezuela and any terrorist group.) From mid-2009 relations with Colombia were again strained by Colombian accusations of Venezuela support for Colombian rebels, prompted in part by the capture from the rebels of weapons purchased by Venezuela from Sweden; Venezuela alleged that Colombia's allowing U.S. forces to use Colombian bases against drug traffickers was a belligerent move by the United States. In Nov., 2009, Chávez ordered 15,000 troops to the Colombian border; the following month he accused the United States of violating Venezuelan airspace from the Netherlands Antilles, where U.S. antidrug operations are based.

In Apr., 2008, Chávez ordered the nationalization of the cement industry and of Venezuela's largest steelmaker; additional companies and industries, perhaps most notably financial institutions, were nationalized into 2010. As his right to rule by decree expired at the end of July, 2008, Chávez signed a number of decrees that mirrored many of the constitutional amendments that voters had rejected at the end of 2007, and in Jan., 2009, he secured legislative passage of a constitutional amendment that would end term limits for all elected officials. A referendum approved the amendment in Feb., 2009.

Meanwhile, in Nov., 2008, Chávez's allies again won a majority of the posts in local and regional elections, but the opposition increased the number of posts it held and won the Caracas mayorlty. Subsequent government moves stripped significant powers from posts that opposition candidates won, further concentrating power in central government hands, and the government launched corruption investigations or other cases against a number of leading opposition figures and critics. By late 2009, drought and increasing energy demands had led to such low water levels behind the Guri Dam that industrial cutbacks and other rationing measures, including rolling blackouts in 2010, were instituted. In Feb., 2010, the government declared an electricity emergency and imposed stricter rationing.

The National Assembly elections in September were won by Chávez's party, but the opposition, which did not boycott the elections, made significant gains, winning 47% of the vote and nearly 40% of the seats and denying the ruling party a constitutionally significant two-thirds majority. In Dec., 2010, there was significant flooding in states along the central and W Caribbean coast, and flood recovery and reconstruction was the pretext for Chávez's seeking legislation to rule by decree. Decried by his critics as an attempt to circumvent the incoming National Assembly, the law gave him decree powers for 18 months in many areas, such as banking and defense, not related to reconstruction. In Mar., 2011, the government adopted rules authorizing the military to arm the nation's militias, a progovernment force made up of militant Chávez supporters; they had previously not been issued firearms.

Chávez was again reelected in Oct., 2012, after having been treated for cancer and declaring himself fully recovered; his margin of victory was much less than in 2006. Subsequently, however, the president was again treated for cancer. This time, complications kept him in a Cuban hospital and led to the postponing of his Jan., 2013, inauguration. In Dec., 2012, Chávez's party made gains in the governors elections. Chávez died in Mar., 2013, after returning to Venezuela; Nicolás Maduro Moros, his vice president, became interim president.

In the April presidential election Maduro was elected, but he only narrowly defeated opposition candidate Henrique Capriles Radonski, a state governor who had lost to Chávez in 2012 by more than 10%. Capriles called for a recount, but a more limited audit was conducted. There was some postelection violence, and Maduro accused Capriles of attempting a coup. In June, 2013, the Venezuela government said it had foiled a Colombian-based attempt to assassinate Maduro. Maduro had previously accused former Colombian president Uribe of plotting to kill him, and his subsequent tenure was marked by recurring charges of assassination plots by various opponents.

A couple significant power blackouts affected Venezuela's electrical grid in late 2013. The government blamed the blackouts on sabotage, and in October expelled several U.S. diplomats it accused of being involved in one blackout, but no concrete evidence of sabotage was presented by the government. Maduro received the power to rule by decree for 12 months in November, which he said was necessary to fight corruption and regulate the economy; inflation rate meanwhile increased to above 50% in 2013 despite government price controls and remained high during 2014, when the country entered a recession. The country also suffered economically from the 2014 oil price collapse, and its economic troubles continued into 2015.

Antigovernment demonstrations surged beginning in Feb., 2014, after students protested alleged police indifference to an attempted sexual assault; weeks of protests were marked by clashes with security forces and attacks by armed militants loyal to government. A number of opposition leaders, mainly from more hardline groups, were arrested in February and March, and three air force generals were arrested in March on charges of plotting an uprising. Denunciations of opposition plots against the president and arrests and charges against political opponents continued into 2015. Maduro also faced criticism beginning in 2014 from prominent leftists who had been supporters of Chávez.

After the United States imposed sanctions against Venezuelan officials for alleged human-rights violations in early 2015, Maduro sought and was given the power to govern by decree during 2015. He subsequently revived the boundary dispute with Guyana, over oil exploration offshore of Guyanaese territory. A Venezuelan crackdown against Colombian migrants and smugglers in Aug.–Sept., 2015, led thousands to flee to Colombia and created tense relations between the two nations. The opposition won the National Assembly elections of Dec., 2015, in a landslide, narrowly winning a two-thirds majority, but a handful of its victories were subsequently challenged in court by the ruling party. The Maduro government subsequently packed the supreme court with sympathetic judges and limited the National Assembly's powers over the central bank; the court subsequently aligned itself with Maduro in disputes with the National Assembly.

In Jan., 2016, Maduro declared an economic emergency, allowing him to rule by edict for two months; it was extended in March and again in May, when he also declared a “state of exception,” greatly increasing his powers. None of the decrees were approved by the assembly, but they were nonetheless allowed by the court. The opposition continued with its attempts to recall the president as economic conditions in the country further deteriorated, leading to widespread food shortages and looting of food markets. There were also electricity shortfalls for several months in the first half of 2016, linked (as in 2009) to issues with the Guri Dam. Maduro used the electoral council to delay a recall referendum, first postponing a possible vote until 2017 and then suspending the recall drive and delaying state governor elections. The supreme court overturned laws passed by the National Assembly and allowed Maduro to rule without legislative approval, as the opposition meanwhile mounted several mass protests against Maduro.

In Dec., 2016, the country was suspended from Mercosur for failing to align its national laws with the organization's key trade and human rights rules and accords; the suspension became indefinite in Aug., 2017. By Dec., 2016, Venezuela was experiencing hyperinflation and in Jan., 2017, it introduced large-denomination banknotes. An attempted withdrawal in the previous month of the then-largest denomination banknote had sparked protests and riots. In Mar., 2017, the supreme court declared that the National Assembly was in contempt and that it would legislate instead. Widespread national and international criticism forced Maduro and the court to reverse parts of the antidemocratic ruling, but both the president and the court continued to work together to rule without the opposition-controlled legislature. The move also sparked recurring demonstrations that continued for weeks.

In May, Maduro called for a constitutional assembly, to be elected by social organizations and municipal governments more supportive of the ruling party than the population; the new National Constituent Assembly was seen as a way of invalidating the freely elected National Assembly. The July election for the constituent assembly was boycotted by the opposition, but the government claimed victory and a 40% turnout; the voting system company said turnout figures had been tampered with. The new assembly dismissed (August) the Socialist attorney general, who had become a vocal critic of Maduro and said she would investigate the July election results. It also claimed sole power to pass laws. The election of the new assembly also led to crippling new financial sanctions on the government by the United States.

In the Oct., 2017, gubernatorial elections, Maduro's party secured the vast majority of the posts despite his unpopularity; the opposition claimed fraud, and there was evidence of some unfairness in the voting process, but abstention by opposition voters also was a factor. In May, 2018, Maduro won reelection in a contest largely boycotted by the opposition, which denounced it as rigged. In Aug., 2018, Maduro was the target of an apparent assassination attempt. The country's hyperinflation led to the introduction of a new, revalued currency, an increase in the minimum wage, and a cut in fuel subsidies, beginning in August.

When Maduro took office in Jan., 2019, the National Assembly declared his government illegitimate, and then recognized Juan Guaidó, the president of the National Assembly, as interim president. Many American and European nations recognized Guaidó as the country's leader, and a number of them imposed new sanctions on Maduro's government; the United States in particular increased the severity of its sanctions as time progressed. Those moves and large demonstrations in favor of Guaidó failed to dislodge Maduro, who retained the support of Russia and China. In March two electrical blackouts left large areas of the country without power for days at a time; a massive blackout also occurred in July.

In Jan., 2020, Maduro allies sought to elect a new National Assembly speaker, Luis Parra, a former Guaidó ally, by preventing most legislators from entering the assembly building; Guaidó was reelected by the majority in another location. Maduro and other high-ranking government officials were charged with narcoterrorism and other crimes by the United States in Mar., 2020. The United Nations estimates that some 4.6 million Venezuelans have left the country since 2015 due primarily to economic conditions (the economy having contracted more than 60% since 2013); most went to Colombia, Peru, and Ecuador.

An attempt to kidnap Maduro in May, 2020, was foiled by Venezuelan security forces; organized by a U.S. veteran, it had originally been planned in conjunction with two of Guaidó's advisers, who later withdrew. In June and July, the supreme court ordered the takeover of several major opposition parties, including Guaidó's. Those moves and the reorganization of the national election council were denounced as designed to frustrate opposition candidates in the 2020 National Assembly elections. Opposition parties boycotted (December) those elections, in which the Socialists and their allies won more than 90% of the seats. Guaidó's National Assembly voted to extend its term into 2021, but European nations did not recognize that move or Guaidó's continuing as interim president (those nations also did not recognize Maduro and his National Assembly). Maduro abolished the constituent assembly prior to the Socialist-dominated National Assembly's opening.

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