World Perspectives: Venezuela

This is from the World Perspectives Document of the International Marxist Tendency. It was passed a few months ago, and reflects its general outlook.

Over the past decade on more than one occasion the workers could have taken power in Venezuela. The problem is a problem of leadership. Chavez is a very courageous and honest man, but he is proceeding empirically, improvising, making up a programme as he goes along. He is trying to balance between the working class and the bourgeoisie. And that cannot be maintained.

Lenin explained that politics is concentrated economics. Chavez was able to make concessions, reforms, the social missions, etc., for quite along time because of the economic situation. The high price of oil allowed him to do this. But that is finished. The price of oil has fallen dramatically, although it has now recovered a little. Inflation is at about 30%. Therefore there has been a fall in real wages. Many of the welfare schemes are being scaled back and unemployment
is increasing.



Bi-Centennial_celbrations_2There is no doubt that the Venezuelan workers still remain loyal to Chavez, but there is also no doubt whatsoever that many workers, even dedicated Chavistas, are getting impatient. They are asking: what sort of a Revolution is this? What sort of Socialism is this? Are we going to solve these problems or not? The threat of counterrevolution has not disappeared. The counterrevolutionary opposition is preparing a new offensive to win a majority in the National Assembly in 2010. If they succeed, or if they win a sufficiently large number of seats, the way will be open for a new counterrevolutionary offensive.

The most striking fact about the Venezuelan revolution is the inability of the imperialists to intervene directly. In the past, they would have sent in the Marines to overthrow Chavez. But they have been unable to intervene directly.

In the same way, British imperialism was compelled to relinquish direct military-bureaucratic control of its colonies, because of the high cost, both financial and political, of attempting to do so. Similarly, the cost of the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan has stretched US resources. A direct military action against Venezuela therefore seems to be ruled out until it has withdrawn from these countries. However, this does not exclude a proxy intervention by Colombia sponsored by the USA, which has waged a constant campaign to undermine, isolate and destroy the Bolivarian Revolution. The defeat of the coup in 2002 was brought about by the intervention of the masses.

Washington is manoeuvring with Uribe to threaten Venezuela. The agreement under which Colombia granted the United States access to up to seven military bases was an act of aggression directed against the Venezuelan Revolution. The external threat from Colombia is very real. But far more serious is the threat from within. The bourgeoisie still holds in its hands key points in the economy. Ten banks still control 70% of the country’s financial activity. Most of the land remains in the hands of the big landowners, while 70% of the food is imported (along with inflation). Above all, the state remains in the hands of the counterrevolutionary bureaucracy. After more than a decade, there are signs of tiredness and disappointment in the masses. This is the most dangerous element in the equation.

At the First Extraordinary Congress of the PSUV Chavez admitted these things and stated that “socialism had not yet been achieved.” He called for the total elimination of capitalism, for the arming of the people and a workers’ militia. All this is necessary, but if this remains on the level of speeches, it will lead nowhere. The fact is that the bureaucracy is systematically undermining the Revolution from within. The movement towards workers’ control is being systematically sabotaged, and workers who attempt to fight the bureaucracy are coming under attack, as we saw in the case of Mitsubishi. This situation is producing a ferment of discontent and disillusionment that is the biggest danger of all. If this mood is expressed in apathy and abstention in the legislative elections, the scene will be set for a counteroffensive of the right.

In Venezuela the working class broke with the bourgeois parties and threw itself, on the basis of Chavez’s appeal, into the attempt to build its own party, a class party, the PSUV. This party, whose future is not yet decided, is being born in the middle of a revolution, and the masses take it as an attempt to build what we call an independent workers’ party.

The PSUV is born, in a confused way, with the impulse of the class, and in its midst there is a struggle between those who want to build a class party, without bosses, and those who would like to see the PSUV just as a party of order, representing their own wishes as a clique and the capitalist order. The main task of the Marxists in the Venezuelan revolution is to help in achieving a most positive outcome of this struggle, becoming a Marxist fraction of this party and building it energetically, helping its most serious elements to win a majority of the party, expel the bureaucrats and deepen the proletarian revolution which is taking place.

We must pay much more attention to our work in this Party, which is at the centre of the problem of the Revolution. We must admit frankly that the leadership of the Venezuelan section has not paid sufficient attention to this work, and as a result we have missed many opportunities. This is a very serious error, which must be rectified immediately. Trade union work is very important, but it must be given a political expression. Our work with the occupied factories remains a key question, but it will be completely sterile if it is not linked to the fight to transform the PSUV.

The Venezuela Marxists must combine theoretical firmness with the necessary tactical flexibility, always stressing the role of the Bolivarian movement and the PSUV. If we work correctly in the next couple of years, the foundation will be laid for a mass left wing opposition within the PSUV, in which we will participate, fertilizing it with the ideas of Marxism. This is the only way in which we can build a mass Marxist current in Venezuela, as the first step towards a future mass revolutionary Marxist Party.

RENEGADE EYE

Oliver Stone's South of the Border ***

Oliver Stone presents in limited release in the US and Europe, a documentary film called South of the Border. A tidal wave of leftist governments has been flowing throughout the Americas. If in 2006 Manuel López Obrador had won, Mexico would have joined the surge. In light of how these events are covered even in the countries where the changes occurred, by the main media outlets, this movie is a welcomed change.



This movement towards the left, was started in reaction to the US controlled International Monetary Fund and its neoliberal policies. That is the unifying factor that spurred what is called the Bolivarian Movement. Stone jetsets to five countries to meet seven Latin American heads of state. Besides Hugo Chavez who is the main focus of the movie, he visits Evo Morales of Bolivia; Cristina Kirchner of Argentina (and her husband, ex-president Nestor Kirchner); Lula da Silva of Brazil; Fernando Lugo of Paraguay; Rafael Correa of Ecuador; and Raul Castro of Cuba. It's uncommon to hear words that aren't just sound bites to portray them as monsters. They are humanized here, Chavez visits the home of his birth, and falls off and breaks a bicycle. We see Chavez driving around Caracas, and casually being approached without a wall of security. Evo Morales teaches Stone how to eat coca, and plays some soccer with him.

The biggest part of the movie focuses on Hugo Chavez. Included is footage of the coup by Chavez against Carlos Andrés Pérez in 1992. Chavez taking responsibility for the coup and surrendering is shown, as is hero status after being let out of prison. Much of what was covered better in The Revolution Will Not Be Televised about the 2002 coup was recapped. This is shown alternately with mostly Fox News coverage of events for joke effect.

George W. Bush (43) was castigated for the US's immediate support for the 2002 coup. This film was made the time when Barack Obama was inaugurated president of the US. All of the leaders are shown watching an inauguration speech by Obama. Chavez hopes he will be like Roosevelt, and initiate a New Deal. Not only Oliver Stone had illusions Obama would be different than other imperialists.

Lula da Silva told about how the IMF tried to discourage him from paying off all of Brazil's debt to the IMF. We meet Fernando Lugo of Paraguay, who came to power with a background in Liberation Theology. The Nestors tell Stone, we now have presidents in South America who look like the people. Bolivia had a president who didn't speak Spanish. Rafael Correa says the US can have a military base in Ecuador, if he can in Miami.

Oliver Stone made it clear near the end of the movie, he wasn't socialist. He believes in a "benign capitalism." I wouldn't use that point to condemn the movie, but rather as a good point for discussion. The Bolivarian leaders are not a monolith. Stone makes them all seem as equals. The subject of the revolutionary tide in Latin America is dealt with superficially, still the positives of this movie outweigh the negatives.

RENEGADE EYE

Venezuela Expropriates Cargill Plant

Written by Patrick Larsen
Friday, 03 April 2009

Throughout 2007 and 2008, scarcity of basic food products has been part of everyday life for millions of Venezuelans. Sometimes it has been coffee, other times sugar, milk, rice, cooking oil or beans that were unavailable on the shelves of super-markets and shops. This has created a potentially dangerous situation which could undermine support for the Bolivarian government.

The inability of the Venezuelan government to solve this problem played a key role in the defeat in the referendum on Constitutional reform in December 2007, where three million Chavez supporters abstained from voting. That explains why, at the beginning of 2008, a campaign was launched on the direct initiative of Chavez to solve the problem. This involved the use of the National Guard to confiscate hidden reserves of food and stop the smuggling of food into Colombia, where speculators can sell the food products at much more favorable prices.



The campaign demonstrated that food scarcity was the result of hoarding, speculation and smuggling on a massive scale. However, no effective measures were taken to deal with the root of the problem at that time. Private property of the food-producing sector was left untouched. As we warned at the time: “The seizure of food stocks by the National Guard and other bodies can temporarily ease the problem, but cannot solve it in the long term. Relying on the institutions of a state apparatus which is still a capitalist state to solve the problems of working people is like putting a fox in charge of guarding hens.”

In February, the government conducted a number of investigations of private companies in the food sector. In a rice processing plant in Guarico state, owned by the country’s largest food producer, Polar, it was revealed that the plant was only working at half capacity. Furthermore, the plant was adding artificial flavoring to 90 percent of its rice in order to get around the price controls decreed by he government, which only apply to essential, unenhanced food items.

On Saturday, February 28, Chavez decreed state intervention at the rice processing plant in Guárico, which is to run for 90 days. The workers at the plant have supported this measure with great enthusiasm and have begun to produce 100 percent unmodified rice. This shows that it is entirely possible to mass produce cheap rice as long as it is done under the control of the working class.

Having discovered this deliberate sabotage, Chavez emphasized that this was only the tip of the iceberg. On his TV program, Aló Presidente, on March 1, he threatened the capitalists in the food sector. If the sabotage continues, he said, “we will expropriate all of their plants, and convert them from private property into social property.”

Then on Wednesday, March 3, Chavez announced the expropriation of the rice plants of Cargill, a U.S.owned multinational food company. It was revealed that this rice-processing plant in Portuguesa was adding artificial flavoring to all of its rice to get round the price controls. Apart from that, INDEPABIS found approximately 18,000 tons of non-modified rice stored in the plant’s warehouse.

Chavez signed the official decree of expropriation of Cargill’s rice plants on March 6. In the same speech he stated that in the past, the oligarchy had been making the laws but that this era had now ended and “Now Venezuela has a government that only abides by the constitution and the people”. On Sunday, March 7, during his weekly Alo Presidente programme, Chavez replied to the criticisms on the part of Polar group owner Lorenzo Mendoza, and warned, “my hand will not shake when it comes to expropriating the whole of the Polar group if they are found to be breaking the law. Let this be a warning to the bourgeoisie as a whole: my hand will not shake,” adding, “And I would have the full support of the people.”

In what was a very radical speech, president Chavez also dismissed those who advocate the need to conciliate with the ruling class. “Some are trying to tell a tale that we have a technical draw, that we are neck and neck [with the opposition], this is completely false” and added, “with this story they want the revolution to surrender and that I should put my foot the brake and say: we cannot go forward, we need to reach agreements.” To these ideas he replied: “The revolution must charge ahead. There cannot be any agreement with the oligarchy or agreements at the top with anybody; I will make sure that we put our foot down on the accelerator of the Revolution.”

He continued: “We have an absolute majority” in the National Assembly, he said. It is now time to “dismantle the old bourgeois state, before it dismantles us.” This is completely correct, but it is also the responsibility of the workers’ movement and its leadership to take the initiative. Many opportunities have been wasted in the past. It is time to take decisive action.

The most striking feature of the recent developments in the struggle against food scarcity is the movement of the workers. Once the ice was broken with the state intervention in the rice-plant in Guárico, workers from the food industry all over Venezuela began to organize and call for action against the sabotage of the capitalists.

More than ever before, the Venezuelan revolution is clashing head-on with private property of the means of production. Private property is an obstacle to national sovereignty in the field of food production. In order to accomplish the basic tasks of the national-democratic revolution, the working class – leading the peasantry behind it – must put itself at the head of the revolution and smash the remnants of private property and the old bourgeois state apparatus. Only in this way can an effective agrarian reform and industrialization of agriculture be introduced, which would give a huge impetus to domestic food production. And in so doing, the national-democratic revolution will grow over into the Socialist revolution. In that sense the Venezuelan revolution will become “permanent”. This is the real lesson of the present dispute over the rice fields.


RENEGADE EYE

The Founding Of The PSUV Youth - A Crucial Battle In The Bolivarian Revolution

By Patrick Larsen in Venezuela
Monday, 25 August 2008

The Venezuelan revolution today finds itself at its most critical stage ever. After a narrow but alarming defeat in the December 2007 referendum, the revolutionary movement faces a new, important test in the November elections for mayors and governors. Preparations are in full swing, and the counter-revolution is trying to mobilize maximum forces to win as many positions as possible, in order to use them in their continued campaign to undermine support for Chávez and the revolution.

As part of this campaign, the sabotage of the capitalists continues, with scarcity of many basic food products. Speculation is an additional factor that has boosted inflation to extreme levels, making it very difficult for hundreds of thousands of working class and urban poor families to make ends meet at the end of each month. Crime rate has also increased - something the opposition conveniently uses to discredit the government.

If the revolution is to sweep away the counter-revolution, it must resolve these problems. We must remember that in December 2007, the referendum was not lost because of a big increase in votes for the opposition. It was lost because approximately 3 million people who had previously voted for Chávez abstained. The reformists attempt to explain this abstention as stemming from the allegedly "low" level of consciousness of the masses. They promote the idea that this was a proof that the Venezuelan people are "not ready" for socialism.

However, for the Marxists, the explanation is very different. From our point of view, the analysis of the December defeat is still the key to understanding the present situation and the tasks that lie ahead. In our opinion, the abstention of three million chavistas was not at all due to the "low" level of the masses. In fact, what is astonishing is the degree of loyalty displayed by the Venezuelan working class and peasants to Chávez and the revolution. Time and again they have moved to defend the revolution against its enemies - not only in electoral battles - but on the streets, in the factories and the military barracks.

The reason the December referendum was lost was is because after 10 years of almost uninterrupted mobilizations, the masses see that their main problems remain unsolved. The power of the oligarchy is still in place, and even though the government has tried to put a check to this with partial measures and nationalizations such as SIDOR, Los Andes, the cement industry and recently Banco de Venezuela, this is not enough to stop the sabotage of the capitalists and begin a serious plan of production that can solve the pressing problems of the masses. To do this would require the complete expropriation of the bourgeoisie and a Socialist plan of production, distribution and exchange, democratically worked out by the workers and peasants.

The PSUV Youth

The PSUV, which had its founding congress in February-March, enjoys widespread support. In June, some 2.5 million party members participated in the internal elections to determine the party's candidates for mayors and governors. Another two million are closely following the development of the party from the sidelines.

The most recent development is the call on behalf of the national party leadership to set up the PSUV Youth organization. This is of the highest importance. As we shall see, the youth have played a very important role throughout the Venezuelan revolution. The formation of the PSUV Youth is something that the Marxists of the CMR (Corriente Marxista Revolucionaria) have been advocating for the last year. It was the central slogan of the two Marxist youth encounters held in Caracas in July 2007 and in Ciudad Bolívar in November 2007, which brought together many young people from all over Venezuela.

The founding congress of the PSUV Youth is set to take place on September 13-15th in Rio Chíco, in the state of Miranda. At present the process of electing voceros (spokesmen) per each 10 youth is taking place in the Socialist battalions (branches of the PSUV). The idea is that these spokespersons will then join with a further 9 spokespersons from other PSUV battalions, and from among them, elect a delegate to the founding congress. In that way, the plan is that the founding congress will represent as many as 140,000 young PSUV members.

The Youth in the Bolivarian Revolution

In the bourgeois media on a world scale, the Venezuelan youth (especially the students) are often portrayed as ardent supporters of the opposition. This is a blatant lie which is intended as a means of shoring up public opinion against the Chávez government. The reality is somewhat different.

The beginning of the Bolivarian revolution was an invaluable source of inspiration to tens of thousands of Venezuelan youth. In the poor urban neighborhoods, many young people began to form Bolivarian circles, groups and societies. Even in the old universities, which have traditionally been dominated overwhelmingly by the children of the bourgeoisie and petit-bourgeoisie, the revolution found a resounding echo.

At every decisive juncture, young people have energetically defended the revolution. For example, this was the case a year ago, when small gangs of fascist youth, supporters of the opposition, tried to set up burning barricades and blockade the streets of Caracas, in response to the non-renewal of RCTV's license. At that time - and again during the December referendum - the balance of forces was clearly very favourable to the revolution. While the opposition students could only mobilize a couple of thousand, the Bolivarian youth organizations mobilized more than one hundred thousand.

In the heat of the revolution, different youth organizations were born, most notably the Frente Francisco Miranda (FFM), which was started in 2003. Chávez gave it important support, both morally and financially. The FFM was launched with revolutionary slogans and called for young people in the poor neighbourhoods to get organized and solve local problems at the community level. It also began to organize brigades of Venezuelan youth to go to Cuba, where they received political and ideological courses, etc. As a result, the organization grew rapidly. In the space of less than one year, it had grown to more than 40,000 members, and had hundreds of organizers in communities throughout Venezuela.

But there was another side to this as well. The organization was born with a highly bureaucratic, top-down structure, and the leadership did not allow criticism within the ranks. Ideologically, the FFM leadership tended towards a Stalinist position, only advocating Socialism after Chávez had embraced it, and focusing on the idealist conception of creating "a new Socialist human being", instead of pointing out the main political tasks that the Bolivarian revolution faces. As a result, this led slowly but surely to the widespread demoralisation of the membership, with thousands abandoning the FFM. From more than 40,000 it dropped to around 8,000 at the present moment.

This experience provides a clear warning. A genuine revolutionary youth organisation must have a fully democratic structure or it will become stale and the youth will abandon it. Also, if the PSUV Youth do not adopt the ideas of Marxism, it will inevitably fall under the influence of other ideas (reformism and/or Stalinism). As happened to the FFM, this would ruin the organization and all the revolutionary potential of the youth will vanish.

A Crucial Battle

There are historical experience as well, that allow us to fully appreciate the significance of the PSUV Youth. In the 1930s, Trotsky carefully analyzed the situation in the workers' movement. At that time there was a ferment in the working class that began to express itself in the Socialist Youth in various countries. In France, where there was an important pre-revolutionary movement of the working class, Trotsky advocated his supporters to enter the Socialist Youth and win over its left wing to Marxism. This tactic was unfortunately only carried out too late and in a half-way manner.

In Spain, where a revolution had begun in 1931 with the proclamation of the Second Republic, the Socialist Youth become extremely radicalized between 1933 and 1935. The possibilities for a revolutionary Marxist tendency within the Spanish Socialist Youth were huge. Trotsky understood this and advocated the entry of his followers. He even predicted, in the summer of 1934, that if the Trotskyists did not win over the bulk of the Socialist Youth in France (and Spain), they would be won by the Stalinists.

This was exactly what happened in Spain, where the Trotskyists under the leadership of Andreu Nin rejected the call by the Socialist Youth leadership to join their ranks in order to "Bolshevise" the Socialist movement. The Stalinists were more clever and understood that the mass base of the Socialist Youth would be decisive for the outcome of the Spanish Revolution. In 1935 they fused their Youth Organisation with the Socialist Youth, and in the coming years, used this mass base to effectively impose their moderate slogans on the movement ("First win the war against Franco, and only afterwards win the Revolution"). As we know, the result was a crushing defeat of the Spanish working class that led to 40 years of Franco dictatorship.

This lesson should be fully absorbed by the Marxists today. The CMR will be actively participating in the building of the Youth. We will fight shoulder to shoulder with the left wing delegates and put forward a Marxist position in the discussions that will take place in the congress (so far, we know that the food scarcity question and the question of military defence against imperialism are on the agenda).

Throughout the country, there are young people in dozens of local collectives as well as unorganized activists who will see the PSUV Youth as a possible revolutionary tool that can throw out the bureaucracy and finish the power of the oligarchy. These layers have seen first hand that reformism does not work, and they are searching for other ideas. This is the reason why the recent speaking tour of the British Marxist theoretician Alan Woods - organized by the CMR - was such an unprecedented success, precisely because he explained revolutionary ideas that connected with the aspirations of the rank and file of the movement.

It is the duty of any genuine revolutionary to work with these wide layers of Bolivarian youth and win them over to the programme and methods of revolutionary Marxism.

Ciudad Guayana
August 18, 2008

RENEGADE EYE