Political Behavior and Political Parties

In 2005 Hugo Chávez began his continuous power grabbing up until the publication of this article in 2007. During his presidency, Venezuela had a weak checks and balances system that allowed Chávez to gradually gain control of more aspects of the Venezuelan government, in 2005 he even gained control of the Venezuelan unicameral legislature. This was extremely important because the unicameral legislature was the only potential blockade to any of his actions. Corrales in his article mentions how usually authoritarianism arises out of “chronic governability crises”, however in the 2004 election Chávez got 63% of the vote and with that Chávez should not have felt threatened and pursue every aspect of governmental power he could get his hands on, but however as we know he did so anyway. Chávez could obtain all this power due to the extremely weak checks and balances mentioned above.

Chávez could stay extremely popular not only in the elite’s eyes but also the poorer populations eyes due to economic growth under Chávez, opposition was never presented to truly challenge him. However, the economic growth seen in Venezuela was extremely limited and not diverse in any way, their dependence to oil created a very unhealthy economy and we can see the effects of the dependence once the oil prices started to fall. When the prices started to fall the people of Venezuela noticed how weak the government was because they could not provide basic needs to its people in times of crisis. As we know the situation in Venezuela got so bad citizens started to flood other nations in order to find basic needs that they were unable to get in their home of Venezuela. The crisis showed the corruption that Chávez lead the government with and showed the almost complete disenfranchisement of any opposition to Chávez, the affects of which are being felt in Venezuela today. The rigid governmental structure has became disastrous, while it worked well with Chávez. The current president Maduro does not hold the levels of public support or economic growth that Chávez did, this lead to an extremely unsettling state of affairs in the country. Even with the people wanting serious changes it is  difficult for the opposition to get a foothold in the government due to the restraints Chávez placed. While Chávez is out of power his actions are still being felt by Venezuela and they will continue to feel those actions.