Феномен каудильизма: венесуэльское измерение

Abstract

This article describes exclusively the Latin American phenomenon meaning promotion of a strong personality enjoying unlimited power within a specific detachment, party, region. ‘Caudillo’ - a god-like personality, a chieftain, the leader of a guerrilla movement that fought for liberation from the colonial expansion of Spain and Portugal. Over time, this concept came to be used to describe an indisputable leader, who had undivided power in a certain territory. Then its meaning expanded significantly and began to denote an authoritarian ruler who suppressed the people around him One of the first Russian scholars to analyze the phenomenon of caudilism was the outstanding researcher A. F. Shulgovsky who laid the foundations for studying this phenomenon. He insisted that the book “Democratic Caesarism” by the Venezuelan sociologist Laureano Vallenilla Lance became a guide for the dictators of the continent. Authoritarianism, thus, became kind of a concept. According to the theoretical constructions contained in the book, democracy is embodied and implemented by a wise ruler who is concerned about the needs of the people, who cares for his subordinates and shows them the right way. During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a tough struggle was unleashed in Venezuela between the irreconcilable antipodes — authoritarianism and democracy. The caudilism manifested itself in various forms even under quite liberal regimes. Such is a chronic disease from which the Venezuelan society has not been cured to this day.