The Illiberal Experience in Venezuela: The Transition from Representative Democracy to Authoritarianism

Abstract

At the end of the 20th century, Venezuela transitioned from being a representative liberal democracy to becoming a form of electoral authoritarian state through a hybrid regime based on illiberal democracy. The crisis of the representative democracy paved the way for a coalition formed by groups close to the radical left and the military establishment headed by Hugo Chávez Frías, who took the electoral route, after having first tried and failed to lead a coup, to reach the presidency with popular support due to widespread social unrest, to take power in 1999. This transition was carried out, at the local level, progressively by the actions of an illiberal and revolutionary regime, as a deliberate reaction against representative liberal democracy. The paper examines the illiberal experience in Venezuela between 1999 and 2007 and its background. While it is true that illiberalism does not always create the conditions that lead to the inevitable transition to an authoritarian regime, the Venezuelan case is an example of its use in the continual dismantling of the rule of law, an increasingly common phenomenon in various countries with a democratic tradition.