Urban Social Movements in Venezuela

Abstract

This chapter will look at social movement organized in the barrios of Caracas, Venezuela. The history of popular organization in the barrios has been an interplay of independent action and linkages with the state, and the fashioning of creative strategies inside, outside, and against the political system. Urban social movements in Caracas are extraordinarily variegated and heterogeneous. There are militant cadre-based groupings that have roots in the guerrilla struggles of the 1960s, as well as collectives that operate through assemblies and mass actions, and cultural groupings based in music, song, and dance. I distinguish urban social movements from political parties and trade unions by their basis in the networks of everyday life, their location in the space of the barrio rather than the party office or union hall, and their attempts to establish independent linkages with the state. While trade unions tend to engage in concerns that are more narrowly economic—such as wages, length of the work week, and benefits—urban social movements see economic inequality as one dimension of the experience of marginality and have tended to couch their actions in cultural-symbolic terms.KeywordsVenezuelaCaracasBarriosCultureAssembliesState