Venezuela’s Bolivarian Revolution

Abstract

The increasingly decisive victories of Chaivez presidency call into question easy characterizations of his supporters as the poor or and attendant notions of spontaneous, uninformed political actors. Since 1998, voters have elected Hugo Chavez to presidency three times with increasing margins each time, and on August 15, 2004, voters returned to polls to decide whether to remove him from office. Fifty-nine percent of voters affirmed president's mandate and defeated recall initiative. Two years earlier, on April 14, 2002, in a remarkable turn of events, Chaivez was returned to power through civil society mobilization just 48 hours after being overthrown by a coup. In 1998, during his initial presidential bid, he won 56.2 percent of total vote; in 2000 he won 59.76 percent of total vote, and in 2004 he won 59 percent again, this time with 70 percent of voters participating (Consejo Nacional Electoral, 2004; Carter Center, 2004). Support for Chivez has come through activism and mobilization of members of civil society who continue to turn out in increasing numbers to support Bolivarian Revolution. Following 1998 election many of organizations that made up electoral coalition that elected Chavez (the Polo Patri6tico) enjoyed support of state. These organizations were often examined by researchers and media and increasingly identified as Chavistas and their projects as Chavismo. In addition, film documentaries and news reports of April 2002 mobilization to restore Chavez to power focused on his supporters' spontaneity, depicting them as members of popular masses organized solely around Chavez himself. This has had effect of homogenizing supporters and personalizing Bolivarian Revolution. However, many of these groups and their actions were not directly organized by Venezuelan state or Hugo Chavez. Instead, many are to varying degrees autonomous from