El Consejo Comunal de Venezuela: ¿Es un Aparato del Poder Estatal o el Poder Autónomo de la Base?

Abstract

The purpose of the present study is to refresh our understanding of Venezuela from the grassroots perspective of the people’s movement. Venezuela has recently been in the center stage of international political and economic debate. Hugo Chávez, the President of Venezuela and advocate of a new form of socialism, has received international support as well as criticism from the polarized interpretive positions of left and right. On the one hand, his brand of socialism has been regarded as a typical form of “populism.” On the other, it has been praised for opening the possibility of a new kind of socialism for the first time in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union. Nevertheless, there has not been any adequate assessment of the actual views and practices of the Venezuelan people, and this indicates that the debate is mired in an analytic framework that is merely formal and devoid of substantive content. Accordingly, the present paper presents the grassroots movement that is currently taking shape via a new model of participatory governance in Venezuela. This is the communal council (consejo comunal), an institution that is playing a vital role in a practically oriented movement for social reform. The paper employs an anthropological approach to arrive at an adequate understanding of this institution and its role. The paper begins with an institutional and objective account of the communal council, which has been set up as a novel form of social integration. Then the paper will investigate how this institution is fulfilling its role of social integration in the Venezuelan social context by presenting the case study of Barrio Artigas, a neighborhood located in the slums of Caracas. Barrio Artigas was selected as the site of the field study not only for its ease of access, but also for the superior organization of its communal council. It is hoped that the present study of the communal council as a program for social transformation will provide an opportunity to re-examine the practical potential of the people’s movement in Venezuela, which has been sidelined due to the debate on large-scale political and economic issues.