Plain Speaking about Chavismo and Anti‑chavismo

In Venezuela, most of the reformist parties and groups active on the left, parliamentary and extra-parliamentary, along with those who describe themselves as center-left and as the “left” wings of the conservative and right-wing parties, have accepted the notion that the country has lived through a genuine “Bolivarian revolution”, which raised the flag of “21^st Century Socialism”, in the words of its ‘great leader’. Outside the country numerous groups, movements and parties have rushed to support “the march of change” which, beginning in Venezuela, will supposedly spread to Ecuador, Bolivia, Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay, Nicaragua, Honduras and El Salvador, and thus link up with the old Stalinists in Cuba.

Due to the diplomatic pressure exerted by the United States and in the wake of the devastation wrought by the capitalist crisis, the reformist currents in Argentina, Paraguay, Honduras and (we think) in Brazil, after having benefited in recent years from the accumulation of capital mainly from China but also from Russia and elsewhere, have now lost control of the government in these countries.

The fact is, more so even than in Cuba, China and Russia, the “Bolivarian revolution” is a total farce and its program has nothing at all to do with socialism, even if we are fed the idea, day in day out, about how opposed it is to the “right wing”.

In Venezuela there is just State capitalism. Even before Chavismo got into government Venezuela was based on State capitalism, dependent on oil revenue. But Chavismo talks about using this revenue in the people’s favour. In fact the only new thing about it is its capacity to drug the masses with the democratic credo, with fame-seeking and popular participation and with the illusion that the government represents the interests of the poor. Chavismo was the political solution to the economic crisis in the 80s and 90s, which allowed the national bourgeoisie and foreign imperialism to maintain capitalist exploitation against a background of social peace.

Learning from the experience of those who rule Cuba, the Venezuelan bourgeoisie spread the same lie: that the economic crisis is just the product of the economic war conducted by a few “anti-patriotic” entrepreneurs, by “right-wing” parties, and by imperialism. It’s exactly what they want people in Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia to believe as well.

A path to socialism?

No. It isn’t. The course of the Venezuelan economy is capitalist in every sense. Businesses, whether private or state-owned, produce commodities on the basis of the exploitation of wage labor. The possibility of accessing services and obtaining products is linked to monetary exchange, even when the State is directly involved in their distribution.

A Struggle against the bourgeoisie?

No, it isn’t. Despite the demagogic, high-flown speeches of the Chavista leaders against “the bourgeoisie”, the government has always managed to ensure that conditions are such that bankers, industrialists and merchants can continue to appropriate high profit margins. By imposing a cocktail of Keynes, Rooseveltian New Deal, liberalism, corporativism and fascism, Chavismo has transferred the oil revenue to the bourgeoisie.

State purchases, dubbed “social” or “socialist”, have allowed national and multi-national firms (Cuban, Argentine, Uruguayan, Nicaraguan, Brazilian, Chinese, Russian, Portuguese, American, etc,) to access Consumers previously beyond their reach. To Venezuela’s badly paid population big business is now flogging food, medicine, mobile phones, white goods, utility vehicles, health care, public housing units, etc, etc.

But this major market is today menaced by the drop in oil prices.

This explains the launch of the “Great Mission” for “Food Self-sufficiency” advertised under the aberrant brand name “socialist commerce”, put into effect by organizing the inhabitants of the various districts into Local Committees for Supply and Production (CLAP) charged with distributing, at administered prices, food and personal hygiene products, which are in short supply, from various firms. This demagogic mobilization, as well allowing the government to scrape something together to compensate for the reduced oil revenue, and the capitalist impresario to empty his warehouse, serves to placate the masses, who are increasingly unhappy about food prices and the high cost of living in general.

In fact the local elections, the referendum (if it actually happens) and the presidential elections are all coming up soon. The unique ability of these opportunists lies in combining populist petty political wheeler-dealing, by manipulating the means of information, with the guarantee that the population will continue to receive a basic minimum of staple goods, at the same time as it guarantees the profit margins of the national capitalist production and the multinationals.

And yet despite presenting the CLAPs as the “alternative to capitalism” long queues form in front of the shops and stuff is sold on at speculative prices. Large-scale rioting and looting has also taken place.

Not even the CLAPs can avoid getting caught in the web of corruption as faction fights inside the Chavist movement and the government party continue, which are minimized by the media and transformed into an argument for an electoral contest between the Chavistas and the opposition.

Every time that a national or multinational company hits a crisis, closes down or threatens to close down, the government steps in with funding, or acquires the bankrupt firms, “expropriations”, which allow the capitalists to firms from the marketplace which are no longer competitive whilst obtaining a corresponding compensation. Sometimes a demagogic “workers control” is declared. While the bourgeois government dons a socialist mask, in fact it is providing financial assistance and perpetuating capitalist exploitation, taking the burden of failed companies off the bourgeoisie.

Meanwhile there is an increased military presence in almost every area of government administration, although it hasn’t prevented a new mafia of corrupt officials from replacing those of the 4^th Republic: soldiers and civilians enrich themselves from dawn to dusk, despite the sharpening of the economic crisis.

Anti-imperialism?

No, it isn’t. The whole of Chavista economic policy is geared towards attracting foreign investment, with exploitation facilitated on easy terms, and guaranteed profits to the multi-nationals. And although they may define China and Russia as “socialist” and “progressive”, their fight against the North American government is only in words, and the oil trade continues unabated.

Do they govern in the workers’ interests?

No, they don’t. The Chavista bourgeois government has been anxious to “modernize” existing laws by redefining workers’ protests of all types as common crimes, regulated by the penal code. What is more the government has placed a ban on demonstrations and protests in a number of urban and industrial areas referred to as “security zones”. Although the regime unions, which disorganize the workers by collaborating with the bosses, undoubtedly predominate, the list of trade unionists arrested and charged is getting longer. Instead of the reduction in working hours promised by the government the working day has actually been intensified and lengthened. Already under the legal framework all-out strikes have been rendered impossible by insisting that minimum services be maintained. In addition there is a range of activities which have been classified as “essential” and therefore subject to strike bans. The Chavistas, constantly using as pretext the imperialist “menace” and the threat of a military coup, have both threatened the use of force against the workers’ struggles and actually used it, dependent as ever on the co-operation of the trade union bosses and federations.

The aim of the government’s wages policy, which sets rises by presidential decree, which run in parallel with the delay in signing collective contracts, and with the complicity of the trade unions, isn’t to improve the living standards of workers, but rather to set a minimum standard of living to head off working-class mobilization. The bourgeois government increases the nominal minimum wage each year, but the underlying tendency is that of a constant reduction in real wages.

Under capitalism a “workers’ government” is not possible; it is just a trap invented by the opportunists. The only workers’ government possible is the dictatorship of the proletariat which can only arise from the violent insurrection of the working class under the leadership of its communist party. Its task will be to bring the insurrection to a close by establishing the domination of the proletarian class and to lead the socialist transformation towards a society without classes, without private property, without commodities, without money, without states, without bosses.

A struggle between capitalism and socialism?

No. it isn’t. The struggle between the Chavistas in government and the right opposition is not between capitalism and socialism, despite all the waffle being put out in the propaganda campaigns of these two bands of political speculators. They are just fighting for control of the government in order to administer the interests of the bourgeoisie, reflecting inter-bourgeois and inter-imperialist contradictions over the control of the country and its oil revenue.

Nothing new under the sun

By declaring the bourgeois republic to be communist, by maintaining the relations of capitalist production, by seeking to hide behind a revolutionary phraseology which includes counter-revolutionary terms: “socialist fatherland”, “socialist market”, “socialist form”, etc, the so-called “Venezuelan revolution” offers nothing to the working masses which opportunists in other parts of the world haven’t offered it already.

The international capitalist crisis takes its course, increasing the contradictions between proletariat and bourgeoisie. The working class will necessarily have to resume class struggle by lining up with its party, the international communist party, by breaking with the regime unions, by resisting appeals to defend the country, and by rejecting all the false socialisms which try to breath life back into the bourgeoisie and its capitalist regime.