Venezuela

The most promising political development in Venezuela this year was the formation of the Party of Revolution and Socialism (PRS). Four hundred people met in Caracas to found the party in July. The new party consists of existing left organisations, such as Morenoist Opción de Izquierda Revolucionaria (OIR, Revolutionary Left Option), the Opción Clasista de Trabajadores (which groups together workers from the oil industry) and the student collective Activate from the Central University of Venezuela. The party includes several well-known UNT leaders, including Orlando Chirino and Stalin Perez...

Much of the discussion about Venezuela has focused on the role and policies of the Hugo Chávez government. But the emergence of the Unión Nacional de Trabajadores (National Workers’ Union, UNT) may in the long-run be more important for the workers of Venezuela. Paul Hampton reports. Since its first congress in August 2003 the UNT has grown fast, helped by support from the Chávez government. It organised a half a million strong May Day demonstration this year and claims over a million workers in affiliated unions. According to the Ministry of Labor, more than three quarters (77%) of collective...

“By Bonapartism we mean a regime in which the economically dominant class, having the qualities necessary for democratic methods of government, finds itself compelled to tolerate – in order to preserve its possessions – the uncontrolled command of a military and police apparatus over it, of a crowned ‘saviour’. This kind of situation is created in periods when the class contradictions have become particularly acute; the aim of Bonapartism is to prevent explosions.” Leon Trotsky, Again on the question of Bonapartism, March 1935, in Writings 1934-35 “I said this before becoming president...

By Pablo Velasco china A former textile worker who posted online reports about a protest demonstrations by steel workers in Chongqing has disappeared and is believed to be in police custody. Shi Xiaoyu was taken away by police from his home in Shaoxing, Zhejiang province, on 20 October, according to Chinese human rights groups. Police arrested him, confiscating his computer and other materials. Shi had been posting information about steel workers’ protests, which began in August this year. The workers were demanding that the company, which used to be one of China's top 500 industrial companies...

Paul Hampton reviews Hugo Chávez and the Bolivarian Revolution by Richard Gott (Verso, 2005) Richard Gott the journalist is like a courtier who rides round in a stretch limo to visit the poor before returning as a “privileged visitor” to the presidential palace. And for Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez, he has nothing but admiration. There is nothing Gott’s book about workers’ factory occupations or about the “co-management” schemes in some workplaces. Despite dramatic changes in the Venezuelan labour movement over the last five years — including the involvement of the old union federation...

A letter from Venezuela by Alex hammond Upon arriving in Caracas last month I have found myself encountering many Venezuelan bourgeois who have come across hard times since the rise of the new order. The younger of these people have been educated to expect a lot from life. The older have been used to getting more. One man I have come to know was working a $60,000 a year job with a nice apartment five years ago. Now he makes $2 an hour and sleeps on his friend’s couch. The other bourgeois I have met are in a similar position to him. There are many with MBAs and MAs who work in dirty, poorly...

Oaxaca As we went to press, teachers in Oaxaca city were planning to take strike action in a further sign of the revival of the movement which rose to prominence last year. The action was backed by the APPO popular committee, which led the mobilisations last year. Students pledged to join the action, holding conferences and discussions in schools. Section 22 of the SNTE teachers’ union planned to march to the zócalo (central square) as part of national action called for by the rank and file CNTE movement. A teacher work stoppage will take place in Huatulco on the Oaxaca southern coast. The two...

Four hundred people met in the Caracas Venezuela on 9 July to found a new socialist party by January 2006, when the World Social Forum will meet in the city. The name currently proposed for the party is the PTRS, the Workers Party for the Socialist Revolution. The 9 July conference was called by a coalition of six organisations, among them the Opción de Izquierda Revolucionaria (OIR, Revolutionary Left Option) which includes some Trotskyists and Orlando Chirino, national coordinator of the trade union confederation, the UNT). Also present were the Opción Clasista de Trabajadores (which groups...

Almost every day in Venezuela, Hugo Chavez interrupts programming on the nation’s TV networks to deliver speeches and to propagandise for his government — the stations have no choice but to transmit his broadcasts, which last up to three hours. However, such tyrannical (and boring) media control is not enough for the self-proclaimed “socialist” president. At the end of July, a new South American news network, Telesur, was launched as an “initiative against cultural imperialism”. Chavez’s claim that Telesur is independent is highly dubious. Not only does the Venezuelan government own 51% of the...

By Paul Hampton Has Hugo Chavez, president of Venezuela, embraced socialism? Is his "Bolivarian revolution" about to grow over into a socialist revolution? Wide sections of the international left seem to think so. In January Chavez told the World Social Forum (WSF): "Everyday I become more convinced, there is no doubt in my mind, and as many intellectuals have said, that it is necessary to transcend capitalism. But capitalism can't be transcended from within capitalism itself, but through socialism, true socialism, with equality and justice. But I'm also convinced that it is possible to do it...