tag:theconversation.com,2011:/es/topics/nicolas-maduro-5271/articlesNicolás Maduro – The Conversation2023-12-08T15:25:50Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2193522023-12-08T15:25:50Z2023-12-08T15:25:50ZWhy Venezuela is threatening to annex Guyana’s oil-rich province of Essequibo<p>The US air force has taken the unusual step of holding joint drills <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/guyana-venezuela-conflict-essequibo-oil-us-military-flight-drills/">with Guyana</a> as the United Nations scheduled an <a href="https://apnews.com/article/venezuela-guyana-un-dispute-oil-essequibo-fc2437e2c566ee0c9f2b340404d4724f">emergency meeting of the security council</a> to discuss Venezuela’s threat to annex more than two-thirds of the oil-rich South American country.</p>
<p>Guyanese president, Irfaan Ali, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/06/venezuela-annex-guyana-maduro#">appealed to Washington and to the UN</a> after the Venezuelan president, Nicolás Maduro, announced that he had taken steps to formalise the incorporation of Essequibo – an oil-rich 160,000sq km region of neighbouring Guyana – as part of Venezuela.</p>
<p>Maduro is a populist nationalist and a dictator, whose country is wracked by poverty. This has contributed to the exodus of <a href="https://www.worldvision.org/disaster-relief-news-stories/venezuela-crisis-facts#:%7E:text=As%20of%20August%202023%2C%20more,crisis%20has%20affected%20numerous%20lives.">more than seven million citizens</a>. Mindful of the fact that presidential elections are due in Venezuela in 2024, Maduro has turned to an issue that he hopes will lead to a rapid turn-around in his popularity. </p>
<p>Venezuela’s territorial dispute with neighbouring Guyana is a <a href="https://dpi.gov.gy/update-timeline-of-guyana-venezuela-border-controversy/">longstanding one</a>. It is arguably made worse by the news that there might be oil and gas potential in Essequibo – not just on land but also <a href="https://www.spglobal.com/commodityinsights/en/market-insights/latest-news/oil/120123-infographic-guyana-oil-output-drilling-fangtooth-production">under the seabed</a>. </p>
<p>In 2015, Maduro <a href="https://www.stabroeknews.com/2015/06/07/news/guyana/venezuela-makes-new-claim-to-guyanas-territorial-waters-potential-oil-block/">issued a decree</a> reiterating Venezuela’s claim and repudiated any plans to exploit resources in Guyana’s territorial sea and exclusive economic zone. Most recently, he has been seen on national television holding a revised map of Venezuela, depicting a country that now includes about 70% of Guyana.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Map of Venezuela, Guyana and Suriname showing disputed territory." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564326/original/file-20231207-29-bsbuje.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/564326/original/file-20231207-29-bsbuje.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=602&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564326/original/file-20231207-29-bsbuje.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=602&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564326/original/file-20231207-29-bsbuje.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=602&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564326/original/file-20231207-29-bsbuje.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=756&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564326/original/file-20231207-29-bsbuje.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=756&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/564326/original/file-20231207-29-bsbuje.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=756&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Map of Venezuela and Guyana with the disputed territory shaded.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Guayana Esequiba</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In 2022, Guyana began an oil licensing round, and <a href="https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/booming-guyana-sets-offshore-oil-auction-under-revamped-fiscal-terms-2022-11-04/">auctioned off</a> 14 exploration blocks. It is thought that the region has the potential to produce at least 12-15 billion oil-equivalent barrels overall – and possibly even as high as 25 billion oil-equivalent barrels. </p>
<p>The oil licensing <a href="https://oilnow.gy/glr2022/">reference map</a> itself is interesting because it displays the entire licensed area and highlights that the initial 14 blocks lie towards the east of the country and closer to the undisputed international maritime boundary with Suriname.</p>
<p>At least <a href="https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/guyana-receives-bids-eight-oil-gas-blocks-including-exxon-total-2023-09-13/#">eight blocks received bids</a>, which have not been disclosed, involving a suite of oil and gas companies including Qatar Energy and the Brazilian operator, Petrobras. The larger offshore licence area runs right up to the current international boundary with Venezuela. </p>
<p>Major western companies such as Exxon-Mobil and Total Energies are interested in this potential. All of which suggest that third-party companies (and their sponsoring national governments) recognise Guyanese sovereignty and the international boundary with Venezuela as legitimate.</p>
<h2>Longstanding dispute</h2>
<p>Venezuela claims that a great deal of what is modern day onshore and offshore Guyana is Venezuelan. In 1899, an international arbitration ruling in Paris settled the border between Venezuela and what was then British Guiana – with an independent Guyana <a href="https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/1966-05-04/debates/ec997344-9295-4d30-8ce8-e552a55eeced/GuyanaIndependenceBill">emerging in 1966</a>. </p>
<p>Successive Venezuelan governments and dictatorial regimes have disputed the positioning of the international boundary. They have argued that the territory, in and around the Essequibo River, is not Guyanese. </p>
<p>Maduro does not want to relitigate the 1899 Paris decision – he simply wants to ignore it. But the International Court of Justice (ICJ) <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/world-court-orders-venezuela-refrain-action-border-dispute-with-guyana-2023-12-01/">already warned Caracas</a> not to take any action about the recognised international boundary. They did not, however, comment on the proposal by Maduro to hold an internal referendum on the matter. </p>
<p>The referendum in question was held in Venezuela on December 3. Citizens were asked a series of questions about whether a new province should be established called Guyana Esequiba. According to presidential supporters, 10 million citizens cast their vote with the vast majority <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/venezuela-claims-95-percent-support-for-oil-region-grab-3w5k3ns0r">in favour</a> of such a proposal. International observers remain deeply sceptical of both <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/04/maduro-venezuela-guyana-essequibo-referendum-vote-turnout">voter engagement</a> and the strength of feeling expressed for such a proposal. </p>
<p>Either way, Maduro has pushed on with his plan to annex the territory. Venezuelan companies have <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/06/venezuela-guyana-takeover-mines-oil-gas-exploit">been encouraged</a> to prepare to enter Guyanese territory. The Venezuelan parliament was tasked with establishing a new licencing framework to authorise such extractive intrusions. </p>
<p>Guyanese operators would be given three months to abandon any operational sites in the claimed area of the country. Around <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/04/maduro-venezuela-guyana-essequibo-referendum-vote-turnout">120,000 Guyanese citizens live</a> in the 61,000 sq mile territory that Venezuela wants to incorporate.</p>
<h2>‘Direct threat’</h2>
<p>The Guyanese president issued a <a href="https://www.upstreamonline.com/politics/guyana-puts-armed-forces-on-alert-as-venezuelan-president-raises-temperature-of-land-dispute/2-1-1566938?zephr_sso_ott=WaGjq6">televised statement</a> that warned about a “direct threat” to Guyana’s territorial integrity and sovereignty. He condemned the “desperate actions” of the Venezuelan president. He asked that Guyana’s small defence force was placed on high alert. Venezuela’s armed forces dwarf Guyana’s.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Brazil is mobilising its forces to ensure that there is no conflict spillover as the country borders both affected parties. Guyana will need international assistance if the situation turns ugly. Regional bodies such as the Organization of American States (OAS) <a href="https://usoas.usmission.gov/oas-resolution-condemns-the-fraudulent-elections-in-venezuela/">have condemned</a> Venezuela’s actions. </p>
<p>What is disconcerting is that Venezuela’s closest <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/venezuelas-maduro-expected-visit-russia-putins-oil-point-man-says-2023-10-16/">geopolitical ally</a> is Putin’s Russia. </p>
<p>The relationship with Moscow strengthened under the late Hugo Chavez’s tenure and expanded to include multiple agreements in the oil, agricultural and technological sectors. Venezuela did not condemn the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. </p>
<p>Maduro will have watched events unfold in Crimea and eastern Ukraine and perhaps picked up some lessons from Putin about how bully a near-neighbour, launch false-flag operations – and then choose your moment to strike.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/219352/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Klaus Dodds does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A longstanding territorial dispute could flare into open confrontation in South America.Klaus Dodds, Professor of Geopolitics, Royal Holloway University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1596052021-04-22T21:40:24Z2021-04-22T21:40:24ZFor Vladimir Putin and other autocrats, ruthlessly repressing the opposition is often a winning way to stay in power<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/396660/original/file-20210422-15-1ybx3ri.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=84%2C91%2C4423%2C2909&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Police arrest a protester at a Moscow rally in support of Russian dissident Alexei Navalny, who fell ill while in prison and is now hospitalized.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/law-enforcement-officers-detain-a-participant-in-an-news-photo/1232442492?adppopup=true">Alexander Demianchuk\TASS via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Alexei Navalny, Russia’s most important opposition leader, is <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/17/world/alexey-navalny-health-gets-worse/index.html">emaciated, hospitalized and reportedly nearing death</a> after developing a <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-politics-navalny/jailed-kremlin-critic-navalny-says-he-has-temperature-and-cough-some-inmates-may-have-tb-idUSKBN2BS1C0">fever and cough</a> in the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/01/world/europe/navalny-prison-russia.html">remote penal colony</a> where he is imprisoned. Navalny was also on a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/04/20/hunger-strike-russia-navalny/">weekslong hunger strike</a> to protest the government’s refusal to let outside doctors treat him in prison.</p>
<p>Navalny’s troubles began in 2019, when he was arrested for “leading an unauthorized protest.” In 2020, while on parole for that crime, <a href="https://theconversation.com/alexei-navalny-suspected-poisoning-why-opposition-figure-stands-out-in-russian-politics-144836">Navalny was poisoned</a> in an apparent assassination attempt linked to Russian leader Vladimir Putin. </p>
<p>In critical condition, Navalny was flown to Germany for emergency medical treatment. He survived the poisoning. But in February 2021, a Russian court said the Germany trip was a parole violation. It sentenced Navalny <a href="https://www.voanews.com/europe/russian-court-sentences-alexei-navalny-35-years-prison">to three years in prison</a>. </p>
<p>The ruling infuriated Russians and spurred thousands to protest. The nationwide demonstrations <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/30/world/europe/russia-protests-navalny-putin.html?action=click&module=RelatedLinks&pgtype=Article">united disparate opposition groups</a> into one movement that is challenging President Vladimir Putin’s 20-year rule. Navalny’s current ill health is <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/21/europe/russia-putin-address-navalny-protests-intl/index.html">again galvanizing protesters</a> and spurring a further government crackdown on <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/putin-warns-west-russian-police-060437752.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAMHBvpIttnT8-P3ZJ4fV3zklgEBuCTzz1U9Ebn3rsviyln9q7ypiQfbUmh_rrn1ywOnMqMScAts1MQr_DIDJlvFwSap8ffSIyI3ZhnDdQC7Rs0-pyaqhP_LF7WmvP8xKlrkMhbdeF1HpC_FMbYaCBjqJcLC8Qo7RALsMvEWuojAg">the opposition</a>.</p>
<p>If Navalny dies, it will even further <a href="https://theconversation.com/navalny-returns-to-russia-and-brings-anti-putin-politics-with-him-153964">energize the opposition against Putin</a>. </p>
<p>So has persecuting him been a political misstep by Russia’s leader?</p>
<p>As an international legal scholar and professor of human rights, I’ve found that <a href="https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783030354763">strong-arm tactics by autocratic leaders</a> can sometimes trigger a reaction that ultimately topples their regime. Often, though, repressive tactics like detention, torture and prosecution help autocrats like Putin stay in power.</p>
<h2>Political prisoners</h2>
<p>Many historic pro-democracy leaders, including <a href="https://www.mkgandhi.org/biography/arrest.htm">India’s Mahatma Gandhi</a>, <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2010/11/13/burma-chronology-aung-san-suu-kyis-detention#">Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi</a> and the United States’ <a href="https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/mlk-topic/martin-luther-king-jr-arrests">Martin Luther King Jr.</a>, were arrested or imprisoned. In these cases, <a href="http://politicalviolenceataglance.org/2015/05/05/the-resisters-toolkit/">political repression mobilized</a> – rather than destroyed – their movements. </p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jogss/ogaa052">Political prisoners</a>, in particular, can turn into international celebrities who rally people around their cause. </p>
<p>South Africa is an iconic example. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.nelsonmandela.org/content/page/biography-timeline">Imprisoned for 27 years</a>, Nelson Mandela became the face of an anti-apartheid movement that evolved from its South African resistance roots into the <a href="https://theconversation.com/boycotts-rallies-and-free-mandela-uk-anti-apartheid-movement-created-a-blueprint-for-activists-today-134857">largest international campaign</a> for regime change in history. Anti-apartheid groups around the globe coalesced to harness <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/british-anti-apartheid-movement">punitive economic tactics</a>, such as boycotts of South African products, and to pressure their governments to apply sanctions. </p>
<p>Eventually, South Africa’s leaders folded to international demands, releasing Mandela in 1990. Mandela was elected president, <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/24595472?seq=3#metadata_info_tab_contents">ushering in the end of</a> the world’s most racially oppressive system. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Mandela holds his right hand in the air, next to a judge" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Mandela is sworn in as South Africa’s first democratically elected president in 1994.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/nelson-mandela-is-sworn-in-as-the-first-democratically-news-photo/585857374?adppopup=true">Louise Gubb/Corbis Saba/Corbis via Getty Images</a></span>
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<h2>The Belarus example</h2>
<p>Autocrats in the 21st century aren’t like past dictators. Most now claim legitimacy through rigged elections, which is why votes in authoritarian countries are often accompanied by repression.</p>
<p>Last August, Belarusian autocrat Alexander Lukashenko – in power since 1994 – <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53637365">faced an unprecedented electoral challenge</a>. He <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/8/8/leading-belarus-opposition-candidates-campaign-manager-detained">jailed opposition leaders</a> and <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53411735">barred rival candidates</a> from running. The elections were held, and Lukashenko <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/10/europe/belarus-election-protests-lukashenko-intl-hnk/index.html">claimed a landslide victory</a>. </p>
<p>But his only remaining opponent in the presidential race, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/b728b6a0-b84d-4f96-97da-2903575cbc9a">was so popular</a> that neither she nor the Belarusian people bought his win. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/09/belarus-election-lukashenko-landslide-victory-fixing-claims">Widespread protests erupted</a> demanding Lukashenko’s ouster. </p>
<p>Lukashenko – a Putin ally – <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/02/17/belarus-crackdown-escalates">cracked down again</a>, including with brutal police violence. Tikhanovskaya went into exile.</p>
<p>Far from quelling popular anger in Belarus, <a href="https://theconversation.com/belarus-protests-why-people-have-been-taking-to-the-streets-new-data-154494">recent research</a> shows the regime’s violent repression of protests mobilized many people. Protesters <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/winters-quiet-belarus-opposition-prepares-protests-75737562">plan to renew their demonstrations soon</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Women in red stand in the snow, holding fists in the air, with pictures of other women" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Feminists in Minsk protest dozens of women imprisoned for demonstrating after Belarus’ presidential election, Aug. 9, 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/feminist-activists-take-part-in-a-flash-mob-with-news-photo/1231161058?adppopup=true">Atringer/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>Still, Lukashenko continues in power. In large part, that’s because many of the nation’s elite and key institutions – like security services and courts – remain loyal to him. </p>
<p>The most successful autocrats don’t use just repression to stay in office. They also retain control through a spoils systems and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/13510347.2013.738860">corruption that aids</a> those who protect their power. </p>
<h2>International condemnation</h2>
<p>Putin is a master of both repression and corrupt bargains – so notorious for both that the United States created new ways to punish such behavior.</p>
<p>A few years after the 2009 death of corruption whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky in a Russian prison in 2009, the U.S. adopted the <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/09/13/us-global-magnitsky-act#">Magnitsky Act</a>, which <a href="https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF10576">now authorizes</a> the president to impose sanctions, including barring entry into the U.S., on “any foreign person identified as engaging in human rights abuse or corruption.” </p>
<p>Canada, the United Kingdom and <a href="https://www.universal-rights.org/uncategorized/eu-adopts-magnitsky-style-individual-sanctions-regime-for-grave-human-rights-violations">European Union</a> later passed similar laws. </p>
<p>These laws <a href="https://www.debevoise.com/insights/publications/2020/12/eu-introduces-magnitsky-style-human-rights">allow countries</a> to punish repressive leaders, as well as any groups or businesses that back their regimes, with asset freezes and travel bans. They have not yet, however, been used against Putin.</p>
<p>On April 15, the Biden administration did significantly <a href="https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2021-04-19/pdf/2021-08098.pdf">expand existing sanctions against Russia</a>, adding new restrictions on the ability of U.S. institutions to deal in Russian <a href="https://home.treasury.gov/system/files/126/sovereign_debt_prohibition_directive_1.pdf">sovereign debt</a>. The new sanctions appear aimed at ratcheting up the economic pressure on Putin and inviting <a href="https://www.gibsondunn.com/biden-administration-imposes-additional-sanctions-on-russia/">similar measures from allies</a>. </p>
<p>In addition to employing <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/what-are-economic-sanctions">targeted</a> and national sanctions, democratic countries have other ways to reproach states that violate international law. These include severing diplomatic ties and mandating global scrutiny by international bodies like the United Nations. </p>
<p>Such responses have had <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-03-02/biden-s-sanctions-on-russia-saudis-spark-grumblings-of-weakness">limited success</a> in forcing autocratic leaders to respect democracy and human rights. </p>
<p>Take Venezuela, for example. There, President Nicolás Maduro has been in power since 2013, and mass protests against his government began in 2015. </p>
<p>In a series of damning reports, the United Nations has characterized the Maduro regime’s killing and imprisonment of protesters as “<a href="https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=26247&LangID=E">crimes against humanity</a>.” Many countries have imposed <a href="https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2021/02/22/venezuela-19-officials-added-to-the-eu-sanctions-list/">increasingly harsh sanctions on Venezuela</a> over <a href="https://fas.org/sgp/crs/row/IF10715.pdf">many years</a>. </p>
<p>Eventually, in 2019, Maduro <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-48887453">released 22 political prisoners</a> and <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-53985277">pardoned 110 more</a>.</p>
<p>But in December, Venezuela held elections that, once again, failed to meet <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-55211149">democratic standards</a>. </p>
<p>Maduro’s party, unsurprisingly, won. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Maduro in a military hat surrounded by soldiers speaks at a microphone with his hand raised" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">President Maduro of Venezuela speaks at a military parade in Caracas on April 13, 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/president-of-venezuela-nicolas-maduro-speaks-beside-head-of-news-photo/1136941388?adppopup=true">Lokman Ilhan/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>An evolving playing field</h2>
<p>Mass protest campaigns can succeed and have succeeded in ousting dictatorial leaders, as seen recently in Ukraine. There, protests in 2004 and then <a href="https://www.britannica.com/place/Ukraine/The-Maidan-protest-movement">again in 2014</a> reoriented the country away from Russia and toward democracy. </p>
<p>History shows successful protest movements must involve at least <a href="https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20190513-it-only-takes-35-of-people-to-change-the-world">3.5% of the population</a> – including the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1086/704699">urban middle class and industrial workers</a> – engaged in coordinated, nonviolent tactics like general strikes and boycotts. That may not seem like a lot of people, but in a country with the population size of Russia’s, this would require over 5 million people to participate in an organized resistance.</p>
<p>In these circumstances, sanctions and global scrutiny can add real weight to a pro-democracy uprising.</p>
<p>But experts <a href="https://carnegieeurope.eu/2020/12/14/new-eu-global-human-rights-sanctions-regime-breakthrough-or-distraction-pub-83415">worry that the international community’s tools</a> are inadequate given the challenges authoritarianism presents worldwide. Today <a href="https://www.v-dem.net/media/filer_public/de/39/de39af54-0bc5-4421-89ae-fb20dcc53dba/democracy_report.pdf">54% of the global population</a> lives in an autocracy like Russia, Belarus or Venezuela – the highest percentage in 20 years. </p>
<p>Perhaps not coincidentally, pro-democracy movements are also on the rise. <a href="https://www.v-dem.net/media/filer_public/de/39/de39af54-0bc5-4421-89ae-fb20dcc53dba/democracy_report.pdf">Mass pro-democracy protests in 2019</a> took place in 44% of countries, up from 27% in 2014.</p>
<p>As the battle between autocracy and democracy plays out in Russia, Belarus and beyond, the world’s historic defenders of democracy – especially the U.S. and European Union – <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2020/leaderless-struggle-democracy">face their own democratic struggles</a>. </p>
<p>That’s good news for Putin – and more cause for democracy advocates to be concerned.</p>
<p><em>This is an updated version of a <a href="https://theconversation.com/for-autocrats-like-vladimir-putin-ruthless-repression-is-often-a-winning-way-to-stay-in-power-156172">story</a> originally published April 9, 2021.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/159605/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Shelley Inglis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>There’s not much the world can do to stop authoritarian rulers from persecuting their political opponents, as shown by the standoff over Russian dissident Alexei Navalny, who is ill and imprisoned.Shelley Inglis, Executive Director, University of Dayton Human Rights Center, University of DaytonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1561722021-04-07T12:29:58Z2021-04-07T12:29:58ZFor autocrats like Vladimir Putin, ruthless repression is often a winning way to stay in power<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393634/original/file-20210406-23-121zchs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=7%2C31%2C5168%2C3414&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Russian police officers beat people protesting the jailing of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, Jan. 23, 2021 in Moscow.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/russian-policemen-beat-participants-of-an-unauthorized-news-photo/1230750514?adppopup=true">Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images)</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Russian dissident Alexei Navalny, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-politics-navalny/jailed-kremlin-critic-navalny-says-he-has-temperature-and-cough-some-inmates-may-have-tb-idUSKBN2BS1C0">sick with a cough and fever</a>, has been moved to the hospital ward of the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/01/world/europe/navalny-prison-russia.html">remote penal colony</a> where he is imprisoned. </p>
<p>Navalny landed in prison after legal troubles that began in 2019, when he was arrested for “leading an unauthorized protest.” In 2020, while on parole for that crime, <a href="https://theconversation.com/alexei-navalny-suspected-poisoning-why-opposition-figure-stands-out-in-russian-politics-144836">Navalny was poisoned</a> in an apparent assassination attempt linked to Russian leader Vladimir Putin. </p>
<p>In critical condition, Navalny was flown to Germany for emergency medical treatment. In February 2021, a Russian court said the Germany trip was a parole violation and sentenced Navalny <a href="https://www.voanews.com/europe/russian-court-sentences-alexei-navalny-35-years-prison">to three years in prison</a>. </p>
<p>The ruling infuriated Russians and spurred thousands to protest. The nationwide demonstrations <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/30/world/europe/russia-protests-navalny-putin.html?action=click&module=RelatedLinks&pgtype=Article">united disparate opposition groups</a> into one movement that is challenging President Vladimir Putin’s 20-year rule. Now Navalny’s current ill health is <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-politics-navalny/allies-of-kremlin-critic-navalny-raise-alarm-over-his-health-after-lawyers-denied-prison-access-idUSKBN2BG2GK">again galvanizing protesters</a>.</p>
<p>If persecuting Navalny <a href="https://theconversation.com/navalny-returns-to-russia-and-brings-anti-putin-politics-with-him-153964">energizes the opposition against Putin</a>, is it a misstep by Russia’s leader?</p>
<p>As an international legal scholar and professor of human rights, I’ve found that sometimes, <a href="https://www.springer.com/gp/book/9783030354763">strong-arm tactics by autocratic leaders</a> do trigger a reaction that ultimately topples their regime. Often, though, repressive tactics like detention, torture and prosecution help autocrats stay in power.</p>
<h2>Political prisoners</h2>
<p>Many historic pro-democracy leaders, including <a href="https://www.mkgandhi.org/biography/arrest.htm">India’s Mahatma Gandhi</a>, <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2010/11/13/burma-chronology-aung-san-suu-kyis-detention#">Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi</a> and the United States’ <a href="https://kinginstitute.stanford.edu/mlk-topic/martin-luther-king-jr-arrests">Martin Luther King Jr.</a>, were arrested or imprisoned. In these cases, <a href="http://politicalviolenceataglance.org/2015/05/05/the-resisters-toolkit/">political repression mobilized</a> – rather than destroyed – their movements. </p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/jogss/ogaa052">Political prisoners</a>, in particular, can turn into international celebrities that rally people around their cause. </p>
<p>South Africa is an iconic example. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.nelsonmandela.org/content/page/biography-timeline">Imprisoned for 27 years</a>, Nelson Mandela became the face of an anti-apartheid movement that evolved from its South African resistance roots into the <a href="https://theconversation.com/boycotts-rallies-and-free-mandela-uk-anti-apartheid-movement-created-a-blueprint-for-activists-today-134857">largest international campaign</a> for regime change in history. Anti-apartheid groups around the globe coalesced to harness <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/british-anti-apartheid-movement">punitive economic tactics</a>, such as boycotts of South African products, and to pressure their governments to apply sanctions. </p>
<p>Eventually, South Africa’s leaders folded to international demands, releasing Mandela in 1990. Mandela was elected president, <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/24595472?seq=3#metadata_info_tab_contents">ushering in the end of</a> the world’s most racially oppressive system. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Mandela holds his right hand in the air, next to a judge" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=406&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393637/original/file-20210406-17-fhokw7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=510&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Mandela is sworn in as South Africa’s first democratically elected president, 1994.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/nelson-mandela-is-sworn-in-as-the-first-democratically-news-photo/585857374?adppopup=true">Louise Gubb/Corbis Saba/Corbis via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The Belarus example</h2>
<p>Autocrats in the 21st century aren’t like past dictators. Most now claim legitimacy through rigged elections, which is why votes in authoritarian countries are often accompanied by repression.</p>
<p>Last August, Belarusian autocrat Alexander Lukashenko – in power since 1994 – <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53637365">faced an unprecedented electoral challenge</a>. He <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/8/8/leading-belarus-opposition-candidates-campaign-manager-detained">jailed opposition leaders</a> and <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53411735">barred rival candidates</a> from running. The elections were held, and Lukashenko <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/08/10/europe/belarus-election-protests-lukashenko-intl-hnk/index.html">claimed a landslide victory</a>. </p>
<p>But his only remaining opponent in the presidential race, Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/b728b6a0-b84d-4f96-97da-2903575cbc9a">was so popular</a> that neither she nor the Belarusian people bought his win. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/aug/09/belarus-election-lukashenko-landslide-victory-fixing-claims">Widespread protests erupted</a> demanding Lukashenko’s ouster. </p>
<p>Lukashenko – a Putin ally – <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/02/17/belarus-crackdown-escalates">cracked down again</a>, including with brutal police violence. Tikhanovskaya went into exile.</p>
<p>Far from quelling popular anger in Belarus, <a href="https://theconversation.com/belarus-protests-why-people-have-been-taking-to-the-streets-new-data-154494">recent research</a> shows the regime’s violent repression of protests mobilized many people. Protesters <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/winters-quiet-belarus-opposition-prepares-protests-75737562">plan to renew their demonstrations soon</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Women in red stand in the snow, holding fists in the air, with pictures of other women" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393639/original/file-20210406-19-be0a0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Feminists protest dozens of women imprisoned for demonstrating after Belarus’s presidential election, Aug. 9, 2020, Minsk.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/feminist-activists-take-part-in-a-flash-mob-with-news-photo/1231161058?adppopup=true">Atringer/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Still, Lukashenko continues in power. In large part, that’s because many of the nation’s elite and key institutions – like security services and courts – remain loyal to him. </p>
<p>The most successful autocrats don’t just use repression to stay in office. They also retain control through a spoils systems and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/13510347.2013.738860">corruption that aids</a> those who protect their power. </p>
<h2>International condemnation</h2>
<p>Putin is a master of both repression and corrupt bargains – so notorious for both that the United States created new ways to punish such behavior.</p>
<p>A few years after a corruption whistleblower, Sergei Magnitsky, died in a Russian prison in 2009, the U.S. adopted the <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/09/13/us-global-magnitsky-act#">Magnitsky Act</a>, which <a href="https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF10576">now authorizes</a> the president to impose sanctions, including barring entry into the U.S., on “any foreign person identified as engaging in human rights abuse or corruption.” </p>
<p>Canada, the United Kingdom and <a href="https://www.universal-rights.org/uncategorized/eu-adopts-magnitsky-style-individual-sanctions-regime-for-grave-human-rights-violations">European Union</a> later passed similar laws. </p>
<p>These laws <a href="https://www.debevoise.com/insights/publications/2020/12/eu-introduces-magnitsky-style-human-rights">allow countries</a> to punish repressive leaders, as well as any groups or businesses that back their regimes, with asset freezes and travel bans. They have not yet, however, been used against Putin.</p>
<p>In addition to <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/what-are-economic-sanctions">targeted</a> and national sanctions, democratic countries have other ways to reproach states that violate international law. These include severing diplomatic ties and mandating global scrutiny by international bodies like the United Nations. </p>
<p>Such responses have had <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-03-02/biden-s-sanctions-on-russia-saudis-spark-grumblings-of-weakness">limited success</a> in forcing autocratic leaders to respect democracy and human rights. </p>
<p>Take Venezuela, for example. There, President Nicolás Maduro has been in power since 2013, and mass protests against his government began in 2015. </p>
<p>In a series of damning reports, the United Nations has characterized the Maduro regime’s killing and imprisonment of protesters as “<a href="https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=26247&LangID=E">crimes against humanity</a>.” Many countries have imposed <a href="https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2021/02/22/venezuela-19-officials-added-to-the-eu-sanctions-list/">increasingly harsh sanctions on Venezuela</a> over <a href="https://fas.org/sgp/crs/row/IF10715.pdf">many years</a>. </p>
<p>Eventually, in 2019, Maduro <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-48887453">released 22 political prisoners</a> and <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-53985277">pardoned 110 more</a>.</p>
<p>But in December, Venezuela held elections that, once again, failed to meet <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-55211149">democratic standards</a>. </p>
<p>Maduro’s party, unsurprisingly, won. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Maduro in a military hat surrounded by soldiers speaks at a microphone with his hand raised" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=392&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/393641/original/file-20210406-13-1hcyhef.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=493&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">President Maduro of Venezuela speaks at a military parade, Caracas, April 13, 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/president-of-venezuela-nicolas-maduro-speaks-beside-head-of-news-photo/1136941388?adppopup=true">Lokman Ilhan/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>An evolving playing field</h2>
<p>Mass protest campaigns can succeed and have succeeded in ousting dictatorial leaders, as seen recently in Ukraine. There, protests in 2004 and then <a href="https://www.britannica.com/place/Ukraine/The-Maidan-protest-movement">again in 2014</a> reoriented the country away from Russia and toward democracy. </p>
<p>History shows successful protest movements must involve at least <a href="https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20190513-it-only-takes-35-of-people-to-change-the-world">3.5% of the population</a> – including the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1086/704699">urban middle class and industrial workers</a> – engaged in coordinated, nonviolent tactics like general strikes and boycotts. That may not seem like a lot of people, but in a country with the population size of Russia’s, this would require over 5 million people to participate in an organized resistance.</p>
<p>In these circumstances, sanctions and global scrutiny can add real weight to a pro-democracy uprising.</p>
<p>But experts <a href="https://carnegieeurope.eu/2020/12/14/new-eu-global-human-rights-sanctions-regime-breakthrough-or-distraction-pub-83415">worry that the international community’s tools</a> are inadequate given the challenges authoritarianism presents worldwide. Today <a href="https://www.v-dem.net/media/filer_public/de/39/de39af54-0bc5-4421-89ae-fb20dcc53dba/democracy_report.pdf">54% of the global population</a> lives in an autocracy like Russia, Belarus or Venezuela – the highest percentage in 20 years. </p>
<p>Perhaps not coincidentally, pro-democracy movements are also on the rise. Forty-four percent of countries saw <a href="https://www.v-dem.net/media/filer_public/de/39/de39af54-0bc5-4421-89ae-fb20dcc53dba/democracy_report.pdf">mass pro-democracy protests in 2019</a>, up from 27% in 2014.</p>
<p>As the battle between autocracy and democracy plays out in Russia, Belarus and beyond, the world’s historic defenders of democracy – especially the U.S. and European Union – <a href="https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2020/leaderless-struggle-democracy">face their own democratic struggles</a>. </p>
<p>That’s good news for Putin – and more cause for democracy advocates like Navalny to be concerned.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/156172/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Shelley Inglis does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>And there’s not too much the rest of the world can do to stop them.Shelley Inglis, Executive Director, University of Dayton Human Rights Center, University of DaytonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1383562020-05-18T10:57:28Z2020-05-18T10:57:28ZVenezuela failed raid: US has a history of using mercenaries to undermine other regimes<p>Members of the Venezuelan opposition have been accused of conspiring with an American private military company, Silvercorp USA, to invade Venezuela and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/05/venezuela-detains-two-americans-allegedly-involved-in-failed-raid-to-remove-maduro">overthrow the government of Nicolás Maduro</a>. </p>
<p>In early May, the Venezuelan military intercepted a group of dissidents and American mercenaries. The Venezuelan military said it killed eight of the insurgents and captured <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/12/venezuela-arrests-botched-maduro-kidnap-attempt">many others</a>. It also <a href="https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2020/05/05/the-invasion-of-venezuela-brought-to-you-by-silvercorp-usa/">arrested</a> two men it claims are former US Special Forces soldiers. No evidence has surfaced to link the US government to the recent attempted invasion – and it has <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/trump-venezuela-invasion-attempt/2020/05/05/8b4d64ec-8ee7-11ea-9e23-6914ee410a5f_story.html">denied responsibility</a> for the incident.</p>
<p>Juan Guaidó, the Venezuelan opposition leader, has also denied involvement in the thwarted coup attempt. Some of his advisers who were allegedly involved in planning the mission <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/05/guaido-advisers-quit-bungled-venezuela-raid-200511200002059.html">have resigned</a>.</p>
<p>The Washington Post subsequently <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/context/read-the-attachments-to-the-general-services-agreement-between-the-venezuelan-opposition-and-silvercorp/e67f401f-8730-4f66-af53-6a9549b88f94/?no_nav=true&p9w22b2p=b2p22p9w00098">published</a> an agreement between members of the Venezuelan opposition and Silvercorp, including <a href="https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2020/05/07/the-venezuela-silvercorp-usa-saga-keeps-getting-weirder/">signatures</a> of two of Guaidó’s advisers, though not Guaidó, and the chief executive of Silvercorp. The US$1.5 million (£1.2 million) contract outlined Silvercorp’s role in the invasion. One of the detained Silvercorp mercenaries made a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p23nt9Lsm-Y&feature=youtu.be">televised confession</a> (possibly under duress) that he was hired to capture Maduro and bring him to the US. </p>
<p>The incident has worsened relations between the US and Venezuela, which were already tense. In March 2020, the US charged Maduro with “<a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/nicol-s-maduro-moros-and-14-current-and-former-venezuelan-officials-charged-narco-terrorism">narco-terrorism</a>” and offered a US$15m reward for his capture. The Trump administration has also previously <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/05/03/us-mulls-military-options-in-venezuela-trump-maduro-guaido/">considered military options</a> to remove Maduro from power. </p>
<p>These events in Venezuela echo past US secret sponsorship of private armies to overthrow governments elsewhere. The US has an extended <a href="https://www.plutobooks.com/9780745337036/outsourced-empire/">history of sponsoring insurgents and mercenaries</a> to undermine unwanted foreign regimes. </p>
<h2>From Guatemala to Indonesia</h2>
<p>In 1954 the US supported ex-Guatemalan military officer Carlos Castillo Armas in his efforts to overthrow Guatemalan leader Jacobo Arbenz. Armas was the leader of a guerilla army that was trained by <a href="https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674019300">the CIA</a> of Guatemalan to invade from Honduras and Nicaragua. The CIA also hired a US company called <a href="https://www.utdallas.edu/library/specialcollections/hac/cataam/Leeker/history/">Civil Air Transport</a> to bomb Guatemala. Arbenz resigned under pressure and went into exile. Armas became president of a new authoritarian regime. </p>
<p>Similarly, President Dwight Eisenhower authorised the CIA to subvert the Sukarno government in Indonesia in 1957-58. The <a href="https://www.usni.org/press/books/feet-fire">CIA supported</a> local insurgent factions to carry out guerrilla attacks and also hired mercenary airline companies for logistics and combat missions. </p>
<p>The American role was exposed in 1958 when the Indonesian authorities downed the aeroplane of Allen Pope, a contractor for Civil Air Transport, the company that had been involved in Guatemala. The US government tried to deny involvement, stating Pope was a “soldier of fortune” motivated by profit. But the <a href="https://thenewpress.com/books/subversion-foreign-policy">US later quietly withdrew its plans</a> for the forced removal of Sukarno. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/335072/original/file-20200514-77267-1kwl1nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/335072/original/file-20200514-77267-1kwl1nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=379&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335072/original/file-20200514-77267-1kwl1nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=379&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335072/original/file-20200514-77267-1kwl1nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=379&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335072/original/file-20200514-77267-1kwl1nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335072/original/file-20200514-77267-1kwl1nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335072/original/file-20200514-77267-1kwl1nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=477&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Allen Pope on trial in Jakarta in 1959.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_Lawrence_Pope#/media/File:Allen_Pope.jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Bay of Pigs and Nicaragua</h2>
<p>In 1961 the CIA tried to overthrow Fidel Castro’s government in Cuba by organising an invasion of Cuban dissidents and mercenary forces in a notorious incident known as the Bay of Pigs. According to <a href="https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1958-60v06/d481">US government documents</a>, the CIA sponsored Cuban exiles that opposed Castro to “avoid any appearance of US intervention”. <a href="https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB564-CIA-Releases-Controversial-Bay-of-Pigs-History/">The CIA trained</a> a Cuban insurgent force called Brigade 2506 and also hired mercenary airline companies for airborne attacks. Castro’s military defeated the US-sponsored invasion. </p>
<p>During the 1980s, the US also secretly hired mercenary forces to support the Contra insurgency against the socialist Sandanista government of Nicaragua. The CIA mobilised mercenaries to <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Reagan-Versus-The-Sandinistas-The-Undeclared-War-On-Nicaragua/Walker-Williams-Kornbluh-Gold/p/book/9780367285104">sabotage oil refineries and Nicaraguan ports</a>. Later, the <a href="https://www.icj-cij.org/en/case/70">International Court of Justice ruled against the US</a> for employing mercenaries to place underwater mines in Nicaraguan ports. The CIA <a href="https://archive.org/details/reportofcongress87unit/mode/2up">also asked a company</a> called Keenie Meenie Services to conduct “sabotage operations for the resistance” against the Sandanista government. </p>
<p>In October 1986, <a href="https://aadl.org/node/244995">Eugene Hasenfus</a>, a pilot hired by the CIA, was captured when the Nicaraguan military shot down his plane. His confessions exposed secret US arms shipments to the Contras and also helped unravel the <a href="https://www.abebooks.co.uk/9780862325756/David-Goliath-Washingtons-Against-Nicaragua-0862325757/plp">Iran-Contra scandal</a>, which revealed secret weapons sales to Iran in order to fund the Contras in Nicaragua in violation of US law. </p>
<h2>Irregular war on terror</h2>
<p>More recently the US has renewed its commitment to what it calls <a href="https://www.jcs.mil/Portals/36/Documents/Doctrine/concepts/joc_iw_v2.pdf?ver=2017-12-28-162021-510">“irregular warfare”</a>. This includes supporting <a href="https://fas.org/irp/doddir/army/fm3-05-130.pdf">insurgents, militias and mercenaries</a> to weaken unwanted governments, as well as in its <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2008/aug/30/roundupreviews5">counter-terrorism</a> efforts. </p>
<p>The US has covertly supported private armed forces in countries across the Middle East in the “war on terror”. For example, in 2001 the <a href="https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol49no4/War_on_Terror_9.htm">CIA and Special Forces paid warlord factions</a> to help remove the Taliban from power in Afghanistan. Before the US military invasion of Iraq in 2003, the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/dec/11/usa.iraq2">US also supported militias</a> fighting against the regime of Saddam Hussein. The US secretly trained <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/19/world/middleeast/cia-arming-syrian-rebels.html">insurgents</a> in attempts to oust President Bashar al-Assad in Syria. </p>
<p>Of course, an extensive record of supporting insurgents and mercenary forces is not evidence that the US was involved in the recent events in Venezuela. But it does demonstrate that there are precedents for such activities.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/138356/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew Thomson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>US denies backing failed raid to remove Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro – but it has a long history of sponsoring private armies elsewhere.Andrew Thomson, Lecturer, Politics and International Studies, Queen's University BelfastLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1355912020-04-17T12:11:27Z2020-04-17T12:11:27ZCatholic Church urges Venezuela to unite against coronavirus<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/327471/original/file-20200413-146889-1mpf93t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C20%2C4649%2C3073&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">He may be praying, but so far the Pope has declined to intervene in Venezuela's crisis to aid a unified coronavirus response.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/venezuelan-faithful-holds-a-sign-as-he-waits-for-the-news-photo/1087321398?adppopup=true">LUIS ACOSTA/AFP via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Coronavirus hasn’t yet hit Venezuela <a href="https://www.as-coa.org/articles/where-coronavirus-latin-america">as hard</a> as neighboring Brazil and Colombia. But after <a href="https://theconversation.com/inside-venezuelas-crisis-7-essential-reads-89018">years of economic and political crisis</a>, the country’s institutions are in ruins and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/venezuela-coronavirus-health-hospital-maduro-guaido/2020/03/19/74ad110c-6795-11ea-b199-3a9799c54512_story.html">experts agree</a> Venezuela is ill-prepared for a pandemic. </p>
<p>As the stalemate between <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuelas-power-struggle-reaches-a-tense-stalemate-as-human-suffering-deepens-114545">interim President Juan Guaidó and de facto President Nicolás Maduro</a> enters its second year, civil society and world leaders <a href="https://venezuelablog.org/venezuela-weekly-coronavirus-leads-multiple-pushes-political-accord/">are pushing</a> for an emergency agreement that would enable Venezuela to mount a coordinated response to coronavirus. </p>
<p>It will be next to impossible for Maduro’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/nobody-is-going-to-bail-out-venezuela-87428">cash-strapped government</a> to address the coming crisis without significant international financial assistance. Only Guaidó, who is recognized as Venezuela’s legitimate leader <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-argentina-venezuela-iadb/argentina-and-brazil-support-venezuelan-opposition-candidate-at-iadb-idUSKBN1QT1RH">by the United States and most countries in the Americas and Europe</a>, can secure that help.</p>
<p>Many advocates <a href="https://www.usip.org/publications/2020/04/venezuela-could-coronavirus-threat-be-opportunity#.Xo-vzoA9lFs.twitter">are calling upon</a> international actors like the European Union, United Nations or the Vatican to engage the conflicting parties. </p>
<p>As <a href="https://venezuelablog.org/positive-neutrality-can-vatican-effective-venezuela/">sociologists</a> who have <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=mG5rPFUAAAAJ&hl=en">studied religion in Venezuela</a> for <a href="https://berkleycenter.georgetown.edu/responses/the-catholic-church-and-the-venezuela-crisis-20-years-on">years</a>, we are tracking this last possibility closely. We find the Catholic Church is in some ways well positioned to aid Venezuela in this latest crisis. But its power to help is also limited. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/327483/original/file-20200413-125133-obtl7f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/327483/original/file-20200413-125133-obtl7f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/327483/original/file-20200413-125133-obtl7f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/327483/original/file-20200413-125133-obtl7f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/327483/original/file-20200413-125133-obtl7f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/327483/original/file-20200413-125133-obtl7f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/327483/original/file-20200413-125133-obtl7f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/327483/original/file-20200413-125133-obtl7f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Venezuelan Catholics at a Holy Week procession in Caracas, April 8, 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/catholic-faithful-wearing-face-masks-against-the-spread-of-news-photo/1209512149?adppopup=true">Cristian Hernandez/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Broad approval for Catholic Church</h2>
<p>On March 30, Venezuela’s Catholic Church issued <a href="https://conferenciaepiscopalvenezolana.com/downloads/mensaje-de-la-presidencia-de-la-cev-abrazar-al-senor-para-abrazar-la-esperanza">a widely circulated message</a> asking all political leaders to “act decisively to reach a fundamental consensus” that would enable Venezuela to “overcome the serious current public health and socio-economic juncture.” </p>
<p>In his <a href="https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/full-text-pope-francis-easter-sunday-urbi-et-orbi-blessing-43012">Easter message</a>, Pope Francis called for a cease of conflicts around the world. He added “in Venezuela, may [God] enable concrete and immediate solutions” to “permit international assistance to a population suffering.”</p>
<p>But so far, neither the Venezuelan Catholic Church nor the Vatican have followed up with concrete efforts to broker an agreement between the Maduro government and the opposition. </p>
<p>Historically, faith leaders have played an important role in <a href="https://undpress.nd.edu/9780268044312/religious-responses-to-violence/">addressing conflict and violence in Latin America</a>, helping gang members start a new life, supporting peasants confronting landowners or mediating between conflicting parties. In nearby Colombia, the church <a href="https://berkleycenter.georgetown.edu/responses/religion-the-catholic-church-and-peace-in-colombia">was a fundamental player in the peace process</a> that ended the FARC guerrillas’ 52-year insurgency against the government. </p>
<p>The Church’s ability to engage in conflict resolution has come about in Latin America in part because it has a bureaucratic structure and administrative districts across the entire region. The Vatican also has an experienced <a href="https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/udetmr83&div=46&id=&page=">diplomatic corps</a>. </p>
<p>Seventy-three percent of Venezuelans <a href="https://www.pewforum.org/2014/11/13/religion-in-latin-america/">identify as Catholic</a>. And in a society in which the courts, parties and most every other institution of public life are discredited or deeply polarizing, <a href="http://www.gumilla.org/biblioteca/bases/biblo/texto/SIC2012745_211-222.pdf">opinion polls</a> consistently show that the Catholic Church has high approval ratings.</p>
<p><iframe id="J4KVd" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/J4KVd/4/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Pope Francis – the first Latin American to lead the Catholic Church – has shown considerable interest in Venezuela since assuming office in 2013, sending Vatican participants to <a href="https://cruxnow.com/church-in-the-americas/2019/06/vatican-takes-part-in-dialogue-to-resolve-crisis-in-venezuela/">two rounds of dialogue</a> between the Maduro government and the opposition. </p>
<p>The Pope even has some Venezuela experts in his administration. His secretary of state, Msgr. Pietro Parolin, was the Vatican’s ambassador to Venezuela from 2009 to 2013. And Arturo Sosa, Superior General of the Jesuit order – the religious order that Francis is part of – is himself Venezuelan.</p>
<h2>The perils of principles</h2>
<p>But past efforts to mediate in Venezuela’s conflict reveal the limits of the Catholic Church’s capacity to influence the political stalemate there. </p>
<p>The Church’s power, in Venezuela and worldwide, is symbolic. It has no way of actually enforcing political agreements. That makes <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/0149-0508.00035">the Church sensitive to</a> conflicting parties actually respecting its authority. </p>
<p>In 2016 <a href="https://venezuelablog.org/government-and-opposition-agree-on-one-big-thing/">both the opposition and the Maduro government requested Vatican involvement</a> in negotiations. That process eventually resulted in an agreement to recognize Venezuela’s opposition-dominated National Assembly and rid the national electoral authority of its Maduro-dominated directors.</p>
<p>But the Maduro government failed to follow through in good faith. So in January 2017 the <a href="https://venezuelablog.org/no-miracles-in-venezuela-conflict-i-dialogue/">Vatican withdrew from further involvement</a> in Venezuela’s conflict and recalled its envoy. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/327486/original/file-20200413-157316-tvi7x4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/327486/original/file-20200413-157316-tvi7x4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/327486/original/file-20200413-157316-tvi7x4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=381&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/327486/original/file-20200413-157316-tvi7x4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=381&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/327486/original/file-20200413-157316-tvi7x4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=381&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/327486/original/file-20200413-157316-tvi7x4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/327486/original/file-20200413-157316-tvi7x4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/327486/original/file-20200413-157316-tvi7x4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=478&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A temporary hospital for COVID-19 patients goes up in Cucuta, Colombia, on the border with Venezuela, March 28, 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/firegighters-soldiers-and-workers-from-the-office-of-the-news-photo/1208490865?adppopup=true">SCHNEYDER MENDOZA/AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>Two years later, amid a crisis caused by the National Assembly’s designation of Juan Guaidó as interim president, Maduro <a href="https://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/venezuela/maduro-envio-carta-al-papa-para-buscar-dialogo-en-venezuela-322696">asked Pope Francis</a> for renewed Vatican mediation. </p>
<p>In a <a href="https://apnews.com/f950d904fc804d639867f75c04a4f545">private letter</a> that was later leaked, the Pope demurred “because what had been agreed in the meetings was not followed by concrete gestures.”</p>
<h2>‘Positive neutrality’</h2>
<p>Since the failed 2016 negotiations, both the Vatican and Venezuela’s national Catholic Church hierarchy have maintained what they call “<a href="https://venezuelablog.org/positive-neutrality-can-vatican-effective-venezuela/">positive neutrality</a>.” </p>
<p>By positive neutrality, Church leaders mean the effort to engage leaders on both sides of the conflict while pushing for <a href="https://conferenciaepiscopalvenezolana.com/downloads/mensaje-de-la-presidencia-de-la-cev-abrazar-al-senor-para-abrazar-la-esperanza">democratic elections, humanitarian aid and political dialogue</a>. They <a href="https://conferenciaepiscopalvenezolana.com/downloads/comunicado-comision-de-justicia-y-paz">denounce the Maduro government</a> for its bleak human rights record and <a href="https://www.diariolasamericas.com/iglesia-venezolana-critica-el-regimen-totalitario-e-inhumano-maduro-n4190826">denial of Venezuela’s humanitarian crisis</a>. They also criticize the opposition for violent protests and unwillingness to negotiate.</p>
<p>Our tracking of the Church’s public discourse in Venezuela shows that its message has been remarkably consistent throughout the government of Nicolás Maduro.</p>
<p>But in polarized Venezuela, neutrality of any kind is rarely well received. </p>
<p>Opposition members have <a href="https://america.periodistadigital.com/sociedad/20190313/maria-corina-machado-papa-crimen-justicia-hay-punto-medio-noticia-689400558514/">long complained</a> about the Vatican’s willingness to stay on the margins of a conflict that has seen protesters beaten, opposition leaders jailed and democracy dismantled. They see Pope Francis as appeasing an authoritarian with dictatorial plans.</p>
<p>The Maduro government, for its part, views the local Catholic hierarchy as an ally of the opposition. Indeed, Venezuela’s bishops have <a href="https://www.religiondigital.org/america/Cardenal-Urosa-Presidencia-Interina-Guaido-venezuela-asamblea_0_2191880817.html">openly supported</a> the presidential claims of Juan Guaidó.</p>
<p><iframe id="ok7Qu" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/ok7Qu/2/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<h2>Religious authority</h2>
<p>Nonetheless, political leaders on both sides consistently seek the blessing of the Venezuelan Catholic Church and the Vatican’s involvement on their behalf.</p>
<p>Our research confirms that the Church has a level of approval and moral authority in Venezuela that crosscuts political powers. That gives it the <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/rethinking-society-for-the-21st-century/religions-and-social-progress-critical-assessments-and-creative-partnerships/F4DCFDEB009BB27E6536EC776A9F2EA6">potential to alter</a> a conflicted equilibrium. </p>
<p>But this moral authority is fragile, and both the Venezuelan Church and the Vatican jealously guard it. Having been defied once by Maduro, the Pope may be disinclined to back another mediation that might fail.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, the coronavirus pandemic appears certain to deepen what is already a tragic humanitarian emergency.</p>
<p>[<em>You’re smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversation’s authors and editors.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/weekly-highlights-61?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=weeklysmart">You can get our highlights each weekend</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/135591/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Smilde is affiliated with the Washington Office on Latin America, an human rights organization.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Hugo Pérez Hernáiz does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>If anyone can convince the Maduro government and the Venezuelan opposition to come together to fight COVID-19, it’s the Pope. But the Church’s power to negotiate an emergency deal is limited.David Smilde, Professor of Sociology, Tulane UniversityHugo Pérez Hernáiz, Professor of Sociology, Universidad Central de VenezuelaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1307492020-02-11T15:13:54Z2020-02-11T15:13:54ZBrazil’s humane refugee policies: Good ideas can travel north<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314004/original/file-20200206-43069-6iy17t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5760%2C3837&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In this March 2018 photo, Venezuelan children wait for a meal at a migrant shelter set up in Boa Vista, Roraima state, Brazil. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source"> (AP Photo/Eraldo Peres)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The global north tends to view the global south as a source of refugees, and it often implements policies aimed at preventing those refugees from reaching the global north. </p>
<p>Brazil recently set a <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/news/briefing/2019/12/5dea19f34/unhcr-welcomes-brazils-decision-recognize-thousands-venezuelans-refugees.html">bold precedent</a> that should make those northern states adjust the lens. Its policy toward Venezuelan refugees, in contrast to its wealthier peers, is pragmatic, humane and sensible.</p>
<p>Venezuela’s political, economic and social collapse has generated a population hemorrhage: More than 4.5 million, or one in seven Venezuelans, have left, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-brazil-usa/u-s-backs-program-to-help-venezuelan-migrants-settle-in-brazil-idUSKBN1ZR2I8?utm_source=Unknown+List">and most remain in the region.</a> Colombia <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/10/25/dont-let-venezuelas-crisis-take-down-colombia-too-refugees/">hosts around 1.5 million.</a> About 260,000 have entered Brazil through its northern border with Venezuela, <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-brazil-usa/u-s-backs-program-to-help-venezuelan-migrants-settle-in-brazil-idUSKBN1ZR2I8?utm_source=Unknown+List">at a rate of about 500 per day.</a> Three elements of the Brazilian response stand out.</p>
<p>First, Brazil has provided basic shelters and services — not detention — to meet the urgent and immediate needs of people streaming across the Venezuelan border into Roraima province. Brazil partners with United Nations agencies, as well as international, regional and domestic aid agencies that contribute financial and logistical assistance. The Brazilian government has also initiated a policy to redistribute arrivals to the interior of Brazil <a href="https://reliefweb.int/report/brazil/venezuelan-migration-brazil-analysis-interiorisation-programme-july-2019">to reduce the burden on Roraima</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314005/original/file-20200206-43113-cszasf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314005/original/file-20200206-43113-cszasf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314005/original/file-20200206-43113-cszasf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314005/original/file-20200206-43113-cszasf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314005/original/file-20200206-43113-cszasf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314005/original/file-20200206-43113-cszasf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314005/original/file-20200206-43113-cszasf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In this February 2019 photo, Venezuelans stand behind the Spanish sign reading ‘Venezuela-Brazil Limit’ near a border checkpoint in Pacaraima, Roraima state, Brazil, on Venezuela’s southern border.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Ivan Valencia)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Next, Brazil has expanded the scope of entitlement to refugee status. The 1984 <a href="https://www.oas.org/dil/1984_cartagena_declaration_on_refugees.pdf">Cartagena Declaration</a> adopted a regional approach to refugee protection, mindful of the history of Latin American states as both producers and recipients of refugee flows.</p>
<p>The international refugee definition contained in the <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/protection/basic/3b66c2aa10/convention-protocol-relating-status-refugees.html">UN 1951 Refugee Convention</a> is individualistic and requires proof that applicants fear personal persecution. But the Cartagena definition supplements that narrow approach by including people who have fled their countries because their lives, safety or freedom have been threatened by generalized violence, foreign aggression, internal conflicts, massive violation of human rights or other circumstances that have seriously disturbed public order. </p>
<p>In June 2019, Brazil’s National Committee for Refugees <a href="https://news.un.org/pt/story/2019/07/1681741">issued a detailed report</a> concluding that the crisis in Venezuela falls under the purview of the Cartagena Declaration. People labelled as migrants elsewhere because they fall outside the narrow terms of the <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/protection/basic/3b66c2aa10/convention-protocol-relating-status-refugees.html">UN Refugee Convention</a> definition are included as refugees under Cartagena. </p>
<h2>Bolder step</h2>
<p>In December 2019, Brazil took an even bolder step: It dispensed with the requirement of individualized refugee status determination for each Venezuelan asylum applicant. </p>
<p>Applicants in Brazil, with documentary proof of identity and without a criminal record, will receive refugee status without an interview. Refugee status, in turn, entitles them to permanent resident status, access employment, public health care, education and other social services available to Brazilians. </p>
<p>After four years, they may apply for naturalization. Within the first month of the policy, about <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/12/06/brazil-grants-asylum-21000-venezuelans-single-day">21,000 Venezuelans were processed</a> under this new system. </p>
<p>Put this in comparative perspective: Unlike the United States and Australia, Brazil has not set up detention centres, separated families and caged children in order to punish Venezuelans for fleeing intolerable circumstances. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-world-without-immigration-detention-is-possible-116626">A world without immigration detention is possible</a>
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<p>That means that Brazil has not wasted scarce resources on vicious and futile deterrence strategies. Brazil also applies a refugee definition that responds to contemporary patterns of forced migration. And unlike other states with sophisticated refugee status determination regimes, Brazil’s group-based recognition of Venezuelans avoids the creation of a mammoth backlog of Venezuelan asylum applications. </p>
<p>Resources that would have been wasted processing individual Venezuelan asylum claims will be directed at managing settlement and integration, and on determining asylum claims from other places.</p>
<h2>Some are just passing through</h2>
<p>Not all Venezuelans who arrive in Brazil seek asylum. </p>
<p>Many transit <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-brazil-usa/u-s-backs-program-to-help-venezuelan-migrants-settle-in-brazil-idUSKBN1ZR2I8?utm_source=Unknown+List">through Brazil</a> in order to rejoin family or friends in nearby states, such as Argentina or Chile. Others go back and forth between Brazil and Venezuela to deliver food, medicine and other necessities to family and communities who remain there. And some do not wish to see themselves as refugees and so do not claim that legal status.</p>
<p>Brazil also allows Venezuelans to obtain <a href="https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/top-10-2018-issue-1-venezuelan-crisis-deepens-south-america-braces-more-arrivals-and">two-year renewable temporary resident permits</a> that also give them access to employment and to public services like health care and education. </p>
<p>There is good reason to believe that whether they are admitted on temporary permits, or permanently as refugees, most Venezuelans will go home voluntarily if and when the circumstances that caused them to flee have improved. That’s another advantage of regional integration programs that enable people to live, work and continue their lives in proximity to their country of origin.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314003/original/file-20200206-43084-xm3m0h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314003/original/file-20200206-43084-xm3m0h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314003/original/file-20200206-43084-xm3m0h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314003/original/file-20200206-43084-xm3m0h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314003/original/file-20200206-43084-xm3m0h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314003/original/file-20200206-43084-xm3m0h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314003/original/file-20200206-43084-xm3m0h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314003/original/file-20200206-43084-xm3m0h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro plays with a Venezuelan boy at an event for beneficiaries of a program to receive Venezuelan migrants in January 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Eraldo Peres)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Regional solidarity plays a paradoxical role in Brazil’s initiative. The Cartagena Declaration, as well as a <a href="https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/free-movement-south-america-emergence-alternative-model">regional free movement initiative under the Mercosur</a> trade bloc, show the emergence of South American co-operation in migration. </p>
<p>On the other hand, President Jair Bolsonaro has not distinguished himself in the past as a champion of refugees and displaced people. One wonders whether his <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jan/18/bolsonaro-maduro-venezuela-video-message-democracy-reestablished">antipathy toward</a> Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro might have more to do with the Brazilian hospitality shown to Venezuelans fleeing Maduro’s regime than solidarity. One is reminded here of <a href="https://www.americanforeignrelations.com/O-W/Refugee-Policies-Refugees-and-the-cold-war.html">refugee politics during the Cold War</a>. But whatever the motive, the current policy has much to commend it. </p>
<h2>Not perfect</h2>
<p>The system is certainly imperfect. Brazil is a middle-income country, and so the quality and availability of public services is uneven. </p>
<p>Bureaucratic inefficiency and lack of co-ordination among different branches of the state cause delay and confusion. Venezuela is not the only source of asylum-seekers; Brazil also receives asylum seekers from Haiti, Africa and the Middle East.</p>
<p>Local aid organizations struggle to fill service gaps, but their resources are also strained by the surge in Venezuelan arrivals.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/more-protection-urgently-needed-for-venezuelan-lgbtq-refugees-in-brazil-129040">More protection urgently needed for Venezuelan LGBTQ+ refugees in Brazil</a>
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</em>
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<p>The absence of habitable and affordable accommodation is also a massive and critical problem in Brazil. Refugees may have no alternative but to live in extremely dangerous and violent places. Language training is weak, though Portuguese is relatively easy for Spanish speakers to learn. Even though refugees can lawfully seek employment, some employers still take advantage of newcomers by overworking and underpaying them. </p>
<p>These are problems. But they are better problems to have than thousands of <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/09/06/758199418/migrant-children-traumatized-after-separations-report-says">severely traumatized children</a>, thousands of drowning deaths in <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jun/20/the-list-europe-migrant-bodycount">the Mediterranean</a> and the abuse, torture, rape and killing of people <a href="https://www.globaldetentionproject.org/countries/africa/libya">seeking refuge</a>in the detention centres of Libya or <a href="https://www.globaldetentionproject.org/countries/asia-pacific/australia">Manus Island.</a></p>
<p>We have something to learn from the Brazilians. If Brazil can find an efficient, pragmatic way to welcome, protect and integrate hundreds of thousands of forced migrants arriving at its border, so can more affluent states. Good ideas — like good people — can migrate north, and we should welcome them.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/130749/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Audrey Macklin does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>If Brazil can find an efficient, pragmatic way to welcome, protect and integrate hundreds of thousands of forced migrants arriving at its border, so can more affluent states.Audrey Macklin, Professor and Chair in Human Rights Law, Director of the Centre for Criminology and Sociolegal Studies, University of TorontoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1291602019-12-27T14:23:18Z2019-12-27T14:23:18ZCountries to watch in 2020, from Chile to Afghanistan: 5 essential reads<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/307993/original/file-20191219-11914-a47ix3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C4079%2C2715&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Anti-government protesters in Chile defend themselves against a police water cannon, Santiago, Nov. 15, 2019. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Chile-Protests/78c38eaebd6e417b9c67c5ef12bb8969/211/0">AP Photo/Luis Hidalgo</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Where will the world’s attention turn in 2020? </p>
<p>The United States’ impeachment trial of Donald Trump and the United Kingdom’s long-awaited Brexit are sure bets. And after the U.S. military withdrawal from northern Syria in October, Bashar al-Assad may well win his civil war this year.</p>
<p>Many other countries will see pivotal events in 2020, too. Here are five countries to watch. </p>
<h2>1. Venezuela</h2>
<p>This year will bring new depths of misery to Venezuela, which is suffering the worst economic collapse ever seen outside war. </p>
<p>“Most Venezuelans today are desperately poor,” explains St. Mary’s College professor Marco Aponte-Moreno, citing a U.N. statistic that 90% of the people in the South American country live in poverty – double what it was in 2014.</p>
<p>The increasingly severe U.S. economic sanctions passed last year, aimed at crippling the authoritarian regime of Nicolás Maduro, are <a href="https://theconversation.com/5-reasons-why-trumps-venezuela-embargo-wont-end-the-maduro-regime-121538">only making life harder for poor Venezuelans</a>, Aponte-Moreno writes.</p>
<p>Most Venezuelans today rely on monthly government food delivery to survive. </p>
<p>“If the government runs out of money, poor people will feel it the most – not the government officials,” writes Aponte-Moreno. </p>
<p>It is unclear when Maduro’s rule will end. Last year, his government survived several coup attempts and opposition leader Juan Guaidó’s effort to wrest power from Maduro to become Venezuela’s “rightful” president was backed by 60 countries. </p>
<p>“Maduro has few international allies,” says Aponte-Moreno. “But China and Russia continue to be Venezuela’s most powerful international boosters and have bailed out Maduro by giving his government massive loans.”</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/307990/original/file-20191219-11946-1ubbq23.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/307990/original/file-20191219-11946-1ubbq23.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/307990/original/file-20191219-11946-1ubbq23.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307990/original/file-20191219-11946-1ubbq23.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307990/original/file-20191219-11946-1ubbq23.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307990/original/file-20191219-11946-1ubbq23.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=516&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307990/original/file-20191219-11946-1ubbq23.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=516&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307990/original/file-20191219-11946-1ubbq23.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=516&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Children bathe with buckets of water in La Guaira, Venezuela, Aug. 17, 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Venezuela-Political-Crisis/37e63708c8c54728a3556bb75685d8c1/24/0">AP Photo/Leonardo Fernandez</a></span>
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<h2>2. Gabon</h2>
<p>Sixty years ago, Gabon was among 17 African countries to declare their independence from colonial rule. Now, many Gabonese are <a href="https://theconversation.com/as-its-ruling-dynasty-withers-gabon-a-us-ally-and-guardian-of-french-influence-in-africa-ponders-its-future-110076">hoping to enter a new era</a>: democracy.</p>
<p>Gabon’s longtime president Ali Bongo Ondimba, whose family has run the central African country since the late 1960s, is frail after an apparent stroke. The 60-year-old narrowly survived a military coup last January. </p>
<p>These events have “created a strong national sentiment that Gabon’s five-decade Bongo dynasty is on its last legs,” writes University of Tampa political scientist Gyldas A. Ofoulhast-Othamot.</p>
<p>Political upheaval is rare in Gabon, an oil-rich country of 2 million. But stability is not the same as democracy. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/307991/original/file-20191219-11896-h7otj1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/307991/original/file-20191219-11896-h7otj1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/307991/original/file-20191219-11896-h7otj1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307991/original/file-20191219-11896-h7otj1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307991/original/file-20191219-11896-h7otj1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307991/original/file-20191219-11896-h7otj1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307991/original/file-20191219-11896-h7otj1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307991/original/file-20191219-11896-h7otj1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A military ‘coup to restore democracy’ in Gabon in Jan. 2019 failed.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Gabon-Coup/c0fec374c0c049ed8df0f7c6291bc8d7/13/0">Gabon State TV via AP</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>“Gabon has had just three presidents” since 1960, writes Ofoulhast-Othamot. “The current president’s father – Omar Bongo Ondimba – ruled Gabon with an iron fist for 42 years,” allowing oil wealth to enrich a tiny elite and dutifully maintaining the country’s loyalty to France. </p>
<p>Surveys show 87% of Gabonese feel that the country is headed in the wrong direction under Bongo.</p>
<p>Gabon’s next presidential election isn’t until 2023. But, Ofoulhast-Othamot predicts, “Bongo’s time in office may run out sooner.” </p>
<h2>3. Chile</h2>
<p>Chile is one of several South American countries to see massive, sustained demonstrations in recent months. Weeks after declaring “war” on protesters, Chilean president Sebastián Piñera relented to their demands to reinvent the country’s constitution.</p>
<p>Chile’s current constitution was written under Gen. Augusto Pinochet, the dictator who ruled the country from 1973 to 1990. Pinochet is reviled for overseeing several thousand extrajudicial executions, torture and forced disappearances. </p>
<p>He also left the country with social and economic policies now “<a href="https://theconversation.com/chiles-political-crisis-is-another-brutal-legacy-of-long-dead-dictator-pinochet-126305">ripping Chile’s social fabric apart</a>,” writes Drake University’s Paul Posner, who studies inequality in Chile.</p>
<p>Pinochet took free market economics to unprecedented extremes in Chile, eviscerating labor rights and ending government funding of the country’s retirement and health care systems.</p>
<p>“These neoliberal reforms came with strong support from the U.S. government,” notes Posner. </p>
<p>Shifting responsibility for providing social services from the state onto the private sector made Chile an economic dynamo. It has grown by around 4.7% annually since 1990. </p>
<p>But that prosperity was unevenly distributed. Unemployment among poor Chileans is 30%, private health care is exorbitantly expensive and even middle-class Chileans can’t afford to retire.</p>
<p>This year, Chileans will vote on a new constitution meant to address these severe social and economic inequities. </p>
<p>“Raised in democracy, Chile’s young protesters expect a fairer share of the country’s wealth,” writes Posner. “And they’re not old enough to fear an authoritarian crackdown for proclaiming their rights.”</p>
<h2>4. Afghanistan</h2>
<p>Eighteen years into the United States’ disastrous war in Afghanistan, renewed negotiations with the Taliban militant group are raising the possibility of peace.</p>
<p>But that will take more than an accord, says peace-building expert Elizabeth Hassemi, a faculty lecturer at Johns Hopkins University.</p>
<p>“History shows that <a href="https://theconversation.com/taliban-negotiations-resume-feeding-hope-of-a-peaceful-more-prosperous-afghanistan-127772">economic growth and better job opportunities are necessary to rebuild stability after war</a>,” she writes.</p>
<p>Hassemi believes Afghanistan’s “abundant natural resources” could help the country along its path to recovery. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/307995/original/file-20191219-11914-jzt5tl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/307995/original/file-20191219-11914-jzt5tl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/307995/original/file-20191219-11914-jzt5tl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307995/original/file-20191219-11914-jzt5tl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307995/original/file-20191219-11914-jzt5tl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307995/original/file-20191219-11914-jzt5tl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307995/original/file-20191219-11914-jzt5tl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/307995/original/file-20191219-11914-jzt5tl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Afghanistan is open for business, Kabul, Sept. 8, 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Afghanistan-Daily-Life/b13b4f95db6d4fe7b726c359dbaff1d9/25/0">AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Afghanistan produces coveted cashmere, pine nuts and saffron, and the craggy mountains of Panjshir Province hide emeralds of renowned color and purity. In a more stable Afghanistan, says Hassemi, agricultural and mineral exports could bring substantial income to rural areas long held by the Taliban. </p>
<p>“A Taliban accord is necessary to end the Afghanistan war,” Hassemi says. “But creating meaningful jobs and sustainable economic growth will help create a durable peace.”</p>
<h2>5. Mexico</h2>
<p>Thirteen months into Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s presidency, <a href="https://theconversation.com/cartel-sieges-leave-mexicans-wondering-if-criminals-run-the-country-126986">cartel violence in Mexico has never been worse</a>.</p>
<p>“Recent deadly attacks by criminal organizations have instilled fear across Mexico,” writes Angélica Durán-Martínez, of University of Massachusetts Lowell. </p>
<p>These include two shootouts between cartels and police that killed 30 people in October 2019, a deadly 12-hour criminal assault on Culiacán, Sinaloa, that forced Mexican security forces to release the son of drug kingpin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, and the November massacre of nine Mormon women and children in northern Mexico. </p>
<p>López Obrador campaigned on novel strategies to “pacify” Mexico. He proposed pardoning low-level drug traffickers who leave the business, legalizing marijuana and holding trigger-happy soldiers responsible for committing human rights abuses.</p>
<p>Today, those proposals remain largely untested. And with <a href="https://politica.expansion.mx/mexico/2019/12/03/2019-cerrara-con-36-000-homicidios-y-solo-1-de-cada-10-se-castiga-reportes">36,000 murders reported last year</a> – 90% of which went unpunished – 2019 was the bloodiest year in modern Mexican history.</p>
<p><em>This story is a round-up of articles from The Conversation’s archives.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/129160/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
There’s much more going on in the world than the Trump impeachment and Brexit. Here are five momentous global stories to track in 2020.Catesby Holmes, International Editor | Politics Editor, The Conversation USLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1243852019-10-09T16:50:28Z2019-10-09T16:50:28ZThe Latin American left isn’t dead yet<p>Argentina, Bolivia and <a href="https://www.elpais.com.uy/informacion/politica/elecciones-dicen-encuestas-cara-octubre.html">Uruguay</a> will all hold presidential elections in October. And, for now, leftists are <a href="https://www.as-coa.org/content/guide-2019-latin-american-elections/argentina">strong contenders</a> in all three countries. </p>
<p>This is a somewhat unexpected development. Beginning in 2015, <a href="https://nacla.org/news/2016/12/09/right-turn">conservatives toppled</a> major leftist strongholds, including in Brazil, Argentina and Chile. The socially progressive Latin American left was <a href="https://aulablog.net/2019/01/09/a-right-turn-in-latin-america/">declared dead</a> <a href="https://www.jacobinmag.com/2016/07/pink-tide-latin-america-chavez-morales-capitalism-socialism/">many times over</a>. </p>
<p>But the left-leaning populist Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/andres-manuel-lopez-obrador-was-elected-to-transform-mexico-can-he-do-it-99176">victory in Mexico</a> in July 2018 showed that Latin American political winds don’t all blow in the <a href="https://theconversation.com/mexicos-left-turn-and-the-road-to-uncertainty-106847">same direction</a>.</p>
<p>So what can be learned from the failures and successes of Latin America’s leftist parties and governments in the very recent past?</p>
<h2>Latin America’s ‘left turn’</h2>
<p>About two-thirds of all Latin Americans lived under some form of leftist government <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/book/1866">by 2010</a> – a “pink tide” that washed over the region following the election of Hugo Chávez in Venezuela in 1998. </p>
<p>Only a few countries – notably Colombia and Mexico – remained under conservative political leadership during this period.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/296464/original/file-20191010-188792-1ysbkxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/296464/original/file-20191010-188792-1ysbkxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/296464/original/file-20191010-188792-1ysbkxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=750&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296464/original/file-20191010-188792-1ysbkxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=750&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296464/original/file-20191010-188792-1ysbkxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=750&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296464/original/file-20191010-188792-1ysbkxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=943&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296464/original/file-20191010-188792-1ysbkxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=943&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296464/original/file-20191010-188792-1ysbkxb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=943&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Argentina, Bolivia and Uruguay have elections in October.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock.com/The Conversation</span></span>
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</figure>
<p>Academics conventionally grouped this <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/welfare-and-party-politics-in-latin-america/BFE6B43ED35B5CB02919279F5620AB73">Latin American left</a> into <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=eKOwSqYH5rcC&printsec=frontcover&dq=uruguay+social+democratic+left&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiBl7LNpY_lAhXQl-AKHaIlB7QQ6AEwAHoECAEQAg#v=onepage&q=uruguay%20social%20democratic%20left&f=false">two camps</a>. </p>
<p>There was the moderate “social democratic” left of Brazil, Chile and Uruguay, which embraced an agenda of egalitarianism while accepting the basic precepts of market economics. </p>
<p>This group was generally contrasted with the <a href="https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=3IVjDgAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PT5&ots=8jhwLduGbl&sig=eLyxmkw3j55zS5nuIfqGGkj6WI8#v=onepage&q&f=false">more radical “populist” left</a> that ran Venezuela, <a href="https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/cuny/cp/2016/00000048/00000004/art00003">Bolivia</a>, Nicaragua and Ecuador. These governments shared the moderate left’s commitment to progressive social change but had bolder aims: an alternative to market economics and profound changes to political institutions. </p>
<p>Such groupings did little to predict these countries’ divergent fates.</p>
<p>In a few places, leftist governments have remained popular, vibrant and electorally competitive after over a decade in power – namely <a href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/bolivia/2018-02-14/key-evo-morales-political-longevity">Bolivia and Uruguay</a>. </p>
<p>But by 2015, <a href="https://www.journalofdemocracy.org/articles/bolsonaro-and-brazils-illiberal-backlash/">Brazil</a>, <a href="https://www.wola.org/sites/default/files/Venezuela/Smilde%20Current%20History--final.pdf">Venezuela</a> and <a href="https://nacla.org/news/2018/07/25/nicaragua-view-left">Nicaragua</a> had all become political and economic catastrophes. <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/party-vibrancy-and-democracy-in-latin-america-9780190870041?cc=us&lang=en&">Chile’s leftist government</a> sharply declined in popularity. </p>
<h2>The conformist temptation</h2>
<p>Our <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ob2gBJoAAAAJ&hl=en">political science research</a> identifies some shared weaknesses of the <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=d7yzgzQAAAAJ&hl=en">Latin American left</a>.</p>
<p>The first lesson comes from the Workers Party, which governed Brazil between 2003 and 2016. </p>
<p>Like many progressive parties, the Workers Party’s founding leaders were idealistic – committed to <a href="https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300050745/workers-party-and-democratization-brazil">upending Brazilian politics as usual</a>. </p>
<p>Under the Workers Party, Brazil experienced a massive <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11186-019-09351-7">expansion of social citizenship rights</a>. By 2008, Brazilian President Lula da Silva was arguably the <a href="https://theconversation.com/as-brazil-tilts-rightward-lulas-leftist-legacy-of-lifting-the-poor-is-at-risk-65939">world’s most popular president</a>.</p>
<p>But the Workers Party became <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/gb/academic/subjects/politics-international-relations/comparative-politics/transformation-workers-party-brazil-19892009?format=PB&isbn=9780521733007">detached from the social movements</a> it once championed. Deeply immersed in the normal – even <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-brazil-is-winning-its-fight-against-corruption-71968">corrupt</a> – give-and-take of Brazilian politics, the party came to be molded by the flawed system it sought to change.</p>
<p>We call this pitfall the “conformist temptation.” </p>
<p>The Workers Party rule ended with the <a href="https://theconversation.com/impeachment-culture-wars-and-the-politics-of-identity-in-brazil-59436">2016 impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff</a>, Lula’s hand-picked successor. Although Rousseff herself <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-is-brazilian-president-dilma-rousseffs-real-crime-59363">faced no corruption charges</a>, the Workers Party left power associated with corruption scandals, campaign finance violations and economic mismanagement – the exact problems it had promised to fix.</p>
<p>Chile’s Socialist Party met a similar fate. </p>
<p>Under Presidents Ricardo Lagos and Michelle Bachelet, moderate leftists who governed Chile almost uninterrupted from 2001 to 2018, the party <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/12/18/chile-just-elected-a-billionaire-president-these-are-the-4-things-you-need-to-know/">distanced itself from its supporters in social movements</a>.</p>
<p>In 2011, students and teachers began <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2011/08/student-protests-in-chile/100125/">protesting</a> Chile’s low levels of public education funding and <a href="https://www.borgenmagazine.com/economic-inequality-in-chile/">high inequality</a>. The <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1866802X1600800305">youth protest movement</a> grew, exposing Chileans’ disappointment at the Socialists’ limited progress on social reforms. </p>
<p>These divisions on the left <a href="https://theconversation.com/chile-heads-into-presidential-runoff-with-a-transformed-political-landscape-86453">allowed Chile’s strong right wing to win</a> Chile’s 2018 presidential election.</p>
<h2>The autocratic temptation</h2>
<p>Crises in Venezuela, Nicaragua and Ecuador result from a different fatal flaw. </p>
<p>In these three countries, leftist leaders succumbed to what we call the “autocratic temptation” – the idea that a charismatic leader or popular political movement not only can speak for an <a href="https://www.journalofdemocracy.org/articles/latin-americas-authoritarian-drift-the-threat-from-the-populist-left/">entire nation</a> but that they can <a href="https://theconversation.com/bolivia-is-not-venezuela-even-if-its-president-does-want-to-stay-in-power-forever-93253">do so forever</a>.</p>
<p>Like many authoritarian leaders, Venezuela’s Nicolás Maduro and Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega have lost touch with their constituents. When leaders become too insulated, <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-dictators-dilemma-9780190228552?cc=us&lang=en&">research shows</a>, safeguards against corruption and irresponsible public policies weaken. </p>
<p>Authoritarian leaders are less likely to change course when things go wrong. </p>
<p>The consequences may be devastating – like Maduro’s egregious failure to adjust Venezuela’s exchange rate policies during its descent into economic crisis and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/venezuelas-crisis-in-5-charts/2019/01/26/97af60a6-20c4-11e9-a759-2b8541bbbe20_story.html">hyperinflation</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.journalofdemocracy.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/Weyland-24-3.pdf">Authoritarian leadership</a> has degraded democracy in Venezuela, Nicaragua and Ecuador in other ways, too. <a href="https://theconversation.com/ecuadors-populist-electoral-victory-for-moreno-shows-erosion-of-democracy-75157">Checks and balances on presidential authority</a> have been weakened and press freedoms restricted. In Venezuela and Nicaragua, the <a href="https://theconversation.com/nicaragua-protests-threaten-an-authoritarian-regime-that-looked-like-it-might-never-fall-95776">electoral process was manipulated</a>.</p>
<p>The autocratic temptation to lionize a charismatic founding leader weakens the governing political party, too, by making it extremely difficult for new leaders to emerge and carry forward the party’s long-term transformative agenda.</p>
<p>In Nicaragua and Venezuela, that has meant that <a href="https://theconversation.com/nicaraguans-try-to-topple-a-dictator-again-98123">autocrats have clung to power</a> despite popular demand that they leave.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://aulablog.net/2018/02/02/ecuador-referendum-marks-critical-juncture-for-moreno-and-correa/">Ecuador</a>, the current and former presidents – Lenín Moreno and Rafael Correa – are engaged in a bitter dispute. Protests have rocked Ecuador over Moreno’s <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-49955695">economic policy shifts</a> away from Correa’s agenda.</p>
<h2>Leftist exceptions</h2>
<p>So what explains the resilience of the left in <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/when-movements-become-parties/F06BEE9DEA9BA4E7DCFBD9A87266FAB8#fndtn-information">Bolivia</a> and <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/how-party-activism-survives/93C5584DB63DF0A80B51F3EEB68BC8E9">Uruguay</a>, where leftist parties have reduced <a href="http://www.santiagoanria.com/data.html">inequality</a> and made tremendous progress toward <a href="https://www.journalofdemocracy.org/articles/delegative-democracy-revisited-more-inclusion-less-liberalism-in-bolivia/">social and political inclusion</a>? Left-wing candidates are polling well in both countries’ <a href="http://www.startribune.com/evo-morales-not-trending-among-bolivia-s-youth-ahead-of-vote/562382812">presidential races</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/296075/original/file-20191008-128681-1cs7t1u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/296075/original/file-20191008-128681-1cs7t1u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296075/original/file-20191008-128681-1cs7t1u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296075/original/file-20191008-128681-1cs7t1u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=451&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296075/original/file-20191008-128681-1cs7t1u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296075/original/file-20191008-128681-1cs7t1u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/296075/original/file-20191008-128681-1cs7t1u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Argentine presidential candidate Alberto Fernandez and running mate, former President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, at a campaign rally, Aug. 7, 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://pictures.reuters.com/CS.aspx?VP3=SearchResult&VBID=2C0BXZSUWZX3IE&SMLS=1&RW=1920&RH=996#/SearchResult&VBID=2C0BXZSUWZX3IE&SMLS=1&RW=1920&RH=996&POPUPPN=8&POPUPIID=2C0BF1MYIRFG1">Reuters/Agustin Marcarian</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In our assessment, what sets Bolivia and Uruguay apart is the strength of the ties between the leftist parties and <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/when-movements-become-parties/F06BEE9DEA9BA4E7DCFBD9A87266FAB8#fndtn-information">allied social movements</a> there. That has encouraged the accountability and responsiveness lacking in Venezuela, Brazil and Chile. </p>
<p>Civil society in Bolivia and Uruguay also retained its capacity for independent mobilization, constraining any possible slide into autocracy or unbridled ambition. </p>
<p>That may explain why Bolivia has so far <a href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/bolivia/2018-02-14/key-evo-morales-political-longevity">avoided the worst social and economic consequences of the autocratic temptation</a> – despite its charismatic indigenous president, Evo Morales, <a href="https://theconversation.com/bolivia-is-not-venezuela-even-if-its-president-does-want-to-stay-in-power-forever-93253">eliminating term limits and consolidating power</a> over the past 14 years. </p>
<p>In Argentina the left’s possible comeback has more to do with conservative president Mauricio Macri’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/sep/10/argentina-economic-crisis-imf-debt-default">economic mismanagement</a>. But the center-left ticket leading Argentina’s presidential race has also succeeded because the candidates formed a broad national coalition – one that includes an array of social movements, from labor unions to feminist groups.</p>
<p>The Latin American left has some life in it yet.</p>
<p>[ <em>You respect facts and expertise. So do The Conversation’s authors and editors.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=yourespect">You can read us daily by subscribing to our newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/124385/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Progressives are leading in the presidential elections of Argentina, Uruguay and Bolivia, bucking the region’s recent rightward trend. But there are lessons in the failures of leftists past.Santiago Anria, Assistant Professor of Political Science and Latin American Studies, Dickinson CollegeKenneth M. Roberts, Richard J. Schwartz Professor of Government and Director, Latin American Studies Program, Cornell UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1247152019-10-09T14:35:14Z2019-10-09T14:35:14ZLatin America: history of treaty used to impose sanctions on Venezuela shows it’s a clumsy way to advance democracy<p>With a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/aug/08/colombia-border-venezuela-war-farc-report">war scare on the Colombian border</a>, duelling presidents in Caracas, and schemes to rescue a <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09692290.2019.1625422?journalCode=rrip20#.XRs9sxhh5ig.twitter">collapsing economy with cryptocurrency</a>, the Venezuela crisis lurches forward even as the international community struggles to change the facts on the ground. </p>
<p>In the most recent escalation of regional pressure, a group of western hemisphere countries including the US, Canada and a host of South American and Caribbean states <a href="https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2019-09-23/trump-south-american-countries-treaty-against-venezuela">voted in September</a> to implement coordinated sanctions against Venezuelan incumbent Nicolás Maduro under the Rio Treaty. These call for extraditing and freezing the assets of certain members of the Maduro regime suspected of criminal activities or human rights violations.</p>
<p>But this decades-old pact is unlikely to give these states the leverage to push Maduro from power. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.oas.org/juridico/english/treaties/b-29.html">The Rio Treaty</a> – whose foundations were built during World War II and its immediate aftermath – is a clumsy instrument for promoting democracy. Officially called the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance, it was signed in September 1947 and has been in force since 1948. The pact <a href="https://www.oas.org/juridico/english/sigs/b-29.html">has 19 member states</a>, after the withdrawal of Mexico, Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, and Nicaragua in recent years. Since the September vote, Uruguay – which was the only country to vote against the move to impose sanctions on Venezuela – also <a href="https://en.mercopress.com/2019/09/25/in-support-of-venezuela-uruguay-abandons-the-rio-treaty">announced</a> it would withdraw from the treaty, which it warned may open a path to armed intervention.</p>
<p>Though long-criticised as a US imposition, the <a href="https://academic.oup.com/ia/article/94/6/1371/5162441">treaty emerged</a> from a Latin American diplomatic victory to create space for regional organisations at a UN conference in 1945 in San Francisco. </p>
<p>Though the same immediate postwar years saw a relative flowering of democracy in Latin America, the Rio Treaty was not envisioned as an instrument for advancing democracy. The eventual text consigned democracy to its <a href="http://www.oas.org/juridico/english/treaties/b-29.html">non-binding preamble</a>. However, early discussions for the Rio Treaty considered the protection and promotion of democracy much more explicitly.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/latin-america-shuts-out-desperate-venezuelans-but-colombias-border-remains-open-for-now-123307">Latin America shuts out desperate Venezuelans but Colombia's border remains open – for now</a>
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<h2>Chances lost</h2>
<p>The most important related regional debate occurred in late 1945 and early 1946 over the so-called “Larreta Doctrine,” which we’ve explored in a <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-politics/article/promise-of-precommitment-in-democracy-and-human-rights-the-hopeful-forgotten-failure-of-the-larreta-doctrine/61FAF29CE66955B2797DF473A6BED176">new research paper</a>. This Uruguayan proposal and the debate around it offer insights into the Rio Treaty’s limitations for promoting democracy and, more importantly, grounds for new thinking about how to address democratic erosion in the Americas.</p>
<p>The proposal, launched by Uruguayan foreign minister Eduardo Rodríguez Larreta, <a href="https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1945v09/d133">had three key elements</a>. First, Rodríguez Larreta insisted democracy and the protection of rights must be considered together. The erosion of either was a concern to neighbours because it threatened the American community, fostered aggressive governments and produced negative spillovers. </p>
<p>Second, where popular sovereignty reigned, governments should commit, in advance, to protect fragile democracies. This also included “locking in” one’s own successors in a web of domestic and regional commitments. The Larreta Doctrine would create regional mechanisms to take collective action to restore rights – though the Uruguayan insisted that military intervention was not the goal. </p>
<p>The third aspect of the proposal was crucial: the US must work through the regional system and do without unilateral diplomatic and military reprisals. Rodríguez Larreta was not blind to power disparities: he understood the US needed to be both engaged and restrained for the system to work.</p>
<p>The willingness of many Latin American states to consider this plan – despite fears it opened the door to US interventionism – <a href="https://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/10.1162/ISEC_a_00212">was one of the fruits</a> of US president Franklin Roosevelt’s “Good Neighbour Policy”. However, trust was not deep enough, nor was democratic governance broad enough and the majority of Latin American states rejected the proposal.</p>
<h2>The spectre of interventionism</h2>
<p>Alongside the failure of the Larreta Doctrine, the US commitment to nonintervention faltered and space for democracy in the region contracted in the late 1940s. The Rio Treaty emerged with the vestiges of wartime co-operation, but it also showed the effect of this shrinking international and domestic political space. The treaty’s signatories made no commitment to democracy, frustrating Rodríguez Larreta’s hopes.</p>
<p>That history suggests why the Rio Treaty is a poor instrument to deal with democratic erosion in the hemisphere: its founding moment rejected that purpose. The application today to one crisis in Venezuela while ignoring the others budding in Latin America echoes the shrinking space and returning interventionism of 1947. The trust that existed was further ruptured by <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books/about/The_Killing_Zone.html?id=0qeecQAACAAJ&redir_esc=y">US Cold War interventionism</a> in Guatemala, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Chile and Nicaragua, among others.</p>
<p>Today, US-led policy in the region faces similar problems. Trust has been undermined by Trump’s anti-immigrant policies at home – widely covered in Latin America – and his attacks on commercial and diplomatic relationships. Concern for democracy and rights also seems reserved for ideological foes, while US allies in <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/u-s-signs-asylum-agreement-with-honduras">Honduras</a> and <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/02/05/trump-republican-lawmakers-weaken-u-n-anti-corruption-commission-guatemala-jimmy-morales-white-house-putin/">Guatemala</a> are given a pass.</p>
<p>Likewise, Trump’s view has been <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/aug/11/donald-trump-venezuela-crisis-military-intervention">too focused on threats of force</a> from the start. Nothing fragments consensus in the Americas like the possibility of US military intervention. Though few saw Trump’s threats as credible, they gave ammunition to the Venezuelan government and risked fracturing opposition consensus within Venezuela and internationally.</p>
<p>For the region as a whole, the response to Venezuela has been <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-how-latin-american-tolerance-of-illiberalism-let-a-nation-slide-into-crisis-110537">too late in coalescing</a>. As long as ideology and oil revenues made Venezuela an attractive partner, many throughout the region turned a blind eye to a long trend toward concentration of power in the country, through the suspension of the legislature and the violent suppression of protests. Opportunities to act collectively through less coercive means were lost.</p>
<p>The history of the Rio Treaty – and the exclusion of the Larreta Doctrine and democracy from that pact – illustrate <a href="https://larrlasa.org/articles/10.25222/larr.459/">the limits that regional policy faces today</a>. They also suggest the need for a very different approach, built on regional consensus, clear commitments and multilateral procedures, and credible great power restraint.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/124715/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tom Long has received funding from the British Council, British Academy, and Truman Library Institute.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Max Paul Friedman has received funding from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and the US Studies Centre at the University of Sydney. </span></em></p>When the Rio Treaty was signed in 1947, an opportunity was missed to promote democracy in Latin America.Tom Long, Associate Professor in New Rising World Powers, University of WarwickMax Paul Friedman, Professor of History, American UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1215382019-08-07T17:13:22Z2019-08-07T17:13:22Z5 reasons why Trump’s Venezuela embargo won’t end the Maduro regime<p>The U.S. has <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/08/05/politics/trump-economic-embargo-venezuela/index.html">announced</a> an economic embargo on Venezuela, intended to put an end to President Nicolás Maduro’s authoritarian regime. </p>
<p>In an Aug. 5 <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/executive-order-blocking-property-government-venezuela/">executive order</a>, President Donald Trump said that the tough new sanctions – which target any company or individual outside of Venezuela doing business directly or indirectly with Maduro’s government – were a response to the Maduro regime’s “continued usurpation of power” and “human rights abuses.” </p>
<p>All Venezuelan government assets in the United States are also now frozen. </p>
<p>The new measures represent a significant escalation from <a href="https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/programs/pages/venezuela.aspx">previous sanctions</a>, which mainly targeted government officials and some key industries such as oil and gas, gold and finance.</p>
<p>But my <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/marco-aponte-moreno-134249">analysis of Venezuela’s political and economic crisis</a> suggests that an embargo alone will not provoke Maduro’s ouster. Here are five reasons why.</p>
<h2>1. Venezuela’s economy is already broken</h2>
<p>Embargos are a <a href="https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/what-are-economic-sanctions">foreign policy tool</a> meant to pressure rogue governments into changing their ways by cutting off their cash flow.</p>
<p>It’s too late for that in Venezuela. </p>
<p>After years of mismanagement and corruption by the Maduro government, Venezuela’s economy is in <a href="https://theconversation.com/inside-venezuelas-economic-collapse-80597">shambles</a>. The GDP has contracted by <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-46999668">more than 15% every year since 2016</a>. Hyperinflation hit <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/08/02/venezuela-inflation-at-10-million-percent-its-time-for-shock-therapy.html">10 million percent</a> in 2019. </p>
<p>Maduro’s cash-strapped government <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/francescoppola/2017/11/14/venezuela-defaults/#3806fbe62755">defaulted on its dollar-based bonds</a> in 2017. This year it has <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-06-04/venezuela-is-said-to-default-on-gold-swap-with-deutsche-bank">failed to make payments on US$1.85 billion</a> that Deutsche Bank and Citigroup loaned Venezuela using the regime’s gold as collateral. Venezuela’s government is nearly bankrupt.</p>
<p>But since this economic decline has happened gradually, beginning in 2014, wealthy Venezuelans – especially corrupt government officials – have already <a href="https://www.gazetadopovo.com.br/wiseup-news/who-are-venezuelas-wealthy/">put their money overseas</a>, primarily in European markets. For example, Venezuelans own some <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/29/world/europe/spain-property-boom-venezuela.html">7,000 luxury apartments</a> in Madrid, according to The New York Times. </p>
<p>American sanctions just can’t hurt Venezuela’s ruling class the way they might have several years ago.</p>
<h2>2. The embargo leaves some cash flows untouched</h2>
<p>Trump’s harsh new sanctions on Venezuela are not a full trade embargo like the Cuba embargo, which has almost totally <a href="https://insightcuba.com/faq/trade-embargo-cuba">isolated the island from world markets since 1962</a>. </p>
<p>Imports and exports with the private sector – a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-freezes-venezuela-govt-assets-in-escalation/2019/08/05/f8f4dd0a-b7eb-11e9-8e83-4e6687e99814_story.html">still sizable market</a> despite Maduro’s socialist policies – will continue to flow freely, as will remittances from Venezuelans living abroad. </p>
<p>These two income sources both come in dollars, which is far more stable and valuable than the local currency. Combined, they can keep the ailing Venezuelan economy afloat for some time. </p>
<p>An incomplete embargo, in other words, will not provoke complete economic collapse. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/287182/original/file-20190807-144878-1a84vcw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/287182/original/file-20190807-144878-1a84vcw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/287182/original/file-20190807-144878-1a84vcw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/287182/original/file-20190807-144878-1a84vcw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/287182/original/file-20190807-144878-1a84vcw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/287182/original/file-20190807-144878-1a84vcw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/287182/original/file-20190807-144878-1a84vcw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/287182/original/file-20190807-144878-1a84vcw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The U.S. embargo is sure to be unpopular in Venezuela. A wall in Caracas reads, ‘Trump, un-embargo Venezuela.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Venezuela-Executive-Order/6010ad273b83495897ff4d528ae3b38d/5/0">AP Photo/Leonardo Fernandez</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>3. The poor, not the regime, will be hurt the most</h2>
<p>Venezuelans with <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/13/venezuela-hyperinflation-bolivar-banknotes-dollars">access to dollars</a> – through remittances or savings squirreled away before the crisis – are surviving this crisis. They can afford food, medicine and gasoline, and buy other goods to barter. </p>
<p>But most Venezuelans today are desperately poor. According to the United Nations, <a href="https://borgenproject.org/top-10-facts-about-poverty-in-venezuela/">90% of people there live in poverty</a>. That’s double what it was in 2014.</p>
<p>The Venezuelan minimum wage of roughly $7 per month is not enough to cover a family’s basic needs. As a result, malnutrition is spreading. Last year, Venezuelans reported <a href="https://borgenproject.org/top-10-facts-about-poverty-in-venezuela/">losing an average of 25 pounds</a>, and two-thirds said they <a href="https://borgenproject.org/top-10-facts-about-poverty-in-venezuela/">go to bed hungry</a>.</p>
<p>The majority of Venezuelans rely on the government to eat. Its monthly <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-food/for-poor-venezuelans-a-box-of-food-may-sway-vote-for-maduro-idUSKCN1GO173">delivery of heavily subsidized food and basic goods</a> known as “CLAP” is a lifeline to the poor. If the government runs out of money, poor people will feel it the most – not the government officials and other Venezuelans with <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/13/venezuela-hyperinflation-bolivar-banknotes-dollars">access to dollars</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/287109/original/file-20190806-84225-1pk34ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/287109/original/file-20190806-84225-1pk34ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/287109/original/file-20190806-84225-1pk34ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/287109/original/file-20190806-84225-1pk34ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/287109/original/file-20190806-84225-1pk34ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/287109/original/file-20190806-84225-1pk34ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/287109/original/file-20190806-84225-1pk34ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Venezuelan National Militia members carry boxes of subsidized food for distribution across the capital of Caracas, July 5, 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Venezuela-Independence-Day/83058532fb664fe88fe46bd1f2507378/2/0">AP Photos/Ariana Cubillos</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>4. China and Russia still support Venezuela</h2>
<p>Maduro has few international allies. When the Trump administration led efforts earlier this year to <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-power-struggle-plunges-nation-into-turmoil-3-essential-reads-110419">recognize opposition leader Juan Guaidó as the legitimate president of Venezuela</a>, 60 countries joined it.</p>
<p>But China and Russia continue to be the Venezuela’s most powerful international boosters and have bailed out Maduro by giving his government <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/02/22/china-russia-have-deep-financial-ties-venezuela-heres-whats-stake/">massive loans</a> in the past. Both have <a href="https://www.euronews.com/2019/02/28/watch-live-un-security-council-votes-on-rival-us-russian-proposals-on-venezuela">vetoed every U.S. effort to pass resolutions against Maduro’s government</a> within the United Nations. </p>
<p>China has exploited <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/02/22/china-russia-have-deep-financial-ties-venezuela-heres-whats-stake/">Venezuela’s vast natural resources</a> for profit. Russia has made the South American nation a strategic geopolitical partner in the Western Hemisphere, a key ally in its <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/08/world/americas/russia-venezuela-maduro-putin.html">efforts to undermine American influence</a>. </p>
<p>Neither of the two countries are likely to comply with an economic embargo to Venezuela. Analysts expect them to <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article233590982.html">continue buying oil, gold</a> and other valuable commodities from Maduro’s regime, providing much-needed cash to his government.</p>
<h2>5. Remember Cuba?</h2>
<p>Embargoes rarely produce regime change of the sort Trump seeks in Venezuela. </p>
<p>Just consider Cuba, which this year celebrated the 66th anniversary of its communist revolution – 57 years after the Kennedy government imposed a <a href="https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/programs/pages/cuba.aspx">trade embargo against it</a>. The Cuba embargo didn’t end the Castro regime; it fueled anti-American sentiment, handing the Castros an easy scapegoat for all the country’s problems – thereby <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/12/141217-cuba-united-states-relations-culture-reaction-castro-obama-world/">improving the government’s own popularity</a>.</p>
<p>An embargo will almost surely do the same in Venezuela. Trump has given Maduro even <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2019/02/15/maduro-blames-trump-for-venezuelas-great-depression/">more ammunition to blame the U.S.</a> for his country’s economic woes. </p>
<p>Maduro has been <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/12/world/americas/venezuela-nicolas-maduro-obama.html">doing that for years</a> anyway. Now, he won’t be totally wrong.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/121538/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marco Aponte-Moreno does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>For one, you can’t break an economy that’s already broken.Marco Aponte-Moreno, Associate Professor of Global Business and Board Member of the Institute for Latino and Latin American Studies, St Mary's College of California Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1203192019-07-24T22:23:06Z2019-07-24T22:23:06ZCanada’s misguided Venezuela policy and the inhumanity of sanctions<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285352/original/file-20190723-110170-z07aln.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C2554%2C1689&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A line of cars spills on to the street as drivers wait to fill their tanks at a fuel station in Cabimas, Venezuela, in May 2019. U.S. sanctions on oil-rich Venezuela appear to be taking hold, resulting in mile-long lines for fuel and other hardships. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>No matter what you believe in or who you believe, there is no denying that what Venezuelans are currently facing <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-trash/warding-off-hunger-venezuelans-find-meals-in-garbage-bins-idUSKCN1QI503">is horrific</a> and morally unacceptable. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/23/world/americas/venezuela-news-noticias.html">Mainstream media</a> <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/24/americas/venezuela-crisis-maduro-guaido-explained/index.html">reports and analyses</a> suggest that the path to stability in Venezuela should be based on a strong moral approach. They believe that Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro’s policies have caused significant economic mismanagement and poor governance. </p>
<p>They often suggest these polices are the source of the current economic and humanitarian crises. Therefore, they urge the international community to promote a change in political leadership in Venezuela or a transformation in the country’s political system. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285351/original/file-20190723-110187-9x4kjk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285351/original/file-20190723-110187-9x4kjk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285351/original/file-20190723-110187-9x4kjk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285351/original/file-20190723-110187-9x4kjk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285351/original/file-20190723-110187-9x4kjk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285351/original/file-20190723-110187-9x4kjk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285351/original/file-20190723-110187-9x4kjk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285351/original/file-20190723-110187-9x4kjk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">In this April 2019 photo, Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro raises his fist to supporters rallying at the presidential palace in Caracas.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But those economic, humanitarian and geopolitical analyses are either incomplete or wrong. Such reports typically ignore the devastating costs of external sanctions. The analysis also focuses solely on the actions of the Chávez and Maduro regimes, and misinterpret the legal basis for international intervention. </p>
<p>We need greater balance when discussing the causes of Venezuela’s economic crisis and should question the legitimacy of external interventions. </p>
<h2>Economic costs caused by outsiders</h2>
<p>The link between the current crisis and Venezuela’s national economic and governance policies and mechanisms is misplaced. The economic costs associated with international economic crises since 2004, along with economic sanctions levied against Venezuela, have been significantly more dramatic. </p>
<p>In the last six years, the Venezuelan economy has experienced <a href="http://cepr.net/images/stories/reports/venezuela-sanctions-2019-04.pdf">significant losses</a> <a href="http://www.15yultimo.com/2019/03/18/impacto-de-la-guerra-economica-contra-el-pueblo-de-venezuela/">estimated</a> at more than US$114 billion. That’s only $15 billion less than the country’s entire economic production in 2015. Of this amount, $21.45 billion is due to the actions of the United States, and $92.85 billion is due to the secondary effect on the economy of those actions.</p>
<p>Even the United Nations Special Rapporteurs noted that U.S. economic sanctions against Venezuela in 2017 and 2019 are having a <a href="http://cepr.net/publications/reports/economic-sanctions-as-collective-punishment-the-case-of-venezuela">serious, harmful impact on the life and health of Venezuelans</a>, causing widespread <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/venezuelas-food-crisis-reaches-a-breaking-point">hunger and other hardships</a> for Venezuelans. They described the impact of these sanctions as a “collective punishment of the civilian population.” </p>
<p>The Special Rapporteur’s <a href="https://chicagoalbasolidarity.files.wordpress.com/2018/08/un-report-on-venezuela-and-ecuador-alfred-de-zayas.pdf">August 2018 report</a> links the ongoing health crisis to the actions of the United States, Canada and the European Union. It notes that these actions have “directly and indirectly aggravated the shortages in medicines such as insulin and anti-viral drugs.”</p>
<h2>Unauthorized sanctions</h2>
<p>These economic measures haven’t been authorized by the UN Security Council. Without <a href="https://www.un.org/en/sections/un-charter/chapter-vii/">the cover</a> of the Charter of the United Nations, the legal basis of these actions is questionable, and they likely constitute an “international wrongful act.”</p>
<p>As well, <a href="https://news.un.org/en/story/2019/01/1031722">because these actions obstruct food and medicine imports</a>, they violate international humanitarian and human rights laws. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285353/original/file-20190723-110158-1ury0so.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285353/original/file-20190723-110158-1ury0so.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/285353/original/file-20190723-110158-1ury0so.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285353/original/file-20190723-110158-1ury0so.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285353/original/file-20190723-110158-1ury0so.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285353/original/file-20190723-110158-1ury0so.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285353/original/file-20190723-110158-1ury0so.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/285353/original/file-20190723-110158-1ury0so.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Venezuela’s self-proclaimed interim president Juan Guaidó speaks during a recent protest in Caracas, Venezuela. A few thousand joined him, far fewer than the number who turned out at demonstrations earlier this year.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photos/Leonardo Fernandez)</span></span>
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<p>Applying sanctions on Venezuela is also an infringement upon the country’s sovereignty. This is especially the case since there is no internal legitimate and legal request to do so. </p>
<p>Juan Guaidó <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/venezuela-coup-media-guaido/">has not been recognized as the legitimate leader of the country by the majority of Venezuelans</a>, despite his recognition as interim president by the United States, Canada, several Latin American countries and a number of European nations. Nor does Guaidó hold the national legal political authority as required by the country’s constitution. </p>
<h2>Responsibility to protect</h2>
<p>The international community’s supposed desire to protect Venezuelans is at the heart of most arguments in favour of international intervention. However, any such intervention is illegal unless it’s supported by or grounded in international law.</p>
<p>Even the <a href="https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/about-responsibility-to-protect.shtml">Responsibility to Protect</a>, a UN global political commitment to avoid failures in responses to massacres and genocides, cannot override the requirements in the UN Charter related to the use of force. Therefore, any coercive actions under its guise, including those related to sanctions and military actions, require authorization by the UN Security Council. </p>
<p>Serious concerns about human rights abuses or our moral outrage at their occurrence might compel the international community to act. However, how the international community chooses to act must still be legal under international law. </p>
<p>In short, the Responsibility to Protect cannot justify forced political change, regardless of the merits of the leader in question. In fact, it was never intended to do so. </p>
<h2>Flawed Canadian policy</h2>
<p>Canada has articulated its support for political change and the establishment of democracy in Venezuela. While fighting for democracy is a noble cause, Canada’s attempt to determine the fate of the Venezuelan people is not. And, if history is any guide, the impact of such external meddling <a href="https://www.cips-cepi.ca/how-canada-failed-in-afghanistan/">is often negative</a>, sometimes catastrophically so. </p>
<p>We need to encourage dialogue among Venezuelans that is aimed at developing an internal solution, even when we disagree with decisions made by the majority of Venezuelans. We also need to abide by the principles of international law in a non-selective manner. </p>
<p>Doing anything less undermines these principles and establishes a less than moral relationship with Venezuela. It also allows Canada to illegally meddle in the country’s internal affairs. </p>
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<p><em>Peggy Mason, president of the Rideau Institute, and Roy Culpeper, chair of the Group of 78, co-authored this piece. They are co-signatories to a <a href="https://www.ceasefire.ca/civil-society-open-letter-to-prime-minister-trudeau-on-venezuela/">Civil Society Statement of Concern on the Crisis in Venezuela</a>.</em></p>
<p>[ <em>You’re smart and curious about the world. So are The Conversation’s authors and editors.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/ca/newsletters?utm_source=TCCA&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=youresmart">You can read us daily by subscribing to our newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/120319/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ruby Dagher does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The devastating costs of economic sanctions on Venezuela are being ignored or disregarded. So too is the lack of a legal basis for international intervention.Ruby Dagher, Part-time Professor at the School of International Development and Global Studies at the University of Ottawa and the School of Public Policy and Administration at Carleton University, Carleton UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1167712019-05-10T12:43:03Z2019-05-10T12:43:03ZVenezuela’s soaring murder rate has plunged the nation into a public health crisis<p>Over the past three decades, Venezuela has shifted from being a peaceful country, to one of the most violent nations in the world. Decades of poor governance have driven what was once one of Latin America’s most prosperous countries to economic and political ruin. The violent confrontations between anti-government demonstrators and forces loyal to president Nicolás Maduro in recent days, alongside the systemic breakdown of public services, have plunged Venezuela’s population into a public health crisis.</p>
<p>Most countries in Latin America have increased their life expectancy over the last 50 years. And Venezuela was no exception: the average life expectancy of the population rose by almost four years every decade from 1950 to 1990, thanks to improvements in healthcare, living standards and nutrition. In particular, there were major advances in reducing infant mortality and tackling infectious and parasitic diseases. </p>
<p>Had the pattern held, Venezuelan men – whose average life expectancy at birth was about 70 years in 1996 – should have averaged almost 77 years in 2013. Instead, as we report in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/ije/dyz072">our new research</a>, men’s life expectancy increased by just one year and six months (from 70 to 71 and a half), while women’s increased by three-and-a-half years (from 76 to 79). The upsurge in violence and murder has stalled further gains. </p>
<h2>Rising violence</h2>
<p>At the beginning of the 1980s, homicides were relatively rare in Venezuela. At around <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S1413-81232012001200008">eight per 100,000 people</a>, it was almost on a par with the most peaceful nations in the region, such as Costa Rica (which had <a href="http://www.scielo.org.mx/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1405-74252005000100008">six homicides per 100,000 people</a> in 1980). But the social and economic upheavals of the 1980s unleashed an unstoppable epidemic of violence, which spread across the country. </p>
<p>According to United Nations, the homicides rate in Venezuela was <a href="https://www.unodc.org/gsh/">53.7 murders per 100,000 persons</a> in 2012; that’s higher than figures for many other Latin American countries, including Colombia, which had <a href="https://www.unodc.org/gsh/">30.8 murders per 100,000 people</a> in the same year, while in the grips of an <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-19390164">undeclared civil war</a>. In the nation’s interior, the situation is even worse: according to <a href="https://igarape.org.br/revisiting-the-worlds-most-violent-cities/">estimations</a>, in the capital city of Caracas, the mortality rate due to violent deaths in 2015 was around 120 homicides per 100,000 people. </p>
<p>Most of the homicides in Venezuela are committed with firearms, which are widely available. While the government and opposition remain locked in turmoil, weapons have flooded onto the black market, where local <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/S1517-45222002000200003">police and armies have become</a> the main smugglers. Worse, the government has implemented a policy to arm pro-government supporters, in order to contain protesters. </p>
<p>Male life expectancy in Venezuela was curtailed by almost two years, exclusively because of violent deaths between 1996 and 2013. Violence has offset improvements in the nation’s mortality rate, achieved by reducing the risk of death from <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/ije/dyz072">cardiovascular diseases and other causes of death</a>. Similar findings have been reported for Mexico where the war on drugs <a href="https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/10.2105/AJPH.2018.304878">held back life expectancy</a> gains in the new century.</p>
<p>Violence has also further negative impacts on the quality of life and psychological well-being of Venezuelan people. Men in Venezuela are dying earlier, but the burden of violence on people goes beyond homicides. Being exposed to a violent environment <a href="https://jech.bmj.com/content/71/2/188">increases the risk</a> of depression, alcohol abuse, suicidal behaviour, and psychological problems, such as fear – among other <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3863696/">detrimental effects</a> on people’s lives. </p>
<h2>A bleak outlook</h2>
<p>Venezuela’s future does not look promising. Outbreaks of political violence have intensified recently, partly due to the steady militarisation of the police. Random shootings against civilians, tear gas shot straight into homes, extrajudicial killings in military operations against street crime and forced disappearances of political dissidents are increasingly being reported by NGOs such as <a href="https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2019/country-chapters/venezuela">Human Rights Watch</a>. </p>
<p>What’s more, severe shortages of food and medical supplies, and the total collapse of the public health system, have left Venezuelans unable to feed their families or access to basic healthcare. Infant and maternal mortality <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/S2214-109X(18)30479-0">has increased</a> again, and infectious and parasitic diseases, such as malaria, measles and diphtheria, <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-regions-infectious-crisis-is-a-disaster-of-hemispheric-proportions-112104">have re-emerged</a>. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-regions-infectious-crisis-is-a-disaster-of-hemispheric-proportions-112104">Venezuela: region's infectious crisis is a disaster of hemispheric proportions</a>
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<p>The acute impacts of political and socioeconomic disintegration on mortality rates since 2013, highlighted by recent deadly demonstrations in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/01/world/americas/venezuela-uprising-crisis.html">Caracas</a>, have yet to be measured. Public institutions in Venezuela have been forced to follow a strict policy of secrecy, and mortality and health data sources have not been updated, nor made publicly available since 2013. The stagnation in life expectancy found up to that year is likely to turn to decline, as this humanitarian crisis worsens.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/116771/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>At the beginning of the 1980s, homicides were relatively rare in Venezuela. Now, it’s one of the most dangerous countries in Latin America.José Manuel Aburto, PhD Candidate, Interdisciplinary Center on Population Dynamics, University of Southern DenmarkJenny Garcia, PhD Candidate in Demography, Institut National d'Études Démographiques (INED)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1165612019-05-03T16:56:04Z2019-05-03T16:56:04ZVenezuelan opposition leader Leopoldo López seeks refuge with Spain after failed uprising<p>An <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics/venezuela-opposition-figure-facing-arrest-warrant-says-he-met-with-generals-idUSKCN1S81JE">arrest warrant</a> has been issued for Venezuela’s most famous political prisoner. Leopoldo López, who was released from house arrest to lead an <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/30/venezuelas-guiado-says-final-phase-of-plan-to-oust-maduro-has-begun">attempted uprising</a> against President Nicolás Maduro on April 30, has sought refuge at the <a href="https://elpais.com/elpais/2019/05/01/inenglish/1556713845_723006.html">residency of the Spanish ambassador to Venezuela</a>. </p>
<p>The Spanish government says López cannot be arrested while in the ambassador’s residence and that it will not hand him over to Maduro’s government, which accuses López of violating the terms of his house arrest.</p>
<p>Venezuela’s crisis has escalated to new levels of chaos in recent days, but has not succeeded in dislodging Maduro. </p>
<p>On April 30, Juan Guaidó – the leader of the Venezuelan National Assembly, who swore himself in as interim president in January – <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/30/venezuelas-guiado-says-final-phase-of-plan-to-oust-maduro-has-begun">called for the Venezuelan people to rise up</a> against Maduro. In an early morning <a href="https://amd-ssl.cdn.turner.com/cnn/big/ads/2019/04/24/Dark_Sacred_Night_TPB_v01_-24LKFS_CNN_576x324.mp4">video posted online</a>, Guaidó, flanked by soldiers and <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/02/americas/venezuela-maduro-guaido-intl/index.html">backed by the United States</a>, said that “Operation Freedom” would be “the beginning of the end” of a regime Guaidó and over 50 countries consider illegitimate. </p>
<p>Next to Guaidó stood, to Venezuelans’ surprise, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2017/06/13/americas/leopoldo-lpez-fast-facts/index.html">Leopoldo López</a>, apparently <a href="https://www.efe.com/efe/english/world/venezuelan-opposition-leader-leopoldo-lopez-freed-from-house-arrest/50000262-3964712">freed from house arrest</a> by soldiers who supported Guaidó’s uprising. </p>
<h2>Uprising in Caracas</h2>
<p>López, a popular former mayor and presidential candidate, was a leading figure in the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-idUSKCN0WE0UX">powerful protest movement against Maduro</a> that began in 2014.</p>
<p>Since Maduro took office in 2013, Venezuela’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/08/venezuela-protests-sign-us-wants-oil-says-nicolas-maduro">economy has faltered</a>, then <a href="https://theconversation.com/nobody-is-going-to-bail-out-venezuela-87428">collapsed</a>. Food, medicine and electricity are scarce. Numerous elections, including Maduro’s reelection last year, have been <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-is-now-a-dictatorship-96960">marred by irregularities</a>. </p>
<p>Maduro has resisted the opposition’s calls for new elections. He claims the country’s economic troubles and <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuelans-reject-maduro-presidency-but-most-would-oppose-foreign-military-operation-to-oust-him-109135">popular unrest</a> are a <a href="http://time.com/5550481/venezuela-maduro-blackout-cyber-sabotage/">U.S. plot against his government</a>. </p>
<p>The April 30 uprising comes after <a href="https://theconversation.com/drone-attack-or-no-venezuelas-maduro-regime-is-probably-here-to-stay-98899">several coup attempts</a>, numerous <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuelas-power-struggle-reaches-a-tense-stalemate-as-human-suffering-deepens-114545">failed opposition efforts</a> to negotiate Maduro’s exit from office and years of frequent protest.</p>
<p>After one major 2014 opposition march in Caracas grew violent, López was charged with “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/20/venezuela-leopoldo-lopez-arrested-violence-continues">arson and criminal incitement</a>.” The moment he waded through crying supporters to turn himself into police on May 18, 2014, he became the face of Venezuela’s democratic struggle.</p>
<p>Supporters saw López as a martyr who confronted the dictatorship rather than going into exile, as so many Venezuelan dissidents have. He was sentenced to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/11/venezuela-opposition-leader-leopoldo-lopez-sentenced-to-14-years-in-jail">14 years in prison</a>.</p>
<p>López’s face was printed on T-shirts, posters and flags that flew across the country. A website, <a href="https://www.freeleopoldo.com">FreeLeopoldo.com</a>, called for “the immediate release of Venezuelan opposition leader Leopoldo López, who was illegally imprisoned in an attempt to silence dissent and free speech.” A hashtag, #FreeLeopoldo, spread his cause worldwide.</p>
<p>After three years, the Maduro government in 2017 conceded to political pressure and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/08/world/americas/venezuela-leopoldo-lopez-political-prisoner.html">released López to house arrest</a> at his home in the swanky Los Palos Grandes neighborhood. By then, the <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuelas-opposition-is-on-the-verge-of-collapse-86187">opposition movement had been all but vanquished</a>. </p>
<p>Then, three months ago, Juan Guaidó reinvigorated the resistance movement <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-power-struggle-plunges-nation-into-turmoil-3-essential-reads-110419">waging a U.S.-supported “peaceful rebellion” against Maduro</a>. Meanwhile, López says, he was <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics/venezuela-opposition-figure-facing-arrest-warrant-says-he-met-with-generals-idUSKCN1S81JE">meeting with commanders and generals from Venezuela’s armed forces</a> in his home, while still under house arrest. </p>
<p>To the majority of Venezuelans who <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuelans-reject-maduro-presidency-but-most-would-oppose-foreign-military-operation-to-oust-him-109135">reject Maduro’s regime</a>, López’s surprise participation in “Operation Freedom” seemed like a sign that political change might actually be on the horizon.</p>
<h2>Leopoldo López’s political pedigree</h2>
<p>Their hope, and López’s freedom, would be short-lived. </p>
<p>After being received as <a href="http://www.epa.eu/war-photos/crisis-photos/leopoldo-lopez-and-his-family-enter-as-guests-to-the-chilean-embassy-in-venezuela-photos-55159633">“guests” of the Chilean government</a> at the Chilean Embassy in Caracas on the evening of April 30, López and his family took refuge with Spain, which recognizes Guaidó as Venezuela’s rightful president.</p>
<p>López is the great-great-grandson of former Venezuelan President Cristóbal Mendoza and is said to be related to <a href="http://www.militaryheritage.com/bolivar.htm">Simón Bolívar</a>, the Venezuela-born general who liberated five South American countries from Spanish rule in the early 19th century.</p>
<p>López studied economics and sociology at Kenyon College in the United States on a swimming scholarship. In 1996, he got a master’s in public policy at Harvard.</p>
<p>He began his political career in 2000, with two four-year terms as the dynamic and popular mayor of Chacao, an upper middle-class municipality of Caracas. By 2008, the end of his second term, he had a <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2015/06/10/venezuelas-last-hope-leopoldo-lopez-maduro/">92% approval rating</a>. </p>
<p>That’s when President Hugo Chávez, Venezuela’s late socialist leader and Maduro’s mentor, accused López of corruption and <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2014/02/21/world/americas/profile-leopoldo-lopez/index.html">banned him from running for office</a>. López was one of many popular Venezuelan politicians to face trumped-up charges that <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2017/06/13/americas/leopoldo-lpez-fast-facts/index.html">served to stop them from electorally challenging Chávez</a>.</p>
<p>In 2011 the Inter-American Court of Human Rights <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/americas/09/16/venezuela.lopez/index.html">ruled</a> that López must be allowed to run for office – an order the <a href="http://www.laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId=433753&CategoryId=10717">Venezuelan Supreme Court rejected</a>.</p>
<p>López, who planned to run for president against Chávez representing the Voluntad Popular – a political party that he, Guaidó and other opposition figures founded in 2009 – withdrew his candidacy. Instead, he backed opposition candidate Henrique Capriles Radonski. </p>
<p>Chávez won the 2012 presidential election, then died a few months into his term. Maduro, his vice president, took office in 2013.</p>
<p>López was sentenced to prison a year later. In February 2017 his wife, Lilian Tintori, traveled to Washington to <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/how-an-oval-office-meeting-led-to-a-trump-tweet-that-changed-us-policy-toward-venezuela/2017/10/06/87e9b178-a52b-11e7-ade1-76d061d56efa_story.html">discuss his case with U.S. President Donald Trump</a> and Vice President Mike Pence. Both expressed public support for her husband, and the Trump administration has been a leading voice in favor of Guaidó.</p>
<p><em>This story is an updated version of an <a href="https://theconversation.com/who-is-leopoldo-lopez-the-newly-freed-opposition-leader-behind-venezuelas-uprising-116336">article</a> originally published on April 30.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/116561/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Marco Aponte-Moreno does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Venezuela’s most famous political prisoner, freed from house arrest by soldiers who turned against President Maduro, now faces arrest after leading an April 30 rebellion against Maduro’s government.Marco Aponte-Moreno, Assistant Professor of Global Business and Member of the Institute for Latino and Latin American Studies, St Mary's College of California Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1157242019-04-30T10:21:46Z2019-04-30T10:21:46ZVenezuela: indigenous people are forgotten victims of crisis<p>It appeared to be a confrontation between humanitarianism and military force. In February, the Venezuelan government placed troops along the country’s border with Colombia to block the entry of humanitarian aid coming from the US and supported by opposition leader, Juan Guaido.</p>
<p>The blockade was widely <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2019/feb/23/venezuela-brazil-border-aid-live-news-latest-updates">covered by the news</a> and sparked controversy when the trucks carrying the supplies were accidentally burned during the clashes between the military and those <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/10/world/americas/venezuela-aid-fire-video.html">trying to clear their passage</a>.</p>
<p>Similar scenes were repeated on Venezuela’s border with Brazil – albeit with <a href="https://www.caracaschronicles.com/2019/02/22/at-the-venezuela-brazil-border-indigenous-communities-fight-for-humanitarian-aid/">even more tragic consequences</a>. There, the military convoy sent to guard the border was stopped by the local indigenous police in the Pemon community of Kumarakapay – in the Gran Sabana national park, an area considered official indigenous territory. The military opened fire, resulting in at least two casualties. Zoraida Rodriguez – an indigenous woman – <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/woman-killed-dozen-injured-near-venezuela-brazil-border-n974501">was killed in her own home</a>.</p>
<p>The unrest at the border between Venezuela and Brazil, however, received much less media attention than the troubles at the Colombian border – partly because events didn’t fit the western media’s dominant narratives about Venezuela.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-a-humanitarian-and-security-crisis-on-the-border-with-colombia-112240">Venezuela: a humanitarian and security crisis on the border with Colombia</a>
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<p>These mainly focus on the country’s failing economy, and the threat of a <a href="https://theconversation.com/tensions-rise-between-colombia-us-and-venezuela-amid-rumours-of-a-military-intervention-104340">potential US military intervention</a>, based on America’s historic record of involvement in other Latin American nations. In the West, the story is often portrayed as a dispute between the troubled Venezuelan government and US imperialism, assuming the Venezuelan nation is internally homogenous. But this ignores the contentious relationship that many Venezuelans, indigenous people included, have historically had with the government.</p>
<h2>A matter of sovereignty</h2>
<p>The confrontations between Pemon indigenous people and the military along the Brazilian border, then, should also be understood as an issue of sovereignty over indigenous territories. Indeed, they also stand in sharp contrast to the <a href="http://www.minci.gob.ve/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/CONSTITUCION.pdf">Venezuelan government’s own rhetoric</a>, which positions the state as a champion of the indigenous cause.</p>
<p>National sovereignty has been a recurrent theme of Venezuela’s <a href="https://www.trtworld.com/americas/what-is-venezuela-s-bolivarian-revolution-23587">Bolivarian Revolution</a>, which was proclaimed by former president Hugo Chavez. This movement espouses socialist policies and a resistance to foreign, particularly US, interference. But the history of indigenous resistance to colonial invasion has also been used by both Chavez and his successor, Nicolas Maduro (who took power in 2013), to symbolise this defiance of foreign intervention.</p>
<p>In 1998, Hugo Chavez gained power with the <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/WORLD/americas/9812/06/venezuela.results/index.html">highest electoral margin</a> in 40 years. His victory was partly because he included marginal populations, such as indigenous people, in his Bolivarian nation-building project.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-regions-infectious-crisis-is-a-disaster-of-hemispheric-proportions-112104">Venezuela: region's infectious crisis is a disaster of hemispheric proportions</a>
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<p>In fact, many indigenous peoples in Venezuela initially saw their incorporation into the Venezuelan nation as part of the Bolivarian Revolution. The 1999 <a href="http://www.minci.gob.ve/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/CONSTITUCION.pdf">constitution</a>, for example, was the first to provide a host of rights for indigenous groups, including “native rights over the land”. </p>
<p>In the 20 years that have elapsed since then, however, many of the state’s promises regarding indigenous people and their territories remain largely unfulfilled and disaffection among them is growing.</p>
<h2>Digging in</h2>
<p>Historically, state expansion into indigenous territories in the south of the country has been linked to natural resources, particularly gold and bauxite, which are abundant in the area. Since colonial times, policing and regional control have been used by the state to exert its monopoly over mining resources.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/271618/original/file-20190429-194627-ed0gy4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/271618/original/file-20190429-194627-ed0gy4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/271618/original/file-20190429-194627-ed0gy4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/271618/original/file-20190429-194627-ed0gy4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/271618/original/file-20190429-194627-ed0gy4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/271618/original/file-20190429-194627-ed0gy4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/271618/original/file-20190429-194627-ed0gy4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Venezuela’s former president, Hugo Chavez, promised change for indigenous people.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/download/success?u=http%3A%2F%2Fdownload.shutterstock.com%2Fgatekeeper%2FW3siZSI6MTU1NjYwMzcyMywiYyI6Il9waG90b19zZXNzaW9uX2lkIiwiZGMiOiJpZGxfMTI1MDI1NTgzNiIsImsiOiJwaG90by8xMjUwMjU1ODM2L21lZGl1bS5qcGciLCJtIjoxLCJkIjoic2h1dHRlcnN0b2NrLW1lZGlhIn0sIjR6S0d0Tm14Y04zVlV5dnRmUDVSYkRSS0JCWSJd%2Fshutterstock_1250255836.jpg&pi=33421636&m=1250255836&src=1Yxi2w1oQQXexrtDoBDBjQ-1-0">Shutterstock</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>This hasn’t changed much under the Bolivarian governments since 1998. In 2016, for example, the government launched a large-scale and widespread mining project to combat the economic crisis. This project has resulted in the <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/14092">increased militarisation</a> of mining areas in the north of Bolivar and Amazonas states, near indigenous territories.</p>
<p>In the early 2000s, during the early years of Chavez’s revolution, the authorities’ presence in indigenous territories, such as the area of Gran Sabana – where Zoraida Rodriguez was killed during the recent unrest – was cast in a more “benevolent” light. The state still enforced its control through a heavy police presence, but a number of special programmes (misiones) were also set up by the government, which benefited many local people through goods and other forms of aid. The programmes were made possible thanks to high international oil prices, and reached remote areas of the territory which had been overlooked by previous governments. </p>
<p>Since the beginning of the <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/nathanielparishflannery/2015/04/28/how-close-is-venezuela-to-defaulting/#5e3f83251ee3">economic crisis</a> in 2015, however, state aid has reduced, and now reaches indigenous territories only intermittently, or not at all. The military presence, on the other hand, has increased. The result of this is a breakdown of the relationship between the Venezuelan state and indigenous people, and a return to the longstanding struggle over territory and mining resources.</p>
<p>The February confrontations between the military and indigenous people over the entry of US aid are symptomatic of this <a href="https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-venezuela-politics-aid-indigenous/indigenous-pemon-on-venezuelas-border-with-brazil-vow-to-let-aid-in-idUKKCN1PY0MS">increasingly contentious relationship</a>. These tensions have been exacerbated by the internal contradictions of the Bolivarian Revolution, which seemingly acknowledges indigenous people’s autonomy and rights over their lands, while simultaneously exercising control over the territory they occupy in the name of national sovereignty. And with the economy in freefall, things may only get worse.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/115724/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Natalia Garcia Bonet does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Despite its rhetoric, the Bolivarian Revolution is betraying Venezuela’s indigenous people.Natalia Garcia Bonet, Lecturer in Social Anthropology, University of KentLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1147152019-04-12T10:40:59Z2019-04-12T10:40:59ZVenezuela’s crisis is a tragedy - but comedy gold for satire, cartoons and memes<p>Thirty-nine journalists have been <a href="https://cpj.org/blog/2019/03/venezuela-crisis-detained-journalist-weddle-maduro.php">detained</a> in Venezuela this year, far more than in <a href="https://cpj.org/reports/2018/12/journalists-jailed-imprisoned-turkey-china-egypt-saudi-arabia.php">any other Latin American country</a>, according to the Caracas-based Institute for Press and Society.</p>
<p>Their arrests are part of the government’s crackdown on journalists who report on the country’s escalating <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuelas-power-struggle-reaches-a-tense-stalemate-as-human-suffering-deepens-114545">instability</a> as President Nicolás Maduro fights to retain power against the opposition’s internationally backed effort to oust him. </p>
<p>Local reporters have seen early morning <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/06/venezuela-journalist-cody-weddle-reports-caracas">raids of their homes</a>, arrests, rushed and legally questionable trials for charges of “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/12/venezuela-luis-carlos-diaz-journalist-taken-sebin">inciting violence</a>. They’ve been given verdicts ranging from <a href="https://cpj.org/2019/04/journalist-luis-carlos-diaz-released-from-detentio.php">self-censorship</a> to <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/venezuela-releases-german-journalist-billy-six-from-jail/a-47943133">jail time</a>. Several foreign reporters – including Univision TV anchor and U.S. citizen Jorge Ramos – have been <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/25/jorge-ramos-univision-detained-venezuela-maduro-interview">deported</a> from Venezuela.</p>
<p>In this repressive environment, journalists are finding ways to <a href="https://intpolicydigest.org/2018/01/04/censorship-venezuela-fuels-social-media-growth/">avoid censorship</a> and still cover the country’s crisis. </p>
<p>Digital news sites and social media platforms, in particular, have become key platforms for informing the public. Using <a href="https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/mar/4/nicolas-maduro-media-control-censors-news-venezuel/">humorous memes</a> and <a href="https://qz.com/1282733/venezuela-under-maduro-the-crisis-as-told-by-its-version-of-the-onion/">political satire</a>, they publicize government abuses, protest daily humiliations like water shortages and blackouts and resist Maduro’s <a href="https://knightcenter.utexas.edu/blog/00-20426-venezuela-leads-latin-america-most-journalists-jailed-because-their-work-according-cpj">autocratic regime</a>.</p>
<h2>Laugh so you don’t cry</h2>
<p>Government pressure on the Venezuelan media dates back to the late <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Hugo-Chavez">President Hugo Chávez</a>, who took office in 1999. Over three administrations, Chávez used his power and immense popularity to chip away at the <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2017/03/31/venezuelas-crumbling-facade-democracy">separation of powers</a> and undermine press freedom.</p>
<p>Maduro has continued this tradition since <a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2013/04/nicolas-maduro-hugo-chavez-s-handpicked-successor-declared-victory-in-venezuela.html">succeeding Chávez</a>, his political mentor, in 2013. He has also overseen Venezuela’s slide into humanitarian crisis, <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevehanke/2019/01/01/venezuelas-hyperinflation-hits-80000-per-year-in-2018/#67bce7e74572">economic collapse</a> and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/may/23/venezuela-dictator-democracy-nicolas-maduro-venezuelans">political chaos</a>. To quash protests, his government has turned <a href="https://www.hrw.org/report/2017/11/29/crackdown-dissent/brutality-torture-and-political-persecution-venezuela">increasingly authoritarian</a>, violently repressing dissent and silencing journalists. </p>
<p>Under such circumstances, Venezuela’s turn toward <a href="https://knightcenter.utexas.edu/blog/00-18674-make-humor-anger-satirical-news-reveals-absurd-venezuelan-politics">satirical news</a> recalls an old saying that’s grown popular in these difficult days: "Me río para no llorar” – laugh so you don’t cry.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/268691/original/file-20190410-2914-1cy7hb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/268691/original/file-20190410-2914-1cy7hb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/268691/original/file-20190410-2914-1cy7hb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/268691/original/file-20190410-2914-1cy7hb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/268691/original/file-20190410-2914-1cy7hb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/268691/original/file-20190410-2914-1cy7hb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/268691/original/file-20190410-2914-1cy7hb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/268691/original/file-20190410-2914-1cy7hb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Several power outages in Venezuela have disabled electric water pumps, forcing people to fill up buckets of river water.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Week-That-Was-In-Latin-America-Photo-Gallery/5da464e9363549d7a2ccb67c4dc8dbab/73/0">AP Photo/Fernando Llano</a></span>
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<p>A satirical website called “El chigüire bipolar” – the bipolar capybara, a name that references a giant South American rodent – <a href="https://www.elnuevoherald.com/noticias/mundo/america-latina/venezuela-es/article148660919.html">recently won an international prize</a> for “creative dissidence.” </p>
<p>Its animated series, “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npUI1vOA_fI">La isla presidencial</a>,” “The Presidential Island,” which began in 2010, has Venezuela’s leftist strongman leader – <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DSqp_oO5-Y">first Hugo Chávez</a>, now Nicolás Maduro – stranded on a desert island with other presidents of Mexico, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Nicaragua, Colombia and with the king of Spain. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/HNTnNWJK0cM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The English language trailer for the Venezuelan web series ‘Presidential Island.’</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>“The Presidential Island” portrays Maduro as illiterate and overweight, a blundering simpleton who is overly proud of his mustache and incessantly invokes the late Hugo Chávez.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PgPvcc6G2Co">one episode from the current season</a>, Maduro takes it upon himself to ration water during a drought. His poor handling of water distribution leads the other presidents to revolt. They find water sources of their own. </p>
<p>Maduro declares it a “coup d'etat” and insists that it’s all an “imperialist” plot – just as he has done during Venezuela’s repeated recent national blackouts.</p>
<p>Political cartoonists are another front of the Venezuelan media’s resistance to oppression by the Maduro regime. </p>
<p>Cartoonist and graphic artist Rayma Suprani was <a href="https://elpais.com/elpais/2014/09/22/inenglish/1411401634_302890.html">dismissed</a> from the national newspaper El Universal in 2014 after a drawing that mocked Maduro’s authority. She portrayed Chávez’s signature as a flatline on a hospital heart-rate monitor, as if to say, “Venezuela’s Socialist revolution is dead.” </p>
<p>Being fired didn’t stop Suprani from drawing. Today, her <a href="https://www.raymasuprani.com/">satirical cartoons</a> and drawings are widely circulated online, offering powerful visual depictions of the country’s always worsening news.</p>
<h2>Juan Guaidó, meme hero</h2>
<p>Venezuela has a long history of satire during times of political and economic crisis. </p>
<p>First published in 1892, “<a href="http://200.2.12.132/SVI/hemeroteca/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=292&Itemid=433">El cojo illustrado</a>” – “The Illustrated Cripple” – was a Venezuelan magazine that used satirical drawings and articles to address political topics without explicitly referring to the government in power. </p>
<p>During its 23 years in circulation, the publication skewered everything from current events to Venezuelan identity politics – always obliquely, using sly humor.</p>
<p>Today, stand-up comics are more explicit, using dark humor to expose the government’s policy missteps and predictable rhetoric.</p>
<p><a href="http://laureanomarquez.com/">Laureano Márquez</a>, a Venezuelan humorist, political scientist and author with 3.43 million <a href="https://twitter.com/laureanomar">Twitter followers</a>, irritates the government from the safety of Spain, where he now lives.</p>
<p>“Russia votes at UN against intervention in Venezuela,” he <a href="https://twitter.com/laureanomar/status/1101464632143810561">tweeted</a> on March 1. “Except if it’s Russian, Chinese or Cuban.” </p>
<p>Communist Russia, China and Cuba are the Maduro regime’s three most powerful international allies. More than 50 countries – including the United States, Colombia and Canada – back National Assembly leader Juan Guaidó’s bid to unseat the president.</p>
<p>Even Guaidó, who appears to have massive popular support for his challenge to Maduro, has also been the target of online ribbing in Venezuela. </p>
<p>On Jan. 22, security footage from the Hotel Lido in Caracas surfaced that appeared to show Guaidó <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-video/under-pressure-over-video-venezuelas-guaido-says-met-officials-idUSKCN1PL00L">meeting with officials from the Maduro regime</a>. That would have been an unpopular move among opposition supporters. </p>
<p>But the grainy video simply showed an unidentified person wearing a baseball cap and gray hoodie, walking with his hands in his pockets, followed by Guaidó’s aide Roberto Marrero. It could be anyone, Guaidó’s supporters reasoned.</p>
<p>The hashtag <a href="https://noticiasya.com/2019/01/25/viral-de-que-trata-el-guaidochallenge/">#GuaidoChallenge</a> quickly went viral on Instagram as users posted photographs and videos of themselves, cartoon characters and random people posing in hats and hoodies. One Instagram user dressed up his dog in a hat and sweatshirt and quipped, “It’s a GuaiDog!” </p>
<p>Even former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and U.S. Senator <a href="https://www.instagram.com/marcorubiofla/p/BtGiQfbHaWb/">Marco Rubio</a> joined the #GuaidoChallenge. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/marcorubiofla/p/BtGiQfbHaWb","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<p>Guaidó eventually admitted that he had in fact meet with the Maduro regime, hoping to persuade them to hold a new presidential election. </p>
<p>That had been unacceptable to Maduro. The next day, Guaidó declared himself interim president of Venezuela, triggering the power struggle that has plunged the country into chaos. </p>
<p>There’s nothing funny about Venezuela’s tragedy. But humor is among the few ways Venezuelans have left to cope with their desperation and frustration. </p>
<p>They’re laughing, as the saying goes, so they don’t cry.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/114715/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Juan-Carlos Molleda is affiliated with Institute for Public Relations, as an academic trustee; with the LAGRANT Foundation, as a board member; with the HIV Alliance, as a board member; and with the Latin American Communication Monitor, as a co-director. </span></em></p>The rise of black comedy to explain Venezuela’s chaos recalls an old saying in the crisis-stricken South American country: ‘Laugh so you don’t cry.’Juan-Carlos Molleda, Edwin L. Artzt Dean and Professor, School of Journalism and Communication, University of OregonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1145452019-04-04T10:43:52Z2019-04-04T10:43:52ZVenezuela’s power struggle reaches a tense stalemate, as human suffering deepens<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267213/original/file-20190402-177175-1seg8fc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Venezuelans have faced food and medicine shortages since late 2015. Now power outages have cut off water supplies, too.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Venezuela-Political-Crisis/b9e08d4240164361b87b8b7eea1d4bff/43/0">AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Even in a country where crisis has become the norm, the past month has been eventful for Venezuela.</p>
<p>On April 3 Juan Guaidó, the Venezuelan National Assembly president who is leading an effort to remove President Nicolás Maduro from office, was stripped of his <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/03/venezuela-juan-guaido-stripped-of-parliamentary-immunity">parliamentary immunity</a>. Arrest seems increasingly likely. Guaidó’s chief-of-staff was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/22/venezuela-juan-guaido-roberto-marrero-arrest-accused-terrorist-cell">jailed</a> on March 22, on charges of organizing a “terrorist cell.”</p>
<p>Two days later, two Russian military planes carrying 35 tons of unspecified equipment and 100 soldiers <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics/russian-air-force-planes-land-in-venezuela-carrying-troops-reports-idUSKCN1R50NB">landed</a> at the international airport in Caracas. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/30/americas/venezuela-third-blackout/index.html">three blackouts left over 90 percent of the country in the dark</a>. Since water pumps need electricity to run, neighborhoods and families were forced to organize <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-04-01/taps-run-dry-in-venezuelan-capital-as-power-cuts-hit-water-pumps">water rationing systems</a> or fetch water from polluted rivers and streams. </p>
<p>Maduro blames the blackouts on “<a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/venezuela-maduro-regime-accuses-juan-guaido-sabotage-electricity-blackouts/">sabotage</a>” by Guaidó and the United States. The opposition blames government corruption and neglect of Venezuela’s energy grid. </p>
<p>Thousands of Venezuelans <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics/venezuelans-rally-to-protest-chronic-power-outages-idUSKCN1RB0MB">protesting the power outages</a> on March 30 were met with violent repression. Counter-protestors came out to <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/venezuelas-rival-factions-rally-power-struggle-persists-62057800">support the Maduro government</a>. </p>
<p>These extraordinary events may give the appearance that <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/03/28/707722484/venezuela-hovers-on-the-brink-of-conflict-many-fear-the-situation-will-escalate">armed conflict is on the horizon</a>. But having researched Venezuela for over 25 years, I believe a prolonged deadlock – and deeper human suffering – is the more likely result. </p>
<h2>International conflict</h2>
<p>Each side in Venezuela’s political struggle has powerful international backers. </p>
<p>Guaidó has been coordinating with the <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-call-from-pence-helped-set-an-uncertain-new-course-in-venezuela-11548430259">Trump administration</a> since before assuming the interim presidency, and Trump has made regime change in Venezuela a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/01/29/dangerous-game-donald-trump-is-playing-with-venezuela/">foreign policy priority</a>. Over 50 countries now recognize Guaidó as Venezuela’s legitimate president.</p>
<p>Maduro’s government retains important support from Cuba, Turkey and China – though China, which has <a href="https://www.thedialogue.org/map_list/">loaned Venezuela some $60 billion</a> over the last 12 years, has diminished its public backing of Maduro.</p>
<p>Russia has become Maduro’s most important ally. The Russian military <a href="https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/27143/russian-transport-aircraft-deliver-men-and-materiel-to-venezuela-direct-from-syria">equipment and personnel</a> sent in March will likely help maintain and operate Venezuela’s sophisticated Russian-made S-300 air defense system, which protects the capital and key military bases from air attack. </p>
<p>The missile defense system may have been damaged in recent power outages, or left understaffed by desertions from Venezuela’s military. </p>
<p>In a <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-national-security-advisor-ambassador-john-bolton-venezuela-2/">March 29 press statement</a>, White House national security adviser John Bolton <a href="https://twitter.com/AmbJohnBolton/status/1111659586547867648">called</a> Russia’s military assistance to Venezuela a “direct threat to international peace and security in the region” that will “perpetuate the economic crisis that has destroyed Venezuela’s economy.”</p>
<p>Russian officials retorted that the deployment is <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/russia-defies-u-s-calls-to-get-out-of-venezuela-11553789375?mod=searchresults&page=1&pos=13">part of a prior bilateral arms trade agreement with Venezuela</a>. </p>
<p>“The United States is present in many parts of the world and no one is telling it where it should or shouldn’t be,” <a href="https://www.apnews.com/5c606dad5e504581b174807f348b3df0">said Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov</a> at a March 28 Kremlin press conference.</p>
<h2>Regime change stalled</h2>
<p>Venezuela’s opposition coalition and its allies in the U.S. appear to have thought that global rejection of Maduro’s re-election and Guaidó’s assuming the interim presidency – coupled with threats of a U.S. military invasion and sanctions on Venezuelan oil – would lead Venezuela’s armed forces to turn against Maduro. That would then usher in a democratic transition.</p>
<p>Recent events have shown that this strategy was simplistic. </p>
<p><a href="https://cnnespanol.cnn.com/2019/02/28/mas-de-500-militares-venezolanos-han-dejado-sus-puestos-y-han-cruzado-a-colombia-segun-autoridades-migratorias/">More than 500 Venezuelan soldiers</a> have defected to Colombia and Brazil. But most have stayed loyal, as have the generals who <a href="https://theconversation.com/drone-attack-or-no-venezuelas-maduro-regime-is-probably-here-to-stay-98899">hold high positions in Maduro’s government</a>. And Maduro has shown himself quite adept at using dispersed violence to discourage dissent.</p>
<p>Despite President Donald Trump’s repeated mentions of a “military option” for dealing with Venezuela, it’s become clear in recent weeks that the U.S. has <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/trumps-intervention-in-venezuela-has-stalled--because-caracas-knows-hes-bluffing/2019/03/31/c985f642-5172-11e9-88a1-ed346f0ec94f_story.html?utm_term=.e293293af368">no actual plans for military action</a>. Indeed, it does not have significant military assets in position near Venezuela. </p>
<p>Venezuela’s armed forces are the <a href="https://www.globalfirepower.com/countries-listing-latin-america.asp">fifth most powerful in Latin America</a>, according to Global Fire Power, which ranks military strength. It has around <a href="https://www.resdal.org/ing/atlas-2016.html">200,000 troops</a>, a volunteer militia, plus <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/in-venezuela-will-maduros-paramilitary-shock-troops-stay-loyal-thats-not-a-given">paramilitary forces</a> and a fleet of Russian Sukhoi fighter jets.</p>
<p>The presence of Russian troops in Venezuela further complicates any plans for U.S. intervention. Russia is a nuclear power, so incurring Russian casualties is probably <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2019/04/02/trump-has-russia-problem-venezuela/?utm_term=.e10bb035823b">too big of a risk for the U.S. to take</a>.</p>
<p>Adam Isacson, a defense expert at the Washington Office on Latin America, a human rights organization, suggests that removing Maduro by force would not only <a href="https://adamisacson.com/thinking-about-the-unthinkable-u-s-military-intervention-in-venezuela/">kill thousands</a> of people on the ground, it would likely require tens of thousands of U.S. troops to occupy Venezuela for years in order to stabilize it.</p>
<p>Outside of south Florida, where some 200,000 Venezuelan exiles are clamoring for Maduro’s ouster, few Americans would have an appetite for such a prolonged operation.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.state.gov/e/eb/tfs/spi/venezuela/">U.S. economic sanctions</a> – which are now targeting Venezuelan oil – appear to be hurting the Venezuelan people more than Maduro’s government. </p>
<p>That will only make a democratic transition more elusive. Depriving the Venezuelan government of cash and credit will <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/26/opinion/venezuela-maduro-blackout.html">impede it from fixing the electrical grid</a> by preventing the purchase of new equipment. And without electricity and water, Venezuelans, who in their vast majority oppose Maduro, will be concentrating on survival rather than protest. </p>
<h2>Working for peace</h2>
<p>An international effort <a href="https://www.fundacioncarolina.es/estudios-y-analisis/publicaciones/analisis-carolina/">led by the European Union, Uruguay, Ecuador and Costa Rica</a> is seeking to negotiate new elections. Calling itself the International Contact Group, this coalition has sent technical teams to Caracas twice to meet <a href="https://eeas.europa.eu/headquarters/headquarters-Homepage/60358/international-contact-group-venezuela-ministerial-declaration_en">with the Maduro government and the opposition</a>. </p>
<p>The International Contact Group has not actually found much interest on either side. </p>
<p>The opposition and its allies in the Trump administration <a href="https://usun.state.gov/remarks/8945">still believe</a> that their strategy of political pressure and economic punishment will lead to the government’s collapse. Maduro, it appears, thinks he can <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/22/world/americas/maduro-guaido-venezuela.html">hunker down and wait out the storm</a>.</p>
<p>There is one glimmer of hope. </p>
<p>After years of political wrangling over humanitarian aid, on March 29 the International Committee of the Red Cross announced that it had brokered agreements with both the Maduro government and the opposition. They will allow the Red Cross to <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/red-cross-announces-venezuelan-aid-effort-11553899904?mod=mhp">distribute food and medicine</a> to Venezuelans, who have suffered severe shortages of both since 2015. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-un/venezuelans-facing-unprecedented-challenges-many-need-aid-internal-u-n-report-idUSKCN1R92AG">United Nations estimates</a> that 94 percent of Venezuela’s population now lives in poverty, and a quarter of its people urgently need humanitarian assistance.</p>
<p>The Red Cross deal shows what can be achieved with “satellite diplomacy” – that is, negotiations that engage with rival factions independently rather than requiring them to meet face to face. </p>
<p>This is significant. It is the first time that this diplomatic technique has succeeded in Venezuela’s conflict.</p>
<p>In the best-case scenario, the humanitarian aid agreement will stick. And it could serve as a model for how international actors can facilitate a democratic transition in Venezuela.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/114545/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Smilde is a senior fellow at the not-for-profit Washington Office on Latin America.</span></em></p>As rival factions vie for control over Venezuela, many of the country’s 31 million people are suffering prolonged power outages, food and water shortages, and limited access to medicine.David Smilde, Professor of Sociology, Tulane UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1131762019-04-02T21:04:27Z2019-04-02T21:04:27ZOil’s corrosive impact on democracy is the true socialist gateway drug<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/266687/original/file-20190331-177167-qrgfot.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro throws his handkerchief into a crowd of supporters at an anti-imperialist rally for peace in Caracas, Venezuela, in March 2019. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>During the Cold War, socialism was portrayed as a gateway drug to communist orthodoxy. The crisis in Venezuela has resurrected tired old tropes about “pinks” and “useful idiots” who start out as democratic socialists, but end up marching in lockstep towards a workers’ dystopia. </p>
<p>United States Sen. Lindsey Graham <a href="https://twitter.com/lindseygrahamsc/status/1088473761966419970?lang=en">tweeted recently that new Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez</a> “and her new socialist colleagues seem hell-bent on making sure that our last 12 years will be spent as Venezuelan socialists, not Americans.” </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1088473761966419970"}"></div></p>
<p><a href="https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/16/politics/rnc-maduro-alexandria-ocasio-cortez/index.html">A Republican National Committee email</a> called Ocasio-Cortez a “mini Maduro,” a reference to Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, and accused her of leading the Democratic Party “to the left with nothing more than an unsubstantiated, factually incorrect socialist wish list.” <a href="https://reason.com/reasontv/2019/03/26/stossel-venezuela-is-socialism"><em>Reason</em>’s John Stossel</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/25/opinion/venezuela-maduro-socialism-government.html"><em>New York Times</em> columnist Bret Stephens</a> have all taken readers down the slippery slope from democratic socialism to Venezuelan disaster socialism.</p>
<p>It is a powerful fallacy. The bogeyman of Venezuelan “socialism” has had repercussions throughout the Americas. A close contest in last year’s Colombian presidential election <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/colombia/article213190354.html">swung toward the ruling party</a> as the conservative candidate Ivan Duque accused the leftist Gustavo Petro of wanting to turn that country into Venezuela. </p>
<p>Even in a jurisdiction as far away as Alberta, conservatives have tried to use the Venezuelan crisis as wedge. <a href="https://www.therebel.media/is_alberta_the_next_venezuela">The right-wing <em>Rebel Media</em> asked</a> whether Alberta would become the next Venezuela as the moderate leftist leader rolled out a carbon tax. </p>
<p>If Maduro’s Venezuela is the guiding light for democratic socialism, it has attracted the support of some rather anti-democratic leaders. It’s not Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib who have leapt to Maduro’s defence. Rather, <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/29/americas/venezuela-geopolitical-battle-intl/index.html">Vladimir Putin, Bashar Al-Assad and Recep Tayyip Erdogan</a>, of Russia, Syria and Turkey respectively, have been among the staunchest defenders of the Venezuelan president since Juan Gauidó declared himself interim president. </p>
<h2>Leftist litmus tests</h2>
<p>There was a time in the early 2000s when Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez served as a tidy litmus test for the international left. </p>
<p>Much like his nemesis, George W. Bush, he divided the world into people for him and people against him. For those on the left with serious misgivings about Chávez’s penchant for authoritarianism, there wasn’t much wiggle room. The United States was <em>the empire</em>. The bloc of Cuba, Bolivia and Venezuela represented <em>the revolution</em>. Forced to choose sides, anyone wanting to maintain their leftist credentials had to pick Chávez. </p>
<p>Since Venezuela descended into chaos under Maduro, however, protesters have transcended political divisions.</p>
<p>Women’s groups and many leftist parties have turned against Maduro, while militaristic nationalists in the Middle East have become his biggest supporters. Yes, there are a few “fellow travellers” — to borrow another Cold War idiom — in the West who continue think of the humanitarian tragedy in Cold War terms. Oliver Stone, <a href="https://twitter.com/theoliverstone/status/415123688036790274?lang=en">who once tweeted</a> that his “heart goes out to Nicolás Maduro,” is a particularly egregious example. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"415123688036790274"}"></div></p>
<p>Anyone who’s paid attention to the real cost in human suffering, however, knows that Venezuela’s crisis looks a lot like a classic natural resource curse. Venezuela, like virtually every other nation blessed with abundant fossil fuels, has known for decades that it must diversify away from its dependence on oil.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP85T00875R001700010011-7.pdf">Even the CIA in the 1970s</a> made the case that the influx of petro dollars could destabilize the country in the long term. Oil could create a class of oligarchs that would represent a target for leftist militants. </p>
<h2>Venezuela became more oil-dependent</h2>
<p>Chávez promised to redirect oil revenue into programs promoting food security and domestic farming. Yet Chávez, too, found the temptations of <a href="https://www.igi-global.com/dictionary/rentier-state/44104">the rentier state</a> too much to resist. Despite all Chávez’s lofty goals and rhetoric about self-sufficiency, <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/07/16/how-venezuela-struck-it-poor-oil-energy-chavez/">the country became more dependent on the rents from oil and gas than before his so-called Bolivarian Revolution</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/266688/original/file-20190331-177167-n1nwjd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/266688/original/file-20190331-177167-n1nwjd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=868&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266688/original/file-20190331-177167-n1nwjd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=868&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266688/original/file-20190331-177167-n1nwjd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=868&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266688/original/file-20190331-177167-n1nwjd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1090&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266688/original/file-20190331-177167-n1nwjd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1090&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266688/original/file-20190331-177167-n1nwjd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1090&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Kiss marks left by supporters of Venezuela’s former president Hugo Chávez cover a photograph of him hanging in Caracas, Venezuela in 2013.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Fernando Llano)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Chávez pumped proceeds from oil revenue into poverty alleviation programs, but the infrastructure of the industry gradually fell into decay and technocrats left for Canada and the U.S. Despite it all, Venezuela still sent around half a million barrels of oil a day to the United States in 2018. </p>
<p>We know that our consumption of fossil fuels is the primary driver of climate change. But less well-known is oil’s corrosive effect on democracy. <a href="https://are.berkeley.edu/fields/erep/seminar/s2006/KTsuijobmarketpaper.pdf">An American political scientist found</a> that the states that most depended on the rents from the extraction of oil and gas tended to be the least democratic and the most corrupt. </p>
<p>Looked at through ideological glasses, the myriad problems facing Russia, Venezuela, Iran and Saudi Arabia can be blamed on corrupt right-wing politicians, Islamism or socialism, depending on your political predisposition. </p>
<p>These rentier states, however, all have one thing in common: they rely on the royalties from unearned income rather than taxing individual citizens to make the government work. The result is a less accountable and more corrupt political system.</p>
<p>Whether that state is nominally socialist, as in the case of Venezuela, Islamic, as in the case of Iran, or ethno-nationalist, as in the case of Russia, is far less important than the overall damage that the reliance on natural resources does to the social and environmental health of its citizens.</p>
<p>If there was a gateway drug to the current crisis in Venezuela, it was oil, not socialism.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/113176/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Russell Cobb does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>During the Cold War, socialism was portrayed as a gateway drug to communist orthodoxy. The crisis in Venezuela has resurrected tired old tropes about “pinks” and “useful idiots.”Russell Cobb, Associate Professor of Latin American Studies, University of AlbertaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1134412019-03-12T21:17:09Z2019-03-12T21:17:09ZUS pulls diplomats from its embassy in Caracas, and tensions between Venezuela and Brazil escalate<p>The United States will <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/03/12/702464026/u-s-to-pull-diplomats-out-of-embassy-in-venezuela">withdraw all remaining staff from its embassy in Venezuela</a>, according to a late-night March 11 announcement by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Twitter, who cited the “<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/12/world/americas/venezuela-embassy-usa.html">deterioriating situation</a>” there.</p>
<p>Since March 7, a <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/03/11/702179263/this-is-going-to-end-ugly-venezuela-s-power-outages-drag-on">power outage</a> has crippled much of Venezuela, including Caracas, the capital.</p>
<p>Venezuela has been in a severe economic and humanitarian crisis since 2016. Now, a <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-crisis-explained-a-tale-of-two-presidents-111198">tense showdown</a> between President Nicolás Maduro and the head of the opposition-led National Assembly, Juan Guaidó, has created political chaos. In late January, following a presidential election <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuelas-elections-are-just-a-new-way-for-maduro-to-cling-to-power-87072">criticized domestically and internationally for irregularities</a>, Guaidó declared himself interim president of Venezuela. </p>
<p>The United States supports Guaidó’s bid to unseat the Venezuelan president. Maduro <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics/venezuela-give-u-s-diplomats-72-hours-to-leave-blames-trump-for-blackout-idUSKBN1QT25W">blames the U.S. government for the blackout</a>, saying it’s a ploy to debilitate his government. </p>
<p>Relations between Venezuela and neighboring countries are little better. </p>
<p>Colombia and Brazil – like most Latin American countries – have recognized Guaidó as the rightful president of Venezuela. Their governments have amassed hundreds of tons of medical and food supplies at their borders with Venezuela. </p>
<p>Maduro, who condemns the humanitarian convoys as the pretext for a <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-crisis-trump-threats-to-maduro-evoke-bloody-history-of-us-intervention-in-latin-america-111169">U.S.-led military invasion</a>, refuses <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-maduro-is-blocking-venezuela-bound-humanitarian-aid-when-so-many-people-in-his-country-need-it-111585">to allow the aid through</a>. Clashes between security forces and demonstrators <a href="https://shilfa.com/venezuela/the-number-of-deaths-at-the-border-with-brazil-has-increased-to-seven/">trying to bring in supplies</a> have killed an estimated seven protesters near the Colombian border and <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/02/venezuela-brazil-border-violence-reports-25-killed-190225104507514.html">25 demonstrators</a> near the Brazilian border. </p>
<p>Though he has quietly welcomed planes bearing humanitarian assistance from <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-47369768">Russia</a>, an ally, Maduro <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/21/world/americas/venezuela-aid-block-brazil.html">closed</a> Venezuela’s land borders with Brazil and Colombia, and <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/venezuela-s-maduro-cuts-ties-colombia-amid-border-conflict-n974991">severed diplomatic ties with Colombia</a>.</p>
<h2>Militarizing the border</h2>
<p>The recent clashes over humanitarian aid have heightened the <a href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/venezuela/2017-08-09/how-avoid-venezuelan-civil-war">risk of conflict between Venezuela and Brazil</a>, too.</p>
<p>As a researcher of <a href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/central-america-caribbean/2017-03-22/latin-americas-murder-epidemic">crime and violence</a> in Latin America, I have watched with concern as <a href="https://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/maduro-envia-veiculos-militares-para-fronteira-da-venezuela-com-brasil-23469527">Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro militarizes the country’s border</a> in response to Venezuela’s crisis. </p>
<p>Bolsonaro, a <a href="https://theconversation.com/bolsonaro-wins-brazil-election-promises-to-purge-leftists-from-country-105481">right-wing former military captain</a>, is an admirer of U.S. President Donald Trump and a fierce critic of all leftist governments – including Venezuela’s. He has <a href="https://internacional.estadao.com.br/noticias/geral,bolsonaro-promete-liderar-ofensiva-internacional-para-derrubar-maduro,70002684004">promised</a> to do “everything” necessary to help Guaidó restore democracy.</p>
<p>In February, Bolsonaro received Guaidó – then on an impromptu <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2019/02/25/americas/venezuela-colombia-guaido-pence-lima-meetings/index.html">diplomatic tour</a> of Latin America – <a href="https://g1.globo.com/politica/noticia/2019/02/28/juan-guaido-chega-ao-planalto-para-encontro-com-bolsonaro.ghtml">at the presidential palace in Brasília</a> with all the pomp of a state visit. </p>
<p>Guaidó is not the only Venezuelan to arrive in Brazil recently. </p>
<p>Every day, <a href="https://theconversation.com/refugees-from-venezuela-are-fleeing-to-latin-american-cities-not-refugee-camps-103040">thousands of Venezuelans</a> pour into neighboring countries, fleeing hunger, poverty and scarcity. There are <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/venezuela-emergency.html">over 3.4 million Venezuelan refugees and migrants</a> worldwide, according to the United Nations. </p>
<p>Colombia has received the brunt of the mass exodus, receiving over <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/news/press/2019/2/5c6fb2d04/venezuelan-outflow-continues-unabated-stands-34-million.html">1.1 million refugees and migrants</a>. But an estimated <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/news/press/2019/2/5c6fb2d04/venezuelan-outflow-continues-unabated-stands-34-million.html">96,000 Venezuelans have also come to Brazil</a> since 2017, most arriving on foot to the northern Brazilian border state of Roraima. Roughly 65,000 of those Venezuelan migrants have <a href="https://data2.unhcr.org/es/documents/download/67282">applied for asylum in Brazil</a>.</p>
<p>To manage the influx, Brazil plans to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-brazil-venezuela/brazil-to-increase-army-presence-on-border-with-venezuela-idUSKCN1FY2UP">double</a> its already <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-45338769">significant military presence</a> at the Venezuelan border, where at least <a href="http://agenciabrasil.ebc.com.br/geral/noticia/2018-08/mais-de-3-mil-militares-atuarao-na-fronteira-com-venezuela">3,200 soldiers were sent in 2018</a> to “guarantee law and order.”</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Venezuelan security forces in <a href="https://www.forte.jor.br/2019/02/21/maduro-envia-veiculos-militares-para-a-fronteira-da-venezuela-com-o-brasil/">tanks</a> patrol the border with Brazil to enforce Maduro’s Feb. 21 order that <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/22/venezuela-crisis-maduro-closes-border-crossing-with-brazil.html">nothing</a> – not aid, not migrants – crosses between the two countries.</p>
<p>The Brazilian Ministry of Defense is <a href="https://www.terra.com.br/noticias/brasil/militares-de-brasil-e-venezuela-negociam-para-evitar-confrontos-na-fronteira-diz-ministerio,3062bdf1554d028e2157a2c6804caab7w9dz6vlc.html">negotiating</a> with the Venezuelan army to prevent further violence over humanitarian aid delivery and remove some heavy artillery from both sides of the border. And Brazilian Vice President Hamilton Mourão, a four-star general, says Brazil <a href="http://agenciabrasil.ebc.com.br/en/internacional/noticia/2019-02/brazil-vice-president-advocates-peaceful-solution-venezuelan-crisis">rejects</a> taking any “extreme measures” in Venezuela.</p>
<p>But the potential for a <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article226624859.html">military confrontation</a> feel very real. </p>
<p>Bolsonaro has dispatched <a href="https://g1.globo.com/rr/roraima/noticia/2019/02/22/aviao-com-ajuda-humanitaria-para-a-venezuela-chega-a-boa-vista.ghtml">planes with 22 tons of rice, powdered milk and medical kits</a> to Roraima to help the roughly 5,200 Venezuelan refugees and migrants living in shelters and on the streets there.</p>
<p>Efforts by Venezuelan opposition supporters to bring some of that aid into Venezuelan territory have been forcefully rebuffed. Venezuelan security forces set up barricades, fired tear gas and targeted demonstrators. </p>
<p>The Brazilian military intelligence website Defesa Net reports that Venezuela has <a href="http://www.defesanet.com.br/ven/noticia/32142/Exclusivo-%E2%80%93-Venezuela-Posiciona-Misseis-S-300-na-Fronteira-com-o-Brasil/">moved anti-aircraft missiles to the border</a>, spurring <a href="https://super.abril.com.br/tecnologia/como-seria-uma-guerra-brasil-x-venezuela/">open speculation</a> in Brazil about how a war with its heavily militarized northern neighbor might play out.</p>
<h2>Violence at the borders</h2>
<p>Officially, Brazil rejects military intervention in Venezuela. </p>
<p>It is part of the Lima Group, a coalition of 14 Latin American governments and Canada that recommends a <a href="https://istoe.com.br/mourao-propoe-corredor-de-escape-para-maduro/">managed exit</a> by Maduro to resolve Venezuela’s crisis. The group is pushing Maduro to relinquish his power and leave the country, allowing Guaidó to lead a transitional government and call new elections.</p>
<p>But <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-bolsonaros-presidency-means-for-brazil-5-essential-reads-105894">Bolsonaro</a> considers Maduro’s government to be a “<a href="https://exame.abril.com.br/mundo/venezuela-bolsonaro-fala-sobre-ditadura-de-maduro-e-rejeita-intervencao/">dictatorship</a>,” and he has sparred with his Venezuelan counterpart <a href="https://exame.abril.com.br/mundo/venezuela-bolsonaro-fala-sobre-ditadura-de-maduro-e-rejeita-intervencao/">on social media</a>.</p>
<p>During Brazil’s 2018 presidential campaign, Bolsonaro’s youngest son Eduardo – a hot-headed 34-year-old congressman and <a href="https://twitter.com/bolsonarosp/status/1025718449425788929?lang=en">Steve Bannon booster</a> – even called for the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4O5DfysbyI">assassination</a> of the Venezuelan leader. He still publicly supports “<a href="https://www.brasil247.com/pt/247/brasil/372886/Filho-de-Bolsonaro-faz-discurso-de-guerra-contra-a-Venezuela.htm">removing</a>” Maduro.</p>
<p>Maduro, for his part, has labeled Bolsonaro a fascist and the “<a href="https://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/em-tensao-com-brasil-maduro-ataca-bolsonaro-hitler-dos-tempos-modernos-23373042">Hitler of modern times</a>.” He accuses both Bolsonaro and Vice President Mourão of being <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2019/02/25/americas/venezuela-colombia-guaido-pence-lima-meetings/index.html">U.S. puppets</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=513&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=513&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=513&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro, left, at a public event with Venezuelan opposition leader and presidential contender Juan Guaidó in Brasilia on Feb. 28, 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Brazil-Venezuela-Political-Crisis/5edd8373f59f417d888cf38a86c50437/4/0">AP Photo/Lucio Tavora</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Battles over humanitarian aid</h2>
<p>Bolsonaro has toned down his belligerent rhetoric as Venezuela’s political crisis has spiraled out of control, focusing on the need for <a href="https://g1.globo.com/politica/noticia/2019/02/28/bolsonaro-diz-que-nao-poupara-esforcos-para-restabelecer-democracia-na-venezuela.ghtml">democracy</a> and humanitarian aid in Venezuela. </p>
<p>This is likely at the urging of Vice President Mourão and other generals who hold <a href="https://brazilian.report/power/2018/12/10/jair-bolsonaro-cabinet/">cabinet positions in his government</a>. Brazil’s military, it’s clear, wants to <a href="https://www.bol.uol.com.br/noticias/2019/02/25/militares-de-brasil-e-venezuela-negociam-para-evitar-confrontos-na-fronteira-diz-ministerio.htm">avoid</a> a messy and protracted conflict with its northern neighbor. </p>
<p>Mourão has disputed claims that the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-brazil-usa-base/brazilian-offer-of-u-s-base-in-doubt-opposed-by-military-idUSKCN1P214H">U.S. is establishing a military base in Brazil</a>, saying that <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-brazil/brazil-will-not-allow-us-use-its-territory-to-invade-venezuela-vice-president-idUSKCN1QE2DS">under no circumstances</a> would Brazil allow U.S. troops to enter Venezuela through Brazil. </p>
<p>He says the only possibility of conflict with Venezuela is <a href="https://g1.globo.com/politica/noticia/2019/02/22/mourao-diz-que-so-ve-confronto-com-venezuela-se-brasil-for-atacado-mas-maduro-nao-e-louco-a-esse-ponto.ghtml">if Brazil is attacked first</a>. </p>
<p>Still, Brazil’s official rejection of President Maduro represents a dramatic break from tradition. Virtually every Brazilian government since the end of military dictatorship in 1985, both left and right, has practiced a <a href="https://www.americasquarterly.org/humanitarian-interventionism-brazilian-style">non-interventionist foreign policy</a> and respected the national sovereignty of its neighbors.</p>
<p>But Venezuela is an unprecedented challenge – a political, humanitarian and migration crisis <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2018/08/23/venezuelas-refugee-exodus-is-biggest-crisis-hemisphere/">of a scale never before seen in Latin America</a>. </p>
<p>All of South America hopes to avoid a <a href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/venezuela/2017-08-09/how-avoid-venezuelan-civil-war">civil war</a> that could spill over into the region. As Bolsonaro is learning, humanitarian aid, migrants and political relations with Maduro must be handled with extreme caution.</p>
<p>The president’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/apr/19/jair-bolsonaro-brazil-presidential-candidate-trump-parallels">influential youngest son</a> doesn’t seem to have <a href="https://ultimosegundo.ig.com.br/politica/2019-02-28/jair-bolsonaro-filtra-carlos.html">received the memo</a>. </p>
<p>On Feb. 23, Eduardo Bolsonaro tweeted that Maduro will only be ousted “<a href="https://www.msn.com/pt-br/noticias/politica/maduro-s%C3%B3-sai-%C3%A0-base-do-tiro-diz-eduardo-bolsonaro/ar-BBTYCIk?li=AAggV10&fbclid=IwAR2PDdpDIjhi-a631E18KjqCqpHhbfFlLJh0m1eOcXfjU9OVhsshx-Jr5Io">with gunshots</a>.” </p>
<p><em>This story is an updated version of a <a href="https://theconversation.com/brazil-and-venezuela-clash-over-migrants-humanitarian-aid-and-closed-borders-112913">story</a> originally published on March 7.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/113441/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>As co-founder of the Igarapé Institute and SecDev Group, Robert Muggah receives funding from a range a international foundations and bilateral partners. Supporters include the Luminate Foundation, Porticus, Claro, Open Society Foundations and the Canadian government. Robert Muggah is also a fellow at the Chicago Council for Global Affairs and the Canadian Global Affairs Institute, affiliated with the World Economic Forum and is faculty at Singularity University.</span></em></p>Citing security concerns, the US is evacuating its embassy in Caracas, where President Maduro blames the US for a calamitous power outage. Venezuela’s relations with Brazil are eroding quickly, too.Robert Muggah, Associate Lecturer, Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1129132019-03-07T11:21:25Z2019-03-07T11:21:25ZBrazil and Venezuela clash over migrants, humanitarian aid and closed borders<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262239/original/file-20190305-48432-cyy361.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Clashes between opposition protesters and Venezuelan soldiers at the Venezuela-Brazil border have killed an estimated 25 people.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Brazil-Venezuela-Political-Crisis/0b27ef1110fd459baa850217f3ff5d88/29/0">AP Photo/Edmar Barros</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Venezuela’s borders are now dangerous flashpoints in a <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-crisis-explained-a-tale-of-two-presidents-111198">tense showdown</a> between President Nicolas Maduro and Venezuela’s self-declared interim president, Juan Guaidó.</p>
<p>The United States, Colombia and Brazil – all supporters of Guaidó’s quest to unseat Maduro – have amassed hundreds of tons of medical and food supplies at Venezuela’s borders with Colombia and Brazil. Maduro, who condemns the humanitarian convoys as the pretext for a <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-crisis-trump-threats-to-maduro-evoke-bloody-history-of-us-intervention-in-latin-america-111169">U.S.-led military invasion</a>, refuses <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-maduro-is-blocking-venezuela-bound-humanitarian-aid-when-so-many-people-in-his-country-need-it-111585">to allow the aid through</a>. </p>
<p>The aid standoff grew deadly between Feb. 22 and 24. As Venezuelan opposition members protested the border blockade, Venezuelan security forces opened fire. As many as <a href="https://shilfa.com/venezuela/the-number-of-deaths-at-the-border-with-brazil-has-increased-to-seven/">seven demonstrators were killed at the Colombian border</a> and an estimated <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/02/venezuela-brazil-border-violence-reports-25-killed-190225104507514.html">25 demonstrators</a> died near the Brazilian border. </p>
<p>Though he has quietly welcomed planes bearing 300 tons of humanitarian assistance from <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-47369768">Russia</a>, an ally, Maduro has now <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/21/world/americas/venezuela-aid-block-brazil.html">closed</a> Venezuela’s land borders with Brazil and Colombia, and <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/venezuela-s-maduro-cuts-ties-colombia-amid-border-conflict-n974991">severed diplomatic ties with Colombia</a>.</p>
<p>Relations between Venezuela and Brazil are deteriorating fast, too. As researchers of <a href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/central-america-caribbean/2017-03-22/latin-americas-murder-epidemic">crime, violence</a> and <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09557571.2016.1230592">military conflict</a> in Latin America we have watched with concern as <a href="https://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/maduro-envia-veiculos-militares-para-fronteira-da-venezuela-com-brasil-23469527">Brazil’s president militarizes the country’s border</a> in response to Venezuela’s crisis. The recent clashes over humanitarian aid have heightened the <a href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/venezuela/2017-08-09/how-avoid-venezuelan-civil-war">risk of conflict between these two South American countries</a>.</p>
<h2>Militarizing the border</h2>
<p>Brazil’s president, the <a href="https://theconversation.com/bolsonaro-wins-brazil-election-promises-to-purge-leftists-from-country-105481">right-wing former military captain Jair Bolsonaro</a>, is an admirer of U.S. President Donald Trump and a fierce critic of all leftist governments – including Venezuela’s.</p>
<p>Since Guaidó challenged the left-wing Maduro for the Venezuelan presidency in January, following a presidential election criticized domestically and internationally for irregularities, Bolsonaro has <a href="https://internacional.estadao.com.br/noticias/geral,bolsonaro-promete-liderar-ofensiva-internacional-para-derrubar-maduro,70002684004">promised</a> to do “everything” necessary to help Guaidó restore democracy.</p>
<p>In February, Bolsonaro received Guaidó – then on an impromptu <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2019/02/25/americas/venezuela-colombia-guaido-pence-lima-meetings/index.html">diplomatic tour</a> of Latin America – <a href="https://g1.globo.com/politica/noticia/2019/02/28/juan-guaido-chega-ao-planalto-para-encontro-com-bolsonaro.ghtml">at the presidential palace in Brasília</a> with all the pomp of a state visit. </p>
<p>Guaidó is not the only Venezuelan to arrive in Brazil recently. </p>
<p>Every day, <a href="https://theconversation.com/refugees-from-venezuela-are-fleeing-to-latin-american-cities-not-refugee-camps-103040">thousands of Venezuelans</a> pour into neighboring countries, fleeing hunger, poverty and scarcity. There are <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/venezuela-emergency.html">over 3.4 million Venezuelan refugees and migrants</a> worldwide, according to the United Nations. </p>
<p>Colombia has received the brunt of the mass exodus, receiving over <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/news/press/2019/2/5c6fb2d04/venezuelan-outflow-continues-unabated-stands-34-million.html">1.1 million refugees and migrants</a>. But an estimated <a href="https://www.unhcr.org/news/press/2019/2/5c6fb2d04/venezuelan-outflow-continues-unabated-stands-34-million.html">96,000 Venezuelans have also come to Brazil</a> since 2017, most arriving on foot to the northern Brazilian border state of Roraima. Roughly 65,000 of those Venezuelan migrants have <a href="https://data2.unhcr.org/es/documents/download/67282">applied for asylum in Brazil</a>.</p>
<p>To manage the influx, Brazil plans to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-brazil-venezuela/brazil-to-increase-army-presence-on-border-with-venezuela-idUSKCN1FY2UP">double</a> its already <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-45338769">significant military presence</a> at the Venezuelan border, where at least <a href="http://agenciabrasil.ebc.com.br/geral/noticia/2018-08/mais-de-3-mil-militares-atuarao-na-fronteira-com-venezuela">3,200 soldiers were sent in 2018</a> to “guarantee law and order.”</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Venezuelan security forces in <a href="https://www.forte.jor.br/2019/02/21/maduro-envia-veiculos-militares-para-a-fronteira-da-venezuela-com-o-brasil/">tanks</a> patrol the border with Brazil to enforce Maduro’s Feb. 21 order that <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/22/venezuela-crisis-maduro-closes-border-crossing-with-brazil.html">nothing</a> – not aid, not migrants – crosses between the two countries.</p>
<p>The Brazilian Ministry of Defense is <a href="https://www.terra.com.br/noticias/brasil/militares-de-brasil-e-venezuela-negociam-para-evitar-confrontos-na-fronteira-diz-ministerio,3062bdf1554d028e2157a2c6804caab7w9dz6vlc.html">negotiating</a> with the Venezuelan army to prevent further violence over humanitarian aid delivery and remove some heavy artillery from both sides of the border. And Brazilian Vice President Hamilton Mourão, a four-star general, says Brazil <a href="http://agenciabrasil.ebc.com.br/en/internacional/noticia/2019-02/brazil-vice-president-advocates-peaceful-solution-venezuelan-crisis">rejects</a> taking any “extreme measures” in Venezuela.</p>
<p>But the potential for a <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article226624859.html">military confrontation</a> feel very real. </p>
<p>Bolsonaro has dispatched <a href="https://g1.globo.com/rr/roraima/noticia/2019/02/22/aviao-com-ajuda-humanitaria-para-a-venezuela-chega-a-boa-vista.ghtml">planes with 22 tons of rice, powdered milk and medical kits</a> to Roraima to help the roughly 5,200 Venezuelan refugees and migrants living in shelters and on the streets there.</p>
<p>Efforts by Venezuelan opposition supporters to bring some of that aid into Venezuelan territory have been forcefully rebuffed by Venezuelan security forces. They set up barricades, fired tear gas and targeted demonstrators. </p>
<p>The Brazilian military intelligence website Defesa Net reports that Venezuela has <a href="http://www.defesanet.com.br/ven/noticia/32142/Exclusivo-%E2%80%93-Venezuela-Posiciona-Misseis-S-300-na-Fronteira-com-o-Brasil/">moved anti-aircraft missiles to the border</a>, spurring <a href="https://super.abril.com.br/tecnologia/como-seria-uma-guerra-brasil-x-venezuela/">open speculation</a> in Brazil about how a war with its heavily militarized northern neighbor might play out.</p>
<h2>Violence at the borders</h2>
<p>Officially, Brazil rejects military intervention in Venezuela. </p>
<p>It is part of the Lima Group, a coalition of 14 Latin American governments and Canada that recommends a <a href="https://istoe.com.br/mourao-propoe-corredor-de-escape-para-maduro/">managed exit</a> by Maduro to resolve Venezuela’s crisis. The group is pushing Maduro to relinquish his power and leave the country, allowing Guaidó to lead a transitional government and call new elections.</p>
<p>But <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-bolsonaros-presidency-means-for-brazil-5-essential-reads-105894">Bolsonaro</a> has made clear that he considers Maduro to be a dictator.</p>
<p>“At the end of the day, [Venezuelans] are citizens, our brothers, and they are going through serious difficulties under the dictatorship of Nicolás Maduro,” <a href="https://exame.abril.com.br/mundo/venezuela-bolsonaro-fala-sobre-ditadura-de-maduro-e-rejeita-intervencao/">he said in October</a>.</p>
<p>During Brazil’s 2018 presidential campaign, Bolsonaro and his three sons – who are also politicians – <a href="https://exame.abril.com.br/mundo/venezuela-bolsonaro-fala-sobre-ditadura-de-maduro-e-rejeita-intervencao/">traded Twitter insults with Maduro</a>. Bolsonaro’s youngest son, a hot-headed 34-year-old congressman and <a href="https://twitter.com/bolsonarosp/status/1025718449425788929?lang=en">Steve Bannon booster</a>, even called for the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4O5DfysbyI">assassination</a> of the Venezuelan leader. He still publicly supports “<a href="https://www.brasil247.com/pt/247/brasil/372886/Filho-de-Bolsonaro-faz-discurso-de-guerra-contra-a-Venezuela.htm">removing</a>” Maduro.</p>
<p>Maduro, for his part, has labeled Bolsonaro a fascist and the “<a href="https://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/em-tensao-com-brasil-maduro-ataca-bolsonaro-hitler-dos-tempos-modernos-23373042">Hitler of modern times</a>.” He accuses both Bolsonaro and Vice President Mourão of being <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2019/02/25/americas/venezuela-colombia-guaido-pence-lima-meetings/index.html">U.S. puppets</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=513&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=513&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262240/original/file-20190305-48426-1l54lyg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=513&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro, left, at a public event with Venezuelan opposition leader and presidential contender Juan Guaidó in Brasilia on Feb. 28, 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Brazil-Venezuela-Political-Crisis/5edd8373f59f417d888cf38a86c50437/4/0">AP Photo/Lucio Tavora</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Battles over humanitarian aid</h2>
<p>Bolsonaro has toned down his belligerent rhetoric in recent days, focusing on the need for <a href="https://g1.globo.com/politica/noticia/2019/02/28/bolsonaro-diz-que-nao-poupara-esforcos-para-restabelecer-democracia-na-venezuela.ghtml">democracy</a> and humanitarian aid in Venezuela. </p>
<p>This is likely at the urging of Vice President Mourão and other generals who hold <a href="https://brazilian.report/power/2018/12/10/jair-bolsonaro-cabinet/">cabinet positions in his government</a>. Brazil’s military, it’s clear, wants to <a href="https://www.bol.uol.com.br/noticias/2019/02/25/militares-de-brasil-e-venezuela-negociam-para-evitar-confrontos-na-fronteira-diz-ministerio.htm">avoid</a> a messy and protracted conflict with its northern neighbor. </p>
<p>Mourão has disputed claims that the <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-brazil-usa-base/brazilian-offer-of-u-s-base-in-doubt-opposed-by-military-idUSKCN1P214H">U.S. is establishing a military base in Brazil</a>, saying that <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-brazil/brazil-will-not-allow-us-use-its-territory-to-invade-venezuela-vice-president-idUSKCN1QE2DS">under no circumstances</a> would Brazil allow U.S. troops to enter Venezuela through Brazil. </p>
<p>He says the only possibility of conflict with Venezuela is <a href="https://g1.globo.com/politica/noticia/2019/02/22/mourao-diz-que-so-ve-confronto-com-venezuela-se-brasil-for-atacado-mas-maduro-nao-e-louco-a-esse-ponto.ghtml">if Brazil is attacked first</a>. </p>
<h2>Non-interventionism no longer</h2>
<p>Brazil’s official rejection of President Maduro represents a dramatic break from tradition. Brazil has historically practiced a <a href="https://www.americasquarterly.org/humanitarian-interventionism-brazilian-style">hands-off foreign policy</a>. </p>
<p>Virtually every Brazilian government since the end of military dictatorship in 1985, both left and right, has espoused non-intervention and respect for the national sovereignty of its neighbors. </p>
<p>But Venezuela is an unprecedented challenge – a political, humanitarian, and migration crisis <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2018/08/23/venezuelas-refugee-exodus-is-biggest-crisis-hemisphere/">of a scale never before seen in Latin America</a>. </p>
<p>All of South America hopes to avoid a <a href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/venezuela/2017-08-09/how-avoid-venezuelan-civil-war">civil war</a> that could spill over into the region. As Bolsonaro is learning, humanitarian aid, migrants and political relations with Maduro must be handled with extreme caution.</p>
<p>The president’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/apr/19/jair-bolsonaro-brazil-presidential-candidate-trump-parallels">influential youngest son</a> doesn’t seem to have <a href="https://ultimosegundo.ig.com.br/politica/2019-02-28/jair-bolsonaro-filtra-carlos.html">received the memo</a>. </p>
<p>On Feb. 23, Eduardo Bolsonaro tweeted that Maduro will only be ousted “<a href="https://www.msn.com/pt-br/noticias/politica/maduro-s%C3%B3-sai-%C3%A0-base-do-tiro-diz-eduardo-bolsonaro/ar-BBTYCIk?li=AAggV10&fbclid=IwAR2PDdpDIjhi-a631E18KjqCqpHhbfFlLJh0m1eOcXfjU9OVhsshx-Jr5Io">with gunshots</a>.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/112913/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>As co-founder of the Igarapé Institute and SecDev Group, Robert Muggah receives funding from a range a international foundations and bilateral partners. Supporters include the Luminate Foundation, Porticus, Claro, Open Society Foundations and the Canadian government. Robert Muggah is also a fellow at the Chicago Council for Global Affairs and the Canadian Global Affairs Institute, affiliated with the World Economic Forum and is faculty at Singularity University.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Adriana Erthal Abdenur is a researcher at the Instituto Igarapé, a Brazilian research center. She also serves on the Committee for Development Policy of the United Nations Economic and Social Council.</span></em></p>Brazil’s president has threatened military intervention in neighboring Venezuela, called its leader a ‘dictator’ and sent troops to the border. But Brazil’s military is quietly working to avoid war.Robert Muggah, Associate Lecturer, Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio)Adriana Abdenur, Associate researcher, Center for Political Strategic Studies, Escola de Guerra Naval (ESG)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1129902019-03-06T11:25:39Z2019-03-06T11:25:39ZVenezuela’s economic collapse is laid bare when you look at how little energy the country is consuming<p>The country with the <a href="https://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/business-sites/en/global/corporate/pdfs/energy-economics/statistical-review/bp-stats-review-2018-full-report.pdf">most oil reserves</a> on the planet is facing a total economic crash, with wildly conflicting inflation estimates – <a href="https://www.imf.org/external/datamapper/PCPIPCH@WEO/WEOWORLD/VEN">as high as 10,000,000%</a> if the IMF’s projections for this year are correct. There has been much discussion about the collapse in Venezuela’s oil exports, intensified by <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2019/02/19/investing/venezuela-oil-sanctions-pdvsa/index.html">US sanctions</a> against <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-02-25/half-billion-dollars-of-sanction-stained-oil-sits-off-venezuela">the state oil</a> company PDVSA, which substantially prevents any oil trading between the two countries and takes away a steady income stream for the country. To understand the scale of the crisis, however, it is vital to look at what has been happening to energy consumption inside the country itself. </p>
<p>Oil consumption in Venezuela <a href="https://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/energy-economics/statistical-review-of-world-energy.html">fell 37%</a> in five years up to 2017, a reminder that the country was struggling under the Maduro administration long before the latest sanctions, which came after opposition leader Juan Guaidó <a href="https://theconversation.com/maduro-has-pushed-venezuela-to-the-brink-of-revolution-sanctions-and-aid-may-tip-it-over-the-edge-112324">announced himself</a> the country’s rightful president in January. Unfortunately, the oil decline is not an environmental achievement but a worrying symptom of Venezuela’s economic conditions – GDP is <a href="https://blogs.imf.org/2019/01/25/latin-america-and-the-caribbean-in-2019-a-moderate-expansion/">expected</a> to have fallen 50% between 2015 and 2019. </p>
<p>In a country where economic data is scarce, different oil products can be used as proxies for different kinds of economic activity. Venezuela’s oil and fuel oil export numbers give insights into the country’s incoming cash flow from abroad, for instance, while diesel consumption is a partial indicator for transport, industry and the power sector. Gasoline is a proxy for transport activity as well. </p>
<p>Diesel consumption declined by 11% on average each year in 2013-17, and gasoline shows a similar pattern with an average annual decline of 7% or by 27% over the same five-year period. Together, the two fuels account for approximately 70% of total oil demand in the country. From the graphic below, you can see that the collapse in oil consumption and GDP are staggeringly similar. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262200/original/file-20190305-48426-2q6uku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262200/original/file-20190305-48426-2q6uku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262200/original/file-20190305-48426-2q6uku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262200/original/file-20190305-48426-2q6uku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262200/original/file-20190305-48426-2q6uku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262200/original/file-20190305-48426-2q6uku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=548&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262200/original/file-20190305-48426-2q6uku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=548&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262200/original/file-20190305-48426-2q6uku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=548&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">ppp = purchasing power parity; MT = millions of tonnes; GDP from IMF.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">BP Statistical Review 2018</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This is not to say that the oil consumption estimates from the likes of BP are anywhere near perfect. Multiple Venezuelan official energy statistics ceased to be published between 2012 and 2015, leaving experts to build the best possible estimates from multiple sources. </p>
<p>BP figures for total oil consumption have been consistently revised downwards every year in recent history, as reality always punches below expectations. You can see this in the following graph, where each coloured line represents a different year of the BP Statistical Review and the estimates included for Venezuelan oil consumption: the yellow line represents the 2018 edition, whose numbers are mostly lower than the estimates in previous years’ editions. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262195/original/file-20190305-48438-jp936a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262195/original/file-20190305-48438-jp936a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262195/original/file-20190305-48438-jp936a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262195/original/file-20190305-48438-jp936a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262195/original/file-20190305-48438-jp936a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262195/original/file-20190305-48438-jp936a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=548&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262195/original/file-20190305-48438-jp936a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=548&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/262195/original/file-20190305-48438-jp936a.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=548&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">SR = BP Statistical Review of World Energy; MT = millions of tonnes.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">BP Statistical Reviews 2015-18</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The view from the ground</h2>
<p>People are not driving around anymore in Venezuela. To make things worse, 90% of buses were <a href="https://venezuelablog.org/venezuelas-public-transportation-crisis/">reportedly</a> out of action by mid-2018. This is a society that just doesn’t go out for work or travel. Businesses are also using less transportation, since they produce fewer goods than they used to – including food. The last implication is terrifying, and can easily be missed when solely looking at numbers. It is possible to survive without a car, but not without food. A litre of milk <a href="https://venezuelablog.org/venezuelas-public-transportation-crisis/">can now easily cost</a> a tenth of a monthly salary. </p>
<p>Energy prices have been severely distorted by a combination of explosive inflation and heavy fuel subsidies. By mid-2018, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/10/venezuela-crisis-fuel-driving-census-maduro">you could buy</a> 3.5m litres of gasoline for a single US dollar, but could barely buy any basic food item. Yet even if you have enough money to fill up your tank, it is increasingly difficult to find fuel – and the cost of spare parts is exorbitant. </p>
<p>The future of oil output looks equally bleak. <a href="https://fas.org/sgp/crs/row/IF10715.pdf">Production</a> is quickly <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2018-venezuela-oil/">collapsing</a>, with refineries only running at an incredibly low 22% of capacity. The power system is actually taking a double hit: the part that depends on fossil fuels in the form of natural gas, diesel and some fuel oil is crumbling while the part driven by hydropower is being <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/where-climate-change-fits-into-venezuela-rsquo-s-ongoing-crisis/">undermined by</a> very low rainfall caused by changing climate patterns. The net result <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/latest-news/article220464510.html">has been</a> thousands of power failures. A dry year could aggravate things further, requiring extra fossil fuels that the country is incapable of producing or affording. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-us-sanctions-hurt-but-the-economic-crisis-is-home-grown-111280">Venezuela: US sanctions hurt, but the economic crisis is home grown</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>As the sanctions continue to bite and hyperinflation rages on, Venezuela’s oil consumption decline looks set to reach levels last seen in the 1990s. The country began <a href="https://www.spglobal.com/platts/en/market-insights/latest-news/oil/020419-venezuelas-pdvsa-begins-partial-rationing-of-gasoline-sources">rationing gasoline</a> in February, and is now in the awkward position of <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-oil-supplies/venezuela-gets-fuel-from-russia-europe-but-the-bill-soars-idUSKCN1QA0H9">importing</a> refined fuels from Russia, India and Spain at “horrifying” premiums, according to an executive of PDVSA. One consequence of the sanctions is that they have affected Venezuela’s ability to transport heavy oil from its own oil fields, since this is made easier by adding diluting agents that are <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-politics-usa-sanctions-fact/factbox-u-s-sanctions-on-venezuelas-oil-industry-idUSKCN1PN34I">often imported</a> from the US. </p>
<p>The perfect storm of sanctions, inflation, production problems and <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/where-climate-change-fits-into-venezuela-rsquo-s-ongoing-crisis/">climate change risks</a> to power supply leaves us wondering how long it might take before the energy system comes to a total halt. As new oil statistics are published in the coming months, everyone from energy analysts to Washington policy hawks will be poring over them to try and understand where the country goes from here.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/112990/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>António Carvalho collaborates with BP for the Statistical Review of World Energy and Energy Outlook, but the views expressed here are his own. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jan Ditzen collaborates with BP for the Statistical Review of World Energy and Energy Outlook, but the views expressed here are his own. </span></em></p>The world’s most oil-abundant nation is heading for energy consumption levels not seen since the 1990s.António Carvalho, Research Associate (Centre for Energy Economics Research and Policy), Heriot-Watt UniversityJan Ditzen, Research Associate (Centre for Energy Economics Research and Policy), Heriot-Watt UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1111692019-02-25T19:27:43Z2019-02-25T19:27:43ZVenezuela crisis: Trump threats to Maduro evoke bloody history of US intervention in Latin America<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/260764/original/file-20190225-26156-rh2j3u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">An officer from Venezuela's National Guard lobs tear gas toward demonstrators during a standoff over humanitarian aid at the Colombian border on Feb. 23, 2019. Four protesters were killed.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/APTOPIX-Venezuela-Political-Crisis/85bfdbbaf79d45bdb0873a736903a4ba/10/0">AP Photo/Fernando Llano</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/crisis-de-venezuela-las-amenazas-de-trump-a-maduro-evocan-la-historia-sangrienta-de-la-intervencion-de-eeuu-en-america-latina-112733">Leer en español</a></em>.</p>
<p>Violence erupted at the Venezuela-Colombia border over the delivery of humanitarian aid to Venezuela, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/guaido-and-supporters-prepare-to-challenge-maduros-blockade-of-aid/2019/02/22/b77eff44-3632-11e9-8375-e3dcf6b68558_story.html">killing four people and injuring 24</a> on Feb. 22.</p>
<p>U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo warned Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro that his “<a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-47348293">days are numbered</a>,” and Trump officials reiterated that the U.S. is considering <a href="https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/02/01/john_bolton_all_options_are_on_the_table_for_venezuela_transfer_of_power.html">all options</a>, including military action, to address Venezuela’s crisis.</p>
<p>Almost 80 percent of Venezuelans <a href="https://www.eleconomista.com.mx/internacionales/Aprobacion-de-Nicolas-Maduro-cae-a-su-nivel-mas-bajo-20161117-0253.html">disapprove of Maduro</a>, who was reinaugurated for a second six-year term in January after an election widely seen as <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-is-now-a-dictatorship-96960">fraudulent</a>. Since taking power in 2013, he has led Venezuela into a deep economic crisis. </p>
<p>In late January, opposition leader Juan Guaidó declared Maduro a “usurper” and <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-power-struggle-plunges-nation-into-turmoil-3-essential-reads-110419">swore himself in as the country’s rightful president</a>. More than 50 countries – including the United States, Europe and <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article223932475.html">most of Latin America</a> – want to replace <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-47126434">Maduro’s regime with a Guaidó-led government</a>. </p>
<p>Despite near global condemnation of Maduro, any U.S. intervention in Venezuela would be controversial. The United States’ long <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Yankee-No-Anti-Americanism-U-S-Latin-Relations/dp/0674019970">history of interfering in Latin American politics</a> suggests that its military operations generally usher in dictatorship and civil war – not democracy. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/256717/original/file-20190131-108334-1ijsfjv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/256717/original/file-20190131-108334-1ijsfjv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256717/original/file-20190131-108334-1ijsfjv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256717/original/file-20190131-108334-1ijsfjv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256717/original/file-20190131-108334-1ijsfjv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256717/original/file-20190131-108334-1ijsfjv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/256717/original/file-20190131-108334-1ijsfjv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Juan Guaidó has declared himself president of Venezuela.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Venezuela-Political-Crisis/58fe638399ce41d38141267539c7f9ac/10/0">AP Photo/Rodrigo Abd</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The Cuban-US Cold War</h2>
<p>Cuba, the focus of my <a href="https://networks.h-net.org/node/28443/discussions/1732572/h-diplo-article-review-759-%E2%80%9C%E2%80%98between-two-communities-so-diverse%E2%80%99">history research</a>, is a prime example of this pattern.</p>
<p>U.S.-Cuban relations have never recovered from President William McKinley’s intervention in Cuba’s war for independence over a century ago.</p>
<p>Before waging what in the U.S. is known as the Spanish-American War in 1898, <a href="http://www.historyofcuba.com/history/teller.htm">McKinley promised</a> that “the people of the island of Cuba” would be “free and independent” from Spain and that his government had no “intention to exercise sovereignty, jurisdiction or control over said Island.”</p>
<p>In the end, however, Cuba’s independence from Spain meant domination by the United States. </p>
<p>For 60 years after the Spanish-American War, the White House made <a href="https://cri.fiu.edu/us-cuba/chronology-of-us-cuba-relations/">repeated military and diplomatic interventions</a> in Cuba, supporting politicians who protected U.S. <a href="http://www.havanaproject.com/2011/08/american-business-in-cuba-1898-1959-a-brief-overview/">economic interests</a> in sugar, utilities, banks or tourism and who backed American foreign policy in the Caribbean.</p>
<p>By 1952, when the U.S.-backed Fulgencio Batista overthrew President Carlos Prío Socarrás, Cuba’s government had effectively become protectors of American businesses, according to my research. Batista had a warm relationship with both Washington, D.C. and the American organized crime groups that used to <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Havana-Nocturne-Owned-Cuba-Revolution/dp/0061712744">control Havana’s tourist industry</a>.</p>
<p>A communist revolution led by Fidel Castro <a href="https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/batista-forced-out-by-castro-led-revolution">overthrew Batista’s military junta</a> in 1959. Castro <a href="http://lanic.utexas.edu/project/castro/db/1960/19600926.html">decried</a> the “imperialist government of the United States” for turning Cuba into an “<a href="http://lanic.utexas.edu/project/castro/db/1960/19600926.html">American colony</a>.”</p>
<p>The Kennedy administration’s trade embargo against Cuba and the disastrous 1961 <a href="https://www.jfklibrary.org/learn/about-jfk/jfk-in-history/the-bay-of-pigs">Bay of Pigs invasion</a> – in which the U.S. military trained Cuban dissidents in an attempt to unseat Castro – only pushed Cuba further into the orbit of Soviet Russia. </p>
<p>For the past six decades, the U.S. and Cuba have remained locked in a <a href="https://theconversation.com/can-latin-america-and-the-united-states-overcome-the-past-40125">Cold War</a>, with a brief thaw under President Barack Obama. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/260759/original/file-20190225-26177-rg8fea.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/260759/original/file-20190225-26177-rg8fea.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/260759/original/file-20190225-26177-rg8fea.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=456&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/260759/original/file-20190225-26177-rg8fea.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=456&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/260759/original/file-20190225-26177-rg8fea.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=456&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/260759/original/file-20190225-26177-rg8fea.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=574&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/260759/original/file-20190225-26177-rg8fea.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=574&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/260759/original/file-20190225-26177-rg8fea.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=574&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A Cuban plane on fire after a US-led attack in the city of Santiago in 1961.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Watchf-AP-I-CUB-APHS411515-Bay-of-Pigs/dbe3c7194b9f4618a366074fdc0c3662/5/0">AP Photo</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Anti-communist coups</h2>
<p>Fearing that communism would spread across the hemisphere, the U.S. government repeatedly interfered in the politics of Latin American nations during the Cold War.</p>
<p>In 1954 the CIA worked with elements of the Guatemalan military to <a href="https://www.pri.org/stories/2016-12-29/why-you-need-know-about-guatemalas-civil-war">overthrow elected President Jacobo Árbenz</a>, whom U.S. policymakers considered dangerously left-wing. Decades of dictatorship and <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/latin_america-jan-june11-timeline_03-07">civil war</a> followed, killing an estimated 200,000 people.</p>
<p>A peace agreement in 1996 restored democracy, but Guatemala has yet to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/21/world/americas/an-apology-for-a-guatemalan-coup-57-years-later.html">recover economically, politically or psychologically</a> from the bloodshed. </p>
<p>Then there is Chile’s U.S.-supported coup d'etat. In 1973, the U.S. government <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1973_Chilean_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat#U.S._involvement">covertly assisted</a> right-wing elements of the Chilean military in overthrowing the socialist president Salvador Allende. </p>
<p>General Augusto Pinochet took power with the quiet financial and political support of the United States. His dictatorship, which lasted until 1990, killed <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-14584095">tens of thousands</a> of Chileans.</p>
<h2>The Dominican Republic and Panama</h2>
<p>U.S. intervention in Latin America did not start or end with the Cold War.</p>
<p>During World War I, the United States was concerned that Germany could use the Dominican Republic as a base of military operations. So American troops <a href="https://2001-2009.state.gov/r/pa/ho/time/wwi/108649.htm">occupied the Caribbean island</a> from 1916 to 1924. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/260762/original/file-20190225-26159-4cphty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/260762/original/file-20190225-26159-4cphty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/260762/original/file-20190225-26159-4cphty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=780&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/260762/original/file-20190225-26159-4cphty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=780&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/260762/original/file-20190225-26159-4cphty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=780&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/260762/original/file-20190225-26159-4cphty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=980&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/260762/original/file-20190225-26159-4cphty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=980&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/260762/original/file-20190225-26159-4cphty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=980&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The mugshot of Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega after his removal and arrest by US troops.</span>
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<p>Though the American-led administration improved the finances and infrastructure of the Dominican Republic, it also created the national guard that helped to propel Gen. Rafael Trujillo into power. His 30-year reign was <a href="https://www.dukeupress.edu/the-dictator-next-door">savage</a>.</p>
<p>President George H. W. Bush’s 1989 invasion of Panama is the rare exception when U.S. intervention in Latin American affairs actually created stability. </p>
<p>Most Panamanians appear to have <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Exiting-Whirlpool-Robert-Pastor/dp/0813338115">supported the 1989 U.S. military operation</a> to remove the corrupt and brutal military strongman <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/30/world/americas/manuel-antonio-noriega-dead-panama.html">Manuel Noriega</a>. </p>
<p>In the years since, Panama has enjoyed comparatively <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2017/05/manuel-noriega-obituary-monroe-doctrine/518982/">peaceful elections and transfers of power</a>.</p>
<h2>Anti-Americanism in Latin America</h2>
<p>On balance, though, U.S. military operations in Latin America have rarely brought democracy. </p>
<p>But they have created strong <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Yankee-No-Anti-Americanism-U-S-Latin-Relations/dp/0674019970">anti-American sentiment</a> in the region, which leftist leaders from Fidel Castro to Hugo Chávez have adeptly harnessed to vilify their political opponents as mere U.S. puppets. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.pewglobal.org/2018/04/12/fewer-people-in-latin-america-see-the-u-s-favorably-under-trump/">Support for the U.S. government</a> is lower now than it has been in decades. Just 35 percent of Argentines, 39 percent of Chileans and 45 percent of Venezuelans view the U.S. favorably, according to the Pew Research Center. </p>
<p>President Maduro, too, has used anti-imperialist rhetoric. He denounces U.S. sanctions and other efforts to isolate his regime as a “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/04/venezuela-maduro-hits-back-at-gringo-plot-to-overthrow-revolution">gringo plot</a>.”</p>
<h2>A safer way to restore democracy</h2>
<p>This history explains why a U.S. intervention in Venezuela would be viewed with skepticism. Though Maduro is unpopular, <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuelans-reject-maduro-presidency-but-most-would-oppose-foreign-military-operation-to-oust-him-109135">65 percent of Venezuelans</a> oppose any foreign military operation to remove Maduro, according to recent polling.</p>
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<p>Rather than plan yet another coup d'etat, I believe U.S. efforts in Venezuela should support the work of the Lima Group, a coalition of 12 Latin American countries, including Mexico, Guatemala and Brazil, plus Canada. </p>
<p>The Lima Group has <a href="https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/venezuela/article226745184.html">ruled out</a> military force in Venezuela. Its pressure campaign to force him out peacefully has included diplomatically isolating his regime and asking Venezuela’s soldiers to <a href="https://www.efe.com/efe/english/world/lima-group-asks-venezuelan-military-to-show-loyalty-guaido/50000262-3887918">pledge loyalty</a> to Guaidó. </p>
<p>A negotiated settlement leading to Maduro’s voluntary departure from office is their ultimate goal.</p>
<p>Regional diplomacy is much slower than foreign intervention. But it avoids further bloodshed and reduces the role of anti-Americanism in Venezuela’s crisis.</p>
<p>It may also open a new chapter in the history of U.S.-Latin American relations – one in which the U.S. takes its lead from the region, and not the other way around.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/111169/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joseph J. Gonzalez does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Trump administration says President Maduro’s ‘days are numbered’ after Venezuelan security forces killed four protesters. But any US-led operation to oust him is likely to be extremely unpopular.Joseph J. Gonzalez, Associate Professor, Global Studies, Appalachian State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1123242019-02-25T13:29:45Z2019-02-25T13:29:45ZMaduro has pushed Venezuela to the brink of revolution – sanctions and aid may tip it over the edge<p>Venezuela stands close to the brink of another revolution. Acute shortages of food and medicine, along with quintuple-digit inflation, has led to an <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-us-sanctions-hurt-but-the-economic-crisis-is-home-grown-111280">economic crisis</a>. </p>
<p>With a large amount of <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-a-humanitarian-and-security-crisis-on-the-border-with-colombia-112240">much-needed humanitarian aid</a> being held at Venezuela’s borders with Colombia and Brazil, things could turn very violent (some skirmishes have <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/23/world/americas/venezuela-aid-live.html">already taken place</a>). The aid has been sent by the US and other international supporters of opposition leader Juan Guaidó. Together they brand President Nicolás Maduro a dictator, believing that he rigged his election in May 2018, and demand that he now stand down and restore democracy. But the army, so far, remains loyal to Maduro and troops have barricaded the border crossings to prevent aid from entering – something Maduro fears is a prelude to US invasion. </p>
<p>In applying <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3057450">my research</a> to the situation in Venezuela, it’s clear that things could soon come to a head. My research shows how dictators can manipulate their trade policies to bolster their political survival, foreclosing democratisation in this process. Using an economic model, I strip these types of situations down to a few essential ingredients, simplifying an extremely complex set of circumstances to facilitate deeper insight into how they work. Using my model to think about Venezuela’s situation, we can see precisely the role that the world’s powerful countries play through their sanctions and aid in shaping Venezuela’s prospects for democracy.</p>
<h2>Keeping people happy</h2>
<p>The basic logic of my model is that the Maduro regime, even as a dictatorship, has to keep the population happy just like any other political regime. After all, while democratic regimes worry about losing power at the ballot box, dictators fear revolution. </p>
<p>The model assumes that people have a sense of how life will be if they overthrew the Maduro regime, through a revolution, paving the way to democracy. Revolution is of course extremely costly and dangerous. But if life becomes so tough for ordinary people that they ultimately feel revolution is worth the costs, then Maduro has the threat of revolution on his hands.</p>
<p>Maduro’s options in the face of the threat of revolution include repression – something <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/01/25/688576099/tense-political-standoff-continues-in-crisis-wracked-venezuela">he has already experimented with</a>. But, from his perspective, repressing his own people is extremely costly politically. It is also risky, especially when this entails turning against his own support base. </p>
<p>Plus, many members of the military are unwilling to turn their weapons on their own people. This elevates the danger that military repression will ultimately backfire and lead to Maduro’s downfall. More than 100 soldiers are said to have defected <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-47352295">during the clashes over aid deliveries</a>.</p>
<p>A better option for Maduro than military repression would be to try and improve the welfare of ordinary people, making them more prepared to live with the status quo of his rule and less inclined to spark a revolution. Adopting this approach is in line with Maduro’s claims that there isn’t any crisis in the country. This is where Venezuela’s vast oil reserves could help him. </p>
<p>One of the insights one gains from viewing this situation through the lens of my model is that dictators can stay in power by using commodities like oil to import food and hence placate the populace. Venezuela’s ability to produce oil has been <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-47239060">badly curtailed</a> by the economic chaos engulfing the country, but the oil it does still produce could help Maduro shore up his survival.</p>
<p>This is where international economic policy becomes critical. The EU and US have levied sanctions on Venezuela’s exports, which means they have committed not to buy Venezuela’s oil. This, in turn, hinders the regime’s ability to use its oil to buy the food that Maduro needs. Having food to offer to his population is what stands between Maduro and the threat of a full-blown revolution. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-a-humanitarian-and-security-crisis-on-the-border-with-colombia-112240">Venezuela: a humanitarian and security crisis on the border with Colombia</a>
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<p>Seen through my model, the explicit purpose of sanctions is to deny Maduro that lifeline, pushing Venezuela to the brink of a revolution. Of course, China and Russia’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jan/24/juan-guaido-venezuelas-opposition-leader-declares-himself-interim-president">support</a> for Venezuela works in precisely the opposite direction, turning Maduro’s survival into a tug of war between the world’s major powers.</p>
<h2>Uncomfortable truths</h2>
<p>The uncomfortable truth is that, although the purpose of sanctions is to put pressure on the Maduro regime, this glosses over an important aspect of how the pressure works. It works by pushing the Venezuelan people to the point of desperation where they are prepared to risk everything in a revolution rather than live with the status quo. </p>
<p>Yet a second uncomfortable truth arguably outweighs the first. Failing to push the Venezuelan people to the brink of revolution will probably lead to a longer period under the Maduro dictatorship, delaying democratisation in Venezuela and entrenching the current misery.</p>
<p>At first sight, US food aid seems to undermine the above rationale. If food is Maduro’s lifeline, and if the purpose of sanctions is to destabilise the Maduro regime by depriving it of food, why send food aid? </p>
<p>I don’t think there was ever any expectation that the Maduro regime would accept the aid. Its purpose was to draw Venezuelan troops to the Colombian border, away from the capital city Caracas, and that is exactly what it has done. This further reduces Maduro’s ability to use the military to repress an uprising in the capital Caracas, further heightening the risk of revolution. It also increases the Venezuelan people’s temptation to overthrow the Maduro regime, because then they could gain access to the food aid immediately.</p>
<p>Another revolution is neither inevitable nor desirable. But, in my view and following the logic of the model I have developed, Venezuela has to get to the brink of revolution before it has any hope of finding the path back to meaningful democracy.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/112324/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ben Zissimos does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Food and medical aid at Venezuela’s borders could spark a revolution.Ben Zissimos, Associate Professor of Economics, University of ExeterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1121042019-02-22T06:01:07Z2019-02-22T06:01:07ZVenezuela: region’s infectious crisis is a disaster of hemispheric proportions<p>Over the last two decades, Venezuela has entered a deep socioeconomic and political crisis. Once recognised as a regional leader for public health and disease control, Venezuela’s healthcare and health research infrastructure has fallen into a state of collapse, creating a severe humanitarian crisis and a major outbreak of infectious disease.</p>
<p>This week, we published <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(18)30757-6/fulltext">the first comprehensive assessment</a> of the vector-borne disease outbreak that is assailing the country. Vector-borne diseases are those spread by insects – mosquitos, sand flies, kissing bugs and others. The “we” is a global consortium of authors, many of whom are Venezuelan doctors and academics working in the country under exceptionally difficult conditions. Others include Colombian, Brazilian and Ecuadorian academics who are witnessing the crisis unfold: Venezuelan refugees on the streets of their cities, diseases (malaria, Chagas disease, measles, diphtheria) spreading through porous land borders, and regional disease outbreaks of unprecedented proportions. </p>
<p>I first travelled to Venezuela in the early 2000s to study Chagas disease, a single-celled parasite spread by the kissing bug, a blood-sucking insect that infests the walls of adobe houses. Chagas disease is a silent killer. Once infected, the parasite can lie dormant for decades in its human host before causing fatal heart disease in middle age. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259976/original/file-20190220-148520-1p7ff18.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259976/original/file-20190220-148520-1p7ff18.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259976/original/file-20190220-148520-1p7ff18.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259976/original/file-20190220-148520-1p7ff18.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259976/original/file-20190220-148520-1p7ff18.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259976/original/file-20190220-148520-1p7ff18.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259976/original/file-20190220-148520-1p7ff18.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Kissing bug: spreader of Chagas disease.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/download/confirm/609147728?src=aSQuQDRj-oPyo2lxQ83yLw-1-23&size=medium_jpg">schlyx/Shutterstock</a></span>
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<p>You can’t travel to Venezuela, including to the communities where I worked in the Llanos (plains) of the west, without being entranced by the beauty of the landscape and the friendliness of its people. From the laboratory in the Institute of Tropical Medicine in Caracas, where I was taken under the wing of Professor Hernan Carrasco and his team, dancing salsa between the benches on a Friday night, to the villages where we slept under the stars in hammocks while the inhabitants sang joropo music, it is a thoroughly welcoming place.</p>
<p>Venezuela is also a place of extreme inequality. You only have to look up from the glitzy streets of downtown Caracas to the mud and brick ranchos clustered on the hillsides above to appreciate that. It is this inequality that drove the socialist revolution, and while times were good – and oil prices high – much of Venezuela’s wealth found its way into the hands of those who needed it most. Declining oil prices, corruption and mismanagement have changed all that. Alongside economic collapse has come a collapse in basic healthcare, an exodus of medical professionals, and a massive upsurge in disease.</p>
<h2>Fragmented information</h2>
<p>At the core of the infectious disease crisis in Venezuela is the lack of reliable data. Either through denial, a lack of resource, or both, the Venezuelan state is reneging on its responsibility to report on the extent of current outbreaks. The purpose of our recent review was to draw together fragmented information from Venezuelan civil societies, researchers, international organisations and neighbouring countries to get the best estimate of what is actually going on. Over 400,000 cases of malaria in 2017, 15% of the rural population infected with Chagas disease, surging dengue, Chikungunya and Zika infections. The picture is grim. </p>
<p>Health is highly politicised in Venezuela and working as a researcher is not without risk. My collaborators have been threatened with jail and having their medical licenses suspended simply for reporting outbreaks in the scientific literature. The Institute of Tropical Medicine where I worked has been raided by colectivos (community organisations that supports the Venezuelan government), microscopes smashed, medical records destroyed, hard drives ripped out of computers. </p>
<p>The centre of the current malaria epidemic in southeastern Bolivar state is also the centre of state-sponsored illegal gold mining in Venezuela. The tonnes of gold recently shipped by the Maduro regime to Russia and Turkey is soaked in the sweat and blood of poor Venezuelans, sleeping with their families beside mosquito-infested mining pits. Drawing attention to this malaria epidemic is drawing attention to the ecological and humanitarian disaster in this region where mercury is polluting pristine rivers and thousands are dying for want of antimalarial drugs that the government will not or, more likely, cannot supply. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259858/original/file-20190219-43258-1nfube.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259858/original/file-20190219-43258-1nfube.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259858/original/file-20190219-43258-1nfube.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259858/original/file-20190219-43258-1nfube.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259858/original/file-20190219-43258-1nfube.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259858/original/file-20190219-43258-1nfube.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259858/original/file-20190219-43258-1nfube.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Illegal gold mining in Bolivar state.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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<p>Venezuelans are resilient and resourceful people. The Venezuelan researchers still living and working in the country are a testament to that, as is the support they receive from the diaspora of Venezuelans forced to live abroad. In recognising the regional aspect to the crisis, the spillover of disease in the region and the millions of refugees, we hope our review will galvanise international organisations to act. I’m optimistic that we are reaching a turning point in a crisis ten years in the making. I fervently hope the spirit of Venezuelans will break through. I hope that scientists will dance salsa again – and soon.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/112104/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Martin Llewellyn does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>New survey of insect-borne disease in Venezuela.Martin Llewellyn, Senior Lecturer, Institute of Biodiversity Animal Health & Comparative Medicine, University of GlasgowLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1115852019-02-15T11:50:09Z2019-02-15T11:50:09ZWhy Maduro is blocking Venezuela-bound humanitarian aid when so many people in his country need it<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258805/original/file-20190213-181627-wgk1a5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=469%2C575%2C3433%2C1625&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Venezuelan soldiers stand guard on the bridge linking their country and Colombia, under orders to obstruct U.S. humanitarian aid.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Venezuela-Political-Crisis/778e2344868a442eac3b57ca08abd174/16/0">AP Photo/Fernando Llano</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Relations between the <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fcomm.2018.00064">United States and Venezuela</a> have been strained since the late Hugo Chávez rose to power two decades ago. They got worse when the Trump administration recognized opposition leader <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/04/americas/europe-guaido-venezuela-president-intl/index.html">Juan Guaidó</a> as the South American country’s president instead of Chávez successor Nicolás Maduro in January 2019.</p>
<p>These tensions could become a full-blown crisis, as has become clear along the Venezuela-Colombia border, where Maduro is <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/02/08/692698637/humanitarian-aid-arrives-for-venezuela-but-maduro-blocks-it?t=1549923499437">blocking the entry</a> of <a href="http://devinit.org/defining-humanitarian-assistance/">U.S. humanitarian aid</a>. The United States says it is sending <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/mike-pompeo-venezuela-aid-pompeo-pledges-20-million-in-venezuela-aid-at-request-of-u-s-backed-opposition-leader-today/">US$20 million in food and medical supplies</a> to alleviate suffering at a time when Venezuelans are experiencing widespread <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/02/11/693417776/doctors-demand-humanitarian-aid-be-allowed-into-venezuela?t=1549922908266">malnutrition and lack access to health care</a>. Maduro contends that these shipments are a plot to meddle in his country’s internal affairs – <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/02/11/693417776/doctors-demand-humanitarian-aid-be-allowed-into-venezuela?t=1549922908266">a Trojan horse</a> courtesy of Uncle Sam to undermine Venezuelan democracy.</p>
<p>Although there is no clear evidence of an ulterior motive, <a href="https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.2307/2648001">history does give Maduro reasons</a> to be skeptical of U.S. intentions. As a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=0M6hB44AAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">political scientist</a> who studies both the political ramifications of international assistance, and Venezuela’s growing instability, I find that humanitarian aid is rarely just about saving lives. In Venezuela, I believe that the U.S.-supplied aid may have substantial political consequences. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258806/original/file-20190213-181631-sgom41.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258806/original/file-20190213-181631-sgom41.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258806/original/file-20190213-181631-sgom41.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=373&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258806/original/file-20190213-181631-sgom41.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=373&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258806/original/file-20190213-181631-sgom41.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=373&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258806/original/file-20190213-181631-sgom41.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258806/original/file-20190213-181631-sgom41.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258806/original/file-20190213-181631-sgom41.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=469&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Demonstrators on the Colombia-Venezuela border in favor of U.S. humanitarian aid and Juan Guaido.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Colombia-Venezuela-Political-Crisis/b0951f2a2f67422d802b3d9daeed4f43/9/0">AP Photo/Fernando Vergara</a></span>
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<h2>A foreign policy tool</h2>
<p>USAID, the primary federal aid agency in the U.S., <a href="http://www.usdiplomacy.org/state/abroad/usaid.php">officially operates independently</a>. However, in practice it has worked closely with the State Department, and the Trump administration discussed <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2017/09/14/politics/rex-tillerson-reform-plan-state-usaid/index.html">making it part of the department</a> when Rex Tillerson served as secretary of state.</p>
<p>The U.S. government generally considers aid and development assistance as part of their broader foreign policy. The State Department officially calls USAID an “important contributor to the objectives of the <a href="https://www.state.gov/s/d/rm/rls/dosstrat/2018/index.htm">National Security Strategy of the United States</a>.” In other words, USAID’s work abroad is at least partially intended to safeguard American security and promote U.S. interests. </p>
<p>President Donald Trump <a href="https://qz.com/1402646/unga-the-us-is-ranking-which-countries-deserve-aid/">recently told the UN General Assembly</a> that the U.S. is “only going to give foreign aid to those who respect us and, frankly, are our friends,” a statement that appeared to be a threat to cut off <a href="https://theconversation.com/us-foreign-aid-explained-74810">American assistance</a> to <a href="https://explorer.usaid.gov/cd/GTM">Guatemala</a>, <a href="https://explorer.usaid.gov/cd/HND">Honduras</a> and <a href="https://explorer.usaid.gov/cd/SLV">El Salvador</a> unless they curb the flow of <a href="https://theconversation.com/todays-us-mexico-border-crisis-in-6-charts-98922">U.S.-bound asylum-seekers</a> and other immigrants.</p>
<p>The U.S. gives those three countries a total of about $450 million a year in <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-mexico/us-pledges-billions-in-aid-to-develop-central-america-curb-migration-idUSKBN1OH23X">foreign aid</a> and the Trump administration has pledged additional funds to slow the flow of people across the border.</p>
<p>Using aid to advance the national interest is not new.</p>
<p>In 2001, when the war in Afghanistan got underway, the Bush administration used aid to complement the military effort to prevent terrorism. Because Afghanistan had harbored Osama bin Laden and others tied to the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York, <a href="https://www.princeton.edu/news/2017/03/10/winning-hearts-and-minds-afghanistan-carries-risks-civilians">USAID got a broad mandate and billions of dollars</a> to help win the hearts and minds of Afghans. That policy was essentially a bet that once military intervention had defused the hostilities, Afghans would have a more favorable view of the U.S. – reducing the risk that terrorists would use Afghanistan as a launching pad.</p>
<p>USAID has also played an explicit role in attempting to win <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/43134075?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">hearts and minds in Iraq</a> in the early 2000s, <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20101028014938/http://afsa.org/fsj/apr00/leepson.cfm">Vietnam</a> in the 1960s and 1970s, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jdeveco.2009.09.011">and elsewhere</a>.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258807/original/file-20190213-181589-hxh90p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258807/original/file-20190213-181589-hxh90p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/258807/original/file-20190213-181589-hxh90p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258807/original/file-20190213-181589-hxh90p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258807/original/file-20190213-181589-hxh90p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258807/original/file-20190213-181589-hxh90p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258807/original/file-20190213-181589-hxh90p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/258807/original/file-20190213-181589-hxh90p.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=533&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Boxes of humanitarian aid from the USAID agency piled up in Colombia, near its border with Venezuela.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Colombia-Venezuela-Political-Crisis/a55db2428043437aa49669f3f3ef9fa6/8/0">AP Photo/Fernando Vergara</a></span>
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<h2>Aiding intervention</h2>
<p>However, it is probably the agency’s history in Cuba that Maduro has on his mind.</p>
<p>In 2014, a year after Maduro succeeded Chávez, the Associated Press reported that USAID covertly funded and ran the <a href="https://www.apnews.com/904a9a6a1bcd46cebfc14bea2ee30fdf">Cuban social network ZunZuneo</a> to help spur dissent in Cuba.</p>
<p>AP reporters identified a series of shell companies the U.S. government used to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/03/white-house-cuban-twitter-zunzuneo-covert">mask this intervention</a>. They also referenced an internal document that purportedly outlined how the U.S. intended to use the ZunZuneo project <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-26876801">to influence Cuban politics</a>.</p>
<p>No other evidence, however, has surfaced to corroborate this story of alleged subversion. Instead, the U.S. government acknowledged funding the project. The <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-26876801">program’s secrecy</a> came about not for subversion, but to protect “practitioners and members of the public,” White House spokesman Jay Carney said at that time. To be sure, Cubans who admit to working for, or being sympathetic to the U.S., do <a href="https://www.politifact.com/global-news/statements/2016/mar/22/raul-castro/are-there-political-prisoners-cuba/">run risks</a> in a country that <a href="https://www.apnews.com/7166a9b6a701462098751c029dee132e">locks up some of its dissidents</a>.</p>
<p>As <a href="https://www.cfr.org/article/maduros-allies-who-backs-venezuelan-regime">Cuba is one of Venezuela’s most important allies</a>, the Venezuelan media followed the ZunZuneo scandal closely. <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/10628">Venezuela denounced the U.S.</a> for its role with the platform, also known as “Cuban Twitter,” so Maduro is no doubt watching out for what the U.S. may attempt in Venezuela through its use of foreign aid.</p>
<p>I have seen no clear evidence of U.S. intentions to use humanitarian aid to destabilize Venezuela, but USAID’s reputation and <a href="http://time.com/5512005/venezuela-us-intervention-history-latin-america/">Venezuela’s own experience with the U.S.</a> gives Maduro good reasons to fear the worst.</p>
<h2>Applying leverage</h2>
<p>Even if the Trump administration has only the best of intentions, it may not be in Maduro’s interest to let the aid across <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-47221124">any of his country’s borders</a>. Humanitarian aid inevitably creates winners and losers – some will reap the benefits of the aid, while <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0022343317708831">others will not</a>.</p>
<p>In a nation where two or more groups are vying for power, that can change the power dynamics. For Maduro, who is still in power, <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-47221124">with the Venezuelan military behind him for the time being</a>, any changes caused by the distribution of aid can only weaken his position politically. To Maduro, it is no doubt clear that Guaidó stands to gain most from the humanitarian aid reaching Venezuelans because he can champion the aid as a success of his <a href="https://www.fresnobee.com/news/business/article226223030.html">shadow government</a>.</p>
<p>Humanitarian aid can give the groups that get access to it and can control its distribution leverage against others. In Syria, food aid got into the hands of the Islamic State group, which used the aid to strengthen its rank-and-file fighters, and extort money from <a href="https://www.thedailybeast.com/us-humanitarian-aid-going-to-isis">communities over which it had control</a>. Food aid also affected the power of different sides in civil wars in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1991/05/12/weekinreview/african-dilemma-food-aid-may-prolong-war-and-famine.html">Angola, Sudan and Ethiopia</a>, among others.</p>
<p>In my view, the U.S., other nations and aid organizations must take care to avoid letting their assistance get politicized while ensuring that humanitarian assistance actually reaches and benefits the thousands of Venezuelans who need it. Otherwise, these shipments could further destabilize the country, making Venezuelans in need of aid in the first place even worse off.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/111585/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Morten Wendelbo has received funding from USAID, for whom he has carried out a number of studies. </span></em></p>These shipments are rarely just about saving lives.Morten Wendelbo, Research Fellow, American University School of Public AffairsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1114662019-02-14T14:18:08Z2019-02-14T14:18:08ZVenezuela is putting democracy and its legitimacy to test<p>Long before the current <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-us-sanctions-hurt-but-the-economic-crisis-is-home-grown-111280">crisis in Venezuela</a>, democracy in Latin America was a damaged project. Military coups d’etat and other violent seizures of power in the 1960s and 1970s were followed by <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0261018318765857">weak attempts at redemocratisation</a>. Efforts to institutionalise social rights, particularly those based on state intervention in the economy, provoked hostile reaction from domestic and foreign markets. </p>
<p>Democratic attempts often faced hurdles caused by profound socio-economic restructuring and severe cuts in public spending – with national budgets linked closely to the global economy. Democracy was also highly dependent on markets. </p>
<p>During the 1980s, oil prices fell dramatically. In Venezuela, debt then skyrocketed, giving way to a dramatic political and economic crisis that was exacerbated by blatant corruption. </p>
<p>Then in 1998 Hugo Chávez was elected president – but with no fixed strategy of what an “anti-capitalist project” might entail. Instead, he took power at the end of a decade that had seen a catastrophic deterioration in living standards and the monopoly of conservative political parties. </p>
<p>Chávez was elected on his pledge to refound the republic in line with the vision of <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Simon-Bolivar">Simon Bolivar</a>, who had liberated Venezuela from Spanish rule in the early 19th century. And for Chávez, over more than a decade his experiments seemed to work. </p>
<p>According to the World Bank, his social, political and economic reforms led to a spectacular 50% <a href="http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/venezuela/overview">reduction of poverty</a>, and a 65% drop in “extreme poverty” between 1998 and 2012. </p>
<p>These gains were mirrored by Venezuela’s neighbours, with Latin America successfully reducing poverty and promoting shared prosperity. The proportion of the region’s 600m people living in extreme poverty (defined as a daily income of less than US$2.50) was <a href="https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/17198">cut in half</a> between 2003 and 2012 to around 12%. </p>
<p>In Venezuela, <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1467-7660.2011.01746.x">post-neoliberalism</a> as a project (committed to the creation of non-market societies, economies and cultures) remained highly dependent on the oil bonanza, accumulating reserves which supported the use (and abuse) of social welfare regimes. Yet as it became increasingly caught in the international oil industry downturn, so too did the post-neoliberal project.</p>
<h2>A state that failed the people</h2>
<p>The halving of the oil price in 2014 sharply reversed the advances made in reducing poverty and inequality. Fatal food and medicines shortages, disease outbreaks and widespread social deprivation spiralled into an unprecedented <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/venezuela-crisis/venezuela-political-tensions-brink-boiling-over-n32546">social and economic crisis</a>. </p>
<p>Now, according to the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), nearly 90% of Venezuelans <a href="https://borgenproject.org/top-10-facts-about-poverty-in-venezuela/">live in poverty</a> – a dramatic increase from an already alarming 48% in 2014.</p>
<p>It would be politically naive to think that the promise of democracy in Venezuela was vulnerable purely because of an over-reliance on a volatile oil industry. That was undoubtedly a fatal flaw, but Venezuela also failed to reconcile a deeply polarised society. </p>
<p>Since his election as president in 2013, Nicolás Maduro has failed to address chronic problems of economic mismanagement, poor planning, increasing social discontent, and corruption. His country has since undergone cycles of protest and repression that reinforced the social divide.</p>
<p>Human rights violations became systematic. There have been well documented restrictions on social protest and freedom of expression, with extrajudicial detentions and arbitrary arrests of opponents. On top of this, a devastating humanitarian crisis has seen an exodus to neighbouring countries - Brazil and Colombia – in a scale never seen before. The number of arrivals from Venezuela to neighbouring countries has steadily increased, reaching <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuelas-health-systems-are-crumbling-and-harming-women-in-particular-98523">5,000 per day</a> in early 2018. </p>
<p>To some, Venezuela had become a failed state, without the basic norms of democratic governance. Then on January 23 2019, Juan Guaidó, leader of the Venezuelan National Assembly, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jan/27/juan-guaido-venezuela-has-chance-to-leave-chaos-behind">declared himself</a> president of the republic.</p>
<p>Guaidó has long been an anti-government activist, but until recently was little known around the world – or even in Venezuela. Yet his move was quickly endorsed by several Latin American countries, as well as Canada and the United States. His self-claim to the presidency is quite problematic too: it draws legitimacy from “assertive politics” rather than from a direct democratic ballot. The end apparently justifies the means. </p>
<h2>Power grab?</h2>
<p>The argument seems to be that Maduro has ruined the Venezuelan economy, violated human rights of all sorts, repeatedly challenged the Venezuelan constitution himself, and was not freely or fairly re-elected in 2018. </p>
<p>Guaidó therefore alleges that that Maduro “stole” power and the role of president has <a href="https://theconversation.com/venezuela-crisis-explained-a-tale-of-two-presidents-111198">therefore been left vacant</a>. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, the president of the European parliament, <a href="https://twitter.com/EP_President/status/1088351174049304576">Antonio Tajani, said</a> the Venezuelan people have had “enough of the hunger and abuse suffered at the hands of Maduro”. And the Trump administration <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jan/26/european-leaders-ready-to-recognise-guaido-as-venezuelan-president">asserts that all countries</a> must “pick a side” and back the “forces of freedom”.</p>
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<p>But can an opposition leader – albeit with the support of foreign powers – simply state that the president of the country is not actually the president, and take power himself? If he can, how would Venezuelans be reassured that removing the “bad” president will not simply legitimise more politics of this “assertive” kind. </p>
<p>So for the moment, the country has been plunged into a situation whereby it has an internationally recognised government which has no democratic mandate from the people or control over state functions - yet it runs parallel to Maduro’s parliament, with a de facto presidential mandate yet a delusional and dangerous sense of authority.</p>
<p>This is not democracy. What Venezuela urgently needs is to reconstruct the foundations of political legitimacy beyond declarations. It requires electoral democracy and political consensus that can genuinely represent the people, deliver development, and reconstruct a sense of citizenship and belonging for its people.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/111466/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Pia Riggirozzi does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Assertive politics is not enough.Pia Riggirozzi, Professor of Global Politics, University of SouthamptonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.