Participatory Politics in Venezuela: Local democracy and polarization

SPEAKER: Gerardo Gonzalez, Consultores21

DISCUSSANT: Prof. Javier Corrales (Amherst College)

DATE: 11 June 2013

ACTIVITY: CEDLA LECTURE

Venezuela continues to be a deeply divided society. Political polarisation shapes the everyday experiences of most Venezuelans, and the April 2013 presidential elections produced an electoral map sharply split between the government and the opposition coalition, the Unidad.

Since 2006, the government has promoted the creation of consejos comunales—neighbourhood-based elected councils responsible for carrying out local development projects with funding from the central government. While these more than 18,000 councils have encouraged citizen participation in local problem-solving, research suggests limited coordination between the councils and local authorities, as well as significant political polarisation within the councils themselves.

In this lecture, Gerardo González will first present Venezuelans’ perceptions of key social, economic and political issues, shedding light on the sources and expressions of current polarisation. He will then examine the internal dynamics of the consejos comunales and their significance for participatory politics, particularly in view of the forthcoming municipal elections.

Gerardo González is a sociologist trained at the Universidad Central de Venezuela and holds a Master’s degree in Latin American Studies from CEDLA. His research focuses on public policy and civil society, survey studies and political ethnography. He has taught at the School of Sociology and the School of Geography at the Universidad Central de Venezuela, as well as in postgraduate programmes at the Universidad Católica Andrés Bello, IESA and Monteávila University.

He currently works at Consultores21, a Caracas-based think tank specialising in social and electoral analysis.