An Assessment Of The US Approaches To Venezuela During The Chávez's Administration 2008-2013

This study aims to reassess the USA's approach to Venezuela during the president Chávez administration(2008-2013).There are many reasons behind this,however the main argument is the disagreement in the foreign policy of both countries.The democratic system established by the USA and accepted by many countries around the world,but for Venezuela is no more than a sample of interference in the policies of other sovereign states.The economic factors are also very important within these disagreements due to the geopolitical situation of Venezuela.The richness of natural resources of the territory is a crucial point for the development of both economies.In order to explore this issue,the thesis goes to review the relations before the Chávez?s administration because,it will give us an idea about how the domestic and foreign policies had been developing,and how they influenced the political changes of this governmental period.During the period(2008-2013),President Chávez had made some important changes in domestic and foreign policies,that pointed to a new democratic regime.Chávez had established a participative democracy instead of representative.Economically it meant to take more control by using the money earned from the oil production,to sustain the country?s economy,and find other strategic partners.The USA did not accept these changes due to its involvement in economic and political changes to the country.Since this period the relation between both countries had suffered a gradual deterioration,this started with the expulsion of the USA and Venezuelan ambassadors from each country,and then with the beginning of the economic blockade by the application of economic sanctions to some governmental representatives and also to the most important oil company in the country,PDVSA.With this research study we will try to have a clearer vision of the reasons of these approaches and also if these approaches are the real cause of the crisis that Venezuela is going through.The fact of being an agricultural country with a modest development,with many natural resources among all its territory and it has become one of the principal producers and sellers of oil in the world which allowed Venezuela to have an accelerated growth and development.The government based its economy in the earnings from the production and sales of the oil.This brought adverse results to the coutry,some of which were positive and others negative as the government in charge expected.Venezuela for many years was limited to live and maintain its economy with the earnings from the sale of oil.These circumstances gave a chance to many people to gain profit from it,creating a remarkable disparity between the population in the country,those people who were rich before,became richer and those who were poor became poorer this effect and reality gradually increased the dissatisfaction in the country.In the middle of the 80 th,Venezuela suffered one of the worst crises since the Democracy regime rule in the country.There was two main political parties;Democratic Action and Christian social party which exchanged the power since 1958 to the ends of the 90 th.During this time the President in charge for the second term was Carlos Andres Perez who was the leader of the Action Democratic party,in this period the economic crisis increased due to the previoulsy incorrect policies applied.President Perez had to create and apply a new strategic plan that included a series of economic reforms in order to solve the problems that the country was going through.In these reforms included the increase of the bank interest rates,the gasoline and transportation prices.The result of these new economic measures was a social outbreak called ¨El Caracazo¨ that left hundreds of people dead and injured,shops destroyed and cities in chaos.The government could not control the situation and in a certain way was unable to find and give some stability to the people who were more affected by this unfortunate episode.During this time the international environment for Venezuela was good,the commercial relationship with other countries around the world continued.This seamlessly established Venezuela as a founding member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries which developed and maintained the oil production and export as it expected.For many years,one of the leading commercial partners of Venezuela has been the USA.It has been part of the production and purchase of oil,thanks to concessions made by Venezuelan governments to some American oil companies.Despite the apparent calm in the country,a sector of the population was showing the discontent with the democratic and neoliberal regime.The most affected people with the increase of the prices and economic reforms were those who live in the popular sectors,those who could not have access to basics for example food,education,social security,and so forth.On February 1992,the government of Carlos Andres Pérez was surprised by an attempted coup d'état led by Hugo Chávez Frías,who was a military officer and leader of “The Revolutionary Bolivarian Movement – 200”.The coup was unsuccessful,and Chávez went to prison,two years later he was pardoned by the ruling President,Rafael Caldera,who was the last Venezuelan President of the Fourth Republic.After his freedom,Chávez founded “the Fifth Republic Movement,” and the Socialist United of Venezuela Party,and was elected as a president in 1998 for the first time.Chávez disagreed with the neo-liberal legislation that ruled the country for 40 years.He wanted to make a Democracy regime with the participation of the people.In 1999 the National Constitution was changed to focus on social reform,the government created Social Missions,Communal councils,and important industries were transferred to the national government.With the inclusion of the Participative Democracy regime,Chávez helped to embrace the social class,which had been excluded for many years in the Fourth Republic.This action allowed him to be a leader of the country for 14 years,from 1999 till his death in 2013.This Socialism of the XXI century let President Chávez be part of a movement that was based on the ideological relationship between the new Venezuelan revolution and the Cuban revolution.The movement allowed neighbouring countries which were trying to follow the same way to subsequently create a new balance among the developing countries and the most powerful countries of the world.His distinctive government characterizes the USA,for trying to have the political and economic control to disadvantaged countries.New alliances and politics mean the infamous feeling of being “the backyard of USA” may disappear,which they take for granted many years before with the commercial trades under the neoliberal politics that ruled the county during the Fourth Republic.The purpose of this research is to explain why and how Venezuela started a change of the political,economic and social environment in the American continent during President Chávez governance(2008-2013).Some of the questions to be answered in the research comprise of: are the new socialist politics the real reason for the deterioration of the relationship between both countries? Moreover,is the actual situation of the country the consequence of this new politic? Venezuela had been criticized for the regime that has been applied since President Chávez came to power as countries globally do not recognize it as a democratic regime.We will analyze,from the definition of Democracy,having sources,different theories,starting from realism theory as a base to show and protect the concept of state sovereignty,to the hegemony theory,which implies the concept of power and how it can affect the international relations environment.This research has four chapters and a conclusion.In chapter one,we will analyze our thesis question,based on the existing literature background.Chapter two will show a summary of some facts that can be considered the beginning of the disagreement between Venezuela and the USA.Chapter three will present the actions taken by the government of the USA against Venezuela and how this contributed to the economic instability of the country.Finally,in chapter four we will analyze what meant for both countries a possible détente between them,which will give us a chance to recognize if this could bring positive results or not,for the development of new agreements in foreign policies represented in common benefits of respect,solidarity,and tolerance.