Word: venezuelan
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According to many commentators on Latin American politics, the failure of last week’s referendum on proposed amendments to the Venezuelan constitution represents a welcome reprieve from the country’s (leftward) drift away from democracy. In a December 8th editorial provocatively entitled “Authoritarians in the Andes,” The New York Times celebrated Venezuelans’ rejection of Chavez’s “power grab” ; a few days earlier, our very own paper relayed economist Ricardo Hausman’s call for continued “vigilance?...
...democracy-challenged Latin America, a valuable service. And, whether he believes it or not, Venezuela did Chvez a favor as well by rebuffing the constitutional amendments that sought to expand and extend his already ample political power. The referendum loss should prod him to focus on the Venezuelan problems that need to be fixed before he leaves office in 2013, instead of the globe-trotting socialist and anti-U.S. crusades he hoped to pursue as President "until 2050," as he remarked last month. If so, he stands a better chance of leaving a solid legacy as the revolutionary...
...usually fractious and incompetent opposition might finally field a viable candidate. Aside from perhaps Rodriguez, pundits can think of few if any chavista potentials. Opponents, meanwhile, could include erstwhile Chvez allies like Garcia, who because they defected over the reforms may have a crossover appeal sorely lacking in Venezuelan politics right...
...opposition’s first major electoral victory since Chavez came to power. Federico Andrés Ortega Sosa, a second-year student at the Kennedy School of Government from Caracas, Venezuela, said the election results might signal “a momentum shift,” since the Venezuelan president has been enjoying “victory after victory” since he was elected in 1998. He also said some could interpret the defeat as proof that the Venezuelan government is indeed a democracy. “If somebody can turn a defeat such as this into...
...proposal that the President makes needs to be built more collectively," Espinal says. "Socialism can't be understood in only one way. People have many doubts, and that is natural when there is a transition. The Venezuelan people need more time to build a proposal." Despite the defeat, Espinal called the vote a "strategic victory" that could help the revolutionary process modify its approach...