Authoritarianism

Venezuela was once the richest country in South America. Under the leadership of Hugo Chavez, the country had ample funding thanks to the boom in oil (the country sits on a huge oil reserve). Venezuela thrived and Chevez’ approval ratings went up. However, he was careless with the spending which intern lead the country to a deficit. When Nicolás Maduro was elected into office in 2013, the oil industry saw hard times, but he did not make any changes to how the country was run. Subsequently, the country became poor as Maduro manipulated the people and the government to remain in power and make money. In 2015, Maduro stacked the Supreme Court in order to take away power from the National Assembly. He essentially had made is own government by then filling the National Assembly with those loyal to his agenda. Later in 2017, a presidential election was held. However, any opposition was removed and some people were even forced to vote for him in order to have a voter turnout. Currently, 80% of Venezuelans want Maduro out of office. Maduro has continued to gain power despite the people’s opposition. Currently, Venezuela has the highest inflation rate in the world. The Gross Domestic Product is just a fraction of what it used to be. As the video points out, the GDP is below that of the United States during the Great Depression. Naturally with the extreme poverty and desperate situation, the crime and murder rates are through the roof.

Maduro started out his presidency with authority, meaning he had “the legitimate right to wield power”. By being elected, power, “the ability to impose [his] will”, was given to him by the people. However, he lost true authority when he manipulated the government in order to gain more power. The say of the people was taken away. This type of government is called authoritarian or authoritarianism. Of course, there were still elections held in the spirit of the democracy (as we all know a government that allows the people to vote) in which their constitution was constructed. But because the elections were coercive and had no alternative politician to vote for, the government is authoritarian masquerading as a democracy. The people were essentially disenfranchised, their right to vote freely was taken away. As mentioned above, Maduro keeps only those who support him in office. These few people control everything about Venezuela, for example, the military has control over the food distribution. Since the collapse of the economy and the discovery of government corruption, the well being of Venezuelans and the country as a whole as plummeted. Here are some important things to know:

-90% of the country is below the poverty line

-73 people die each day due to violent crimes

-3 million residents have left

-inflation is expected to reach 10,000,000% (some perspective, in 2009, 1 VEF =.465 USD, now 248,488.00 VEF= 1USD and increasing!)

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