Why Venezuela can not be considered a Democracy

What are the parameters to confirm if any country is or not a Democracy? What are the institutions of a democracy? Democracy is a goal for the majority of the countries that want to progress. No one have an ideal democracy but is perfectible thru the evolution of their institutions.  This article help to understand those institutions and them it will be applied to explain a real case:   Is Venezuela a democracy?

Fig 1. Political Institutions in a Democratic Country
Elected Officials
Free, fair and frequent elections
Freedom of expression
Alternative sources of information
Associational autonomy
Inclusive citizenship

     In the fig 1, you can see the different institutions needed for a modern democracy, also called Polyarchal democracy. Those institutions are not all at ones when a democracy is beginning to take form and some of them have evolved thru time. For example, women in USA, were not able to vote until 1920’ but nowadays the majority of the countries have Universal Suffrage. Political parties also have changed and are not the same in all the nations.

This work focus on countries because not all elements are needed in smaller units as organizations, schools, clubs, etc.   

The first important characteristic of a democracy is to have elected official. Elected officials represent just people participation, voting for them according with the ideas that they have proposed (Political Agenda). This is a point in favor of the Venezuelan regimen because elections are very common there. “From 1999 to 2013, Venezuela held four presidential, four regional, three legislative and two municipal elections, in addition to six national referenda and one election for delegates to a constituent assembly”. (Kornblith, 2013) The President, representatives for the National Assembly, state governors, municipal councils, mayors and other public officials are elected by the Venezuelan people in direct elections, but this is not the only criteria needed to confirm a democracy.

The second one is to have free, fair and frequent elections. Participation is the key, people must be motivated to go a vote for the ideas that considerer more relevant without coaction, as is important that the agenda and the official rotate, them is important the frequency.  Here is where the differences begin to emerge. Yes, Venezuela has frequent elections but they are far from be free and fair. According with Miriam Kornblith, who was part of the National Electoral Council from 1998 to 1999, “electoral processes are so strongly tilted in favor of the ruling party that its defeat at the polls becomes virtually impossible”. Government use public resources in favor of incumbents, public media is used in favor of the government party, and all institutions work in favor of their candidates. In the last parliamentary elections, although the opposition received 52 % of the votes, only won 40 % of the seats in the National Assembly. (Kornblith, 2013) In addition, in the last presidential elections where Nicolas Maduro was declared president, with only 50.6 % of the votes by the CNE, his opponent Enrique Capriles demanded a completely recount. During Election Day, 3200 violations were identified. Nevertheless, CNE did not authorized a complete audit including voting notebooks and Nicolas Maduro got the presidency.

Freedom of expression is the third element in a Democracy. Open communication that permit idea sharing, express points of view, heard and be heard, including everybody, candidates and citizens. In the 2012 Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) report talked about the deterioration of the human rights in Venezuela including “limits on the freedoms of speech and the press, including physical attacks on journalists and obstacles to accessing public information and reporting on events of public interest. (Kornblith, 2013) Last year, during the February protests, President Maduro ordered the Colombian news station NTN24 off the air due to “State Reasons”. After that, CNN was warned that its broadcasts could be blocked. CNN staff work permission was also revoked. The social media Twitter was blocked by the government on February 13, 2014. A total of 579 violations of freedom of expression were registered during 2014. (Cabrera, 2015)

The number four is Alternative sources of information. Different kind of independent sources, with different points of view and different criteria are needed to understand the different issues in a society and give citizens the capacity to decide what they want or what is needed. What happen in Venezuela? Venezuelan government own 6 TV stations and 8 more mass media, but also 6 private TV stations, 107 radio stations and 20 newspapers  identified themselves as pro-government.   During the last 16 years, the government has closed one national TV station (RCTV), two regional TV stations and six cable TV stations; more than 34 radio stations and two newspapers but, this is not the only way how Venezuelan regimen control media; new legislation to regulate media, that has generated self-censorship in different medias. In addition, in the last year newspapers have suffered of lack of paper to print their editions, several newspapers have closed and others have restricted their number of pages. (Human Rights Watch, 2014)

The next one is associational autonomy, what that means? People should be free to organize themselves in political parties, interest groups, lobbying organizations, unions, professional organizations, etc. Citizen participation is key in a democracy and these kind of organizations are a vehicle for participation. Venezuela has opposition parties but opposition is criminalized. One of the most important opposition leaders Leopoldo Lopez and opposition mayors Daniel Ceballos and Enzo Scarano are in jail, accused of instigating violence in the 2014 three months demonstrations.

And the last one is inclusive citizenship. Democracy is the government of all and for all, everybody must be included no matter what ideas they support. In the Venezuela case, inclusion is a big problems. “The government intimidate, censor and prosecute its critics” (Human Rights Watch, 2014). Looks like there are first class citizens who support the government and, dissents are the second class.

Only one of the six institutions is present in the Venezuelan regimen, allot of work is needed to transform it in and real modern Democracy.

Bibliography

Cabrera, J. (2015, January 20). NGO: 2014, The worst year in terms of freedom of expression in Venezuela. El Universal. Retrieved from El Universal: http://www.eluniversal.com/nacional-y-politica/150120/ngo-2014-the-worst-year-in-terms-of-freedom-of-expression-in-venezuela

Dahl, R. (2005) What Political Institutions Does  Large-Scale Democracy Require? Political Science Quarterly Volume 120 Number 2, 187-197

Human Rights Watch. (2014). World Repot 2014. New York: Seven Stories Press.

Kornblith, M. (2013). Chavismo after Chavez? Journal of Democracy, 47 - 61.