The change of elites in Venezuela during the first stage of the bolivarian revolution

Abstract

The political change that took place in Venezuela in the heat of the Bolivarian Revolution brought with it a modification in the correlation of forces and in the way in which the country's elites were configured, with the emergence of new power groups that modified the structure of the state, entering into direct conflict with the hegemonic corporations of the previous political period. Through the Constituent Assembly and a whole institutional operation, chavism managed to weaken the political parties of the elitist bipartisanism and subsequently promote the growth of companies and corporations that presented a line of action in line with the Bolivarian project. From a populist rhetoric of an antagonistic nature, Chávez was able to construct a -subject people- that opposed the project of the elites, thus assuming the risks inherent to this type of discourse: extreme social polarisation and the tendency towards hyper-personalist leadership. Nevertheless, the first years of his mandate were marked by economic development focused on the reduction of poverty and inequality, and the will to dynamise a national economy outside the interests of big capital and in favour of the social majorities left unprotected by the previous regime.