Anarchism inVenezuela has historically played a fringe role in the country's politics, being consistently smaller and less influential than equivalent movements in much of the rest ofSouth America. It has, however, had a certain impact on the country's cultural and political evolution.
On the other hand, according to a series of surveys carried out by Latinobarómetro between1998 and 2010, the population of Venezuela has maintained the most favorable view of a statist policy compared to that of other Latin American countries. Although the percentage increased throughout the government ofHugo Chávez, a 2017 study by the Delphos Institute showed a decrease in these values, but had not yet reached the pre-1998 levels.[1]
In early 1810, during the debates within thePatriotic Society regarding the concept offederalism,Coto Paúl, himself influenced by the works ofWilliam Godwin,[2] proclaimed the following words against those who saw federalist ideas as anarchic:[3]
Anarchy! It is liberty that unties the shackles of tyranny. Anarchy! When the gods of the weak mistrust and curse it dreadfully, I bow to it on my knees. Sirs! May anarchy guide us to Congress with that burning flame of the furies in our hands, and may its smoke intoxicate those partisans of order and lead them to follow it through the streets and plazas yelling “Liberty!”[4][5]
— Coto Paúl
Simón Rodríguez was also inspired by the ideas ofutopian socialists, especially in their pedagogical approaches.[6] Some anarchists give a libertarian interpretation to Rodríguez's idea of thetoparquía, rule by independent districts.[7] For J.A. Calzadilla Arreaza, Simón Rodríguez's toparchy "steals the word from the lexicon of feudalism to turn it into a new republican and democratic concept, no longer lordship over the place, but a place with power of its inhabitants and their wills".[8]
During the time of theUnited States of Venezuela, between the late 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, the most active period in the region's anarchist history, there were few Venezuelan anarchists. There were, however, a somewhat significant number of local intellectuals who were at least influenced by the ideology's theorists.[9] Although the Venezuelan conservativeFermín Toro was one of the main promoters of thelaissez faire philosophy in Venezuela, he later rejected these positions, approaching the socialist ideas of the time, including some ofPierre-Joseph Proudhon. However, he defended non-libertarian positions as a central-federal political order.[10] The writerRafael María Baralt also quoted Proudhon on various occasions and even met him personally and spoke with him.[10]
Ángel Capelletti andCarlos Manuel Rama argue in their bookEl anarquismo en América Latina ("Anarchism in Latin America") thatEzequiel Zamora, aliberal politician and prominent rebel leader during theFederal War, was influenced by Proudhonian ideas.[9][11] According to Laureano Villanueva, Zamora had socialist ideas[12] and “was not waging wars to impose rulers on the peoples, but the other way around, so that the people could govern themselves, since it was in this way that he understood liberalism and the Federation”.[13]
On September 18, 1852, the workAnalysis of socialism and a clear, methodical and impartial exposition of the main ancient and modern socialists, especially those of Saint-Simón, Fourier, Owen, F. Leroux and Proudhon, was published in theCaracas Post by an anonymous author, which was intended to be a synthesis of the socialist doctrines of the time.[10]
While in Venezuela, the French anarchist andimpressionist painter,Camille Pissarro, developed a political commitment by observing the social injustices in the country, which influenced his arrival to anarchism.[14]
After the fall of theParis Commune in 1871, several exiles, among whom were Proudhonian libertarians, founded the Venezuelan section of theInternational Workingmen's Association, which existed at least until 1893 since that year a communiqué was sent to theZurich Congress, signed by Bruno Rossner, H Wilhof and A Pisen.[15] However, the organization did not manage to permeate within the Venezuelan labor movement, limiting itself to foreign workers.[16] Like other Latin American sections of the International, it had sizeable Proudhonian as well as Bakuninist influence.[17]
One reason behind the weakness of the early anarchist movement was the regime ofJuan Vicente Gómez, who ruled Venezuela as dictator between 1908 and 1935. Gómez extensively persecuted rivals, political dissidents, and trade unionists. Among the later victims were members of a nascentanarcho-syndicalist movement, belonging to an ideology brought in by radical immigrants fromEurope. While they were few in numbers, the efforts of these people in forming mutual societies, organizing oil industry strikes, spreading propaganda, etc. gained them a certain notoriety, but also the full attention of Gómez's persecution.[18]
In 1909, Manuel Vicente Martínez publishedEl socialismo y las clases jornaleras, a work "with a clear Proudhonian mutualist orientation", according to Rodolfo Montes de Oca. In addition to Proudhon, reference is also made toJean Grave,Charles Malato,Peter Kropotkin andAlfred Naquet.[19]
Some earlycommunists had anarchist influences:Pío Tamayo [es], a revolutionary poet and co-founder of theCommunist Party of Venezuela, taught his fellow political prisoners the "socialism ofBakunin andMarx". Tamayo, who died in prison, was imprisoned by Gómez.[20] Another political prisoner during this period was theColombianindividualist anarchistBiofilo Panclasta (1879–1943), who participated in the "Revolución Liberal Restauradora" ofCipriano Castro, aiding in the overthrow of PresidentIgnacio Andrade, prior to his encounter of anarchist thought. Arrested in 1914 after returning to Venezuela, Panclasta spent seven years in prison, more due to his friendship with Castro (deposed in a coup d'état by Gómez) than for his ideology.[21]
The Venezuelan naturist philosopherCarlos Brandt, although at first a sympathizer of former presidentCipriano Castro, changed his thinking to a "vegetarian-like pacifism." He explored different currents such as "anti-vivisection,pantheism,naturism, anarchism and above allpacifism as an ethic and ideal social model for humanity." Brandt established a friendship with theanarcho-pacifistLeo Tolstoy.[22] He also became friends withGeorge Bernard Shaw,Albert Einstein,Ernst Haeckel,Max Nordau,Gabriela Mistral,Alfred Russel Wallace and other thinkers of his time. The dictatorship of Juan Vicente Gómez soon landed him to prison and later forced him into exile. Fleeing from the Gómez dictatorship, he published his bookEl vegetarianismo where "for the first time in anarchism, he was not only committed to the vegetarian diet solely or mainly because of its healthiness, but because of a commitment to respect animals based on the fact that human beings are also an animal". Brandt collaborated with the libertarian magazineGeneración Consciente in Spain.[23]
Another promoter of Tolstoyan ideas wasJulio César Salas fromMérida, who founded the newspaperPaz y Trabajo in 1904, later continuing on the magazineDe Re Indica. Salas made friends with anarchists likeJosé Ingenieros. However, he never openly declared himself an "anarchist."[19]
Rafael Bolívar Coronado, aVillacuran lyricist for the famous songAlma Llanera, collaborated with his pen with the libertarian movement ofCatalonia. Alma Llanera, known today as the secondnational anthem of Venezuela, had a great impact that led the dictator Juan Vicente Gómez himself to grant Bolívar Coronado a scholarship to study in Spain. As the ship set sail he ran to the deck and shouted: "Death to Gómez, the tyrant!" and declared: "I am an anarchist, Bolshevik and ... racist".[24] Later he said about the Alma llanera: "Of all my abominations, I regret the lyrics ofAlma Llanera the most".[25]
The Venezuelan artist, antimilitarist and anarchist Mattia Léoni (born inPuerto Cabello in 1897), together with his brother Léonidas, joined the libertarian movement ofTuscany,Italy, at a very young age, where he trained as a sculptor at theCarrara School of Fine Arts. DuringWorld War I both brothers managed to go into exile inFrance and joined the libertarian schoolLa Ruche inParis. Mattia Léoni died in 1985 in Paris, France.[26]
On July 3, 1918, whatJulio Godio called "the first industrial strike in Venezuela" occurred, which involved the workshops ofAroa as well as the transit personnel of The Bolivar Railway Company Limited, where the Italian anarchist Vincenzo Cusatti participated as its leader. Although this strike was defeated, it left its mark on the Venezuelan trade union movement.[27]
Around 1931, anarchist tendencies predominated in the clandestine oil union Sociedad de Auxilio Mutuo de Obreros Petroleros (SAMOP) in which there were some American workers affiliated with theIndustrial Workers of the World.[28] However, this was not a specifically anarchist organization, especially considering that its main animator,Rodolfo Quintero, was aMarxist.[29]
After the end of the Gómez regime, and with the growth of new politicals movements in Venezuela, many libertarian-minded radicals were absorbed by or helped found non-anarchist organizations, as in the case of Pío Tamayo. Like Tamayo, some joined the Communist Party of Venezuela. Others were among the founders of theDemocratic Action in 1941. Between 1936 and 1945, anti-anarchist repression had a constitutional footing, in the form of theLey Lara [es] (Lara Law).
After theSpanish Civil War, many exiled anarchists arrived inVenezuela, finding a political climate far different from that ofFrancoist Spain. This second wave of anarchist European immigrants caused the regrowth of the small libertarian scene, primarily through the foundation of theFederación Obrera Regional Venezolana (FORVE, Venezuelan Regional Workers Federation) in 1958, after ten years of harsh military dictatorship. FORVE was affiliated with theInternational Workers' Association, a global anarcho-syndicalist movement founded in 1922.[30] Some additional minor groups were formed, and newspapers, pamphlets and books were published, but few of these left the Spanish immigrant milieu.
Among the exiled Spanish anarchists wasConcha Liaño, founder of theMujeres Libres. She lived in Venezuela from 1958 until her death. In 2012, Liaño affirmed that "[Hugo] Chávez is an envoy from God."[31] Another Spanish anarchist was Antonio Serrano (1919-2008), founder of the Venezuelan anarchist newspaperEl Libertario. Also living in Venezuela was the Spanish anarchist writerGerminal Gracia. In later years, as the ageing Spanish Civil War veterans diminished in importance, few movements would associate with the anarchist label.
In 1968,Rafael Caldera was elected aspresident of Venezuela, initiating a policy of "pacification" for the leftist armed groups in Venezuela. This generated a series of changes in the Venezuelan left, with some deciding to make a political life within the Venezuelan state scheme. Around that time, in part due to criticisms of certain authoritarian positions held by the Communist Party of Venezuela, theMovement for Socialism (1971),Radical Cause (1971) and theParty of the Venezuelan Revolution (1966) split from the party.[32]
Although he was not exactly an anarchist, former guerrillaDouglas Bravo - founder of the Party of the Venezuelan Revolution - proposed the "model of coexistence", "where the armed forces are not the center of power, nor is the party the center of power. Instead, the new social organization will be governed by organized communities”; and he explained that “what happens is that for the State to exist, the State disjoins the community, it takes away the sovereign powers of the community. When the community assumes its own sovereign, democratic, and more than democratic, convivial powers, there is no need for a party, there is no need for the State, there is no need for the police.”
For his part, the also former guerrillaAlfredo Maneiro - founder of Radical Cause - criticized statism, although without renouncing the parties, however, he said that the party, in order not to become bureaucratized, should move with the grassroots social struggles. In addition to that, he supported a radical democracy and rejected state paternalism such as that represented by the minimum wage, which in his opinion impaired "the capacity for union bargaining and the workers' struggle."[33]
From a vision of amarket socialism,Teodoro Petkoff - founder of the Movement to Socialism - affirmed that Marxists in Venezuela must assume positions that diminish the role of the State in the economy to favor the development of the productive forces in order to break with thestate capitalism that suffocates them, and he assured from a Marxist proposition that “societies begin to change when the development of their productive forces collide with the relations of production. That is when the instances of social change take place.”
Faced with the failure of the armed struggle in Venezuela, important leaders of theRevolutionary Left Movement such asDomingo Alberto Rangel andSimón Sáez Mérida began a process of radicalization. The former became a promoter of abstentionism while he edited the magazineAl Margen.[32] Later they came to sympathize with anarchism.
Some libertarian influence was seen among students in theRenovación Universitaria (University Renewal) of 1968-1970, part of theProtests of 1968. In this there were occupations of faculties, assemblies, demonstrations, graffiti, flyers, publications in the press and street clashes against the police. During that time, a transformation of the universities was demanded, questioning the current study curriculum, the political parties entrenched within the universities (including those of the left) and the traditional evaluation system. They defended a greater participatory democratization of the study centers, counting for this with a massive participation of students, teachers and employees. This movement was stopped especially with the Kangaroo Operation on October 31, 1969, whereRafael Caldera intervened with the army at theCentral University of Venezuela. After 19 days, theUniversity of Los Andes in Mérida was also raided.[34]
On the other hand, some politicians with a libertarian orientation —especially of Hispanicanarcho-syndicalist inspiration— such asFrancisco Olivo,Pedro Bernardo Pérez Salinas andSalom Mesa were members of theDemocratic Action party, when it had a more popular inclination. This led to exiled Spanish anarchists joining this party. For his part, Salom Mesa, after being a member of the Democratic Action and thePeople's Electoral Movement parties and even becoming a deputy inCongress on several occasions, chose to subscribe to anarchism and reject "political action".[35]
It wasn't until the 1980s that anarchist movements again resurfaced - theColectivo Autogestionario Libertario (CAL. Libertarian Self-managing Collective) was the most visible. Two journals,El Libertario (published by CAl 1985-87) andCorreo A (published 1987-1995) emerged. Some youths were drawn in throughanarcho-punk. TheCuban anarchist editorial collectiveGuángara had correspondents in Venezuela, by 1985. Prominently, theArgentine anarchist philosopher and university professorÁngel Cappelletti (1927–1995) worked in Venezuela for 26 years, until his retirement in 1994.[36]
In 1995 the newspaperEl Libertario reappeared, published by a group calling itself the Commission of Anarchist Relations (CRA). The CRA, which restyled itself the Collective Editorship in 2007, opposes theChavismo andBolivarian Revolution of former PresidentHugo Chávez, theFifth Republic Movement, and its successor theUnited Socialist Party of Venezuela. The group sees itself as involved in a "tri-polar struggle" against both the left-wing government and Venezuela'sAmerican-backed right-wing opposition movement.El Libertario publishes five editions yearly. Other minor groups exist or have existed, such as the CESL inCaracas, the CEA inMérida, and theAteneo La Libertaria, first active inBiscucuy and then in the rural area to the southwest ofLara. In January 2006 the Alternative Social Forum was organized in Caracas, and theAnarchist Black Cross has been somewhat active in the country.
From 2010, different initiatives have arisen such as the Colectivo Zona de Libertad, the Sabino Romero Social Center, the Temporally Autonomous Zone Mobile Library, the Libertarian Student Pedagogical Movement (MUPEL), the Anarkismo Guacareño group, the ARDA collective and the Lonely Mobile Library.
In 2011, the minorFederación Anarquista Revolucionaria de Venezuela (FARV) was formed. Unlike the CRA andEl Libertario, the group took firmly pro-Boliviarian stances, stating that it supported the "Bolivarian process critically as radical militants of the Social revolution". Their ideas and principles were "based on theespecifist trend withinlibertarian communism".[37]
In his later years, the long-standing MarxistDomingo Alberto Rangel collaborated with the anarchist newspaperEl Libertario,[38] and in an interview in 2011 he stated that "the new paradigm is anarchism."
During his adolescence, theJustice First party deputyMiguel Pizarro was an anarchist who "moved between readings by Bakunin and Kropotkin."[39] As a high school student, he was the founder ofNi Casco Ni Uniforme ("No Helmet Nor Uniform"), an antimilitarist movement opposed to the government imposition of Pre-Military Instruction in secondary education. This fact would lead him to be expelled from the institution where he studied.[40]
In October 2013, Chávez's successor, PresidentNicolás Maduro, accused unionist workers of theSIDOR steel company of being behind regional unemployment, denouncing them as "anarcho-syndicalistpopulists".[41]
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