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TheRepublic of Venezuela, was a democraticbipartidist republic first established in 1953, andreplaced in 1999 by theBolivarian Republic of Venezuela. Venezuela wasruled by a military dictatorship from 1948 to 1958. After the1948 Venezuelan coup d'état brought an end to athree-year experiment in democracy, atriumvirate of military personnel controlled the government until 1952, when it heldpresidential elections. These were free enough to produce results unacceptable to the government, leading them to be falsified and to one of the three leaders,Marcos Pérez Jiménez, assuming the Presidency. His government was brought to an end by the1958 Venezuelan coup d'état, which saw the advent of democracy with a transitional government under AdmiralWolfgang Larrazábal in place until theDecember 1958 elections. Prior to the elections, three of the main political parties,Acción Democrática,COPEI andUnión Republicana Democrática, with the notable exclusion of theCommunist Party of Venezuela, signed up to thePuntofijo Pact power-sharing agreement. This period is pejoratively known as the "Adeco" period.
This period was characterised by the alternation of political power established in the Punto Fijo Pact; by the nationalisation of the oil industry in 1976 and the creation ofPDVSA, the national oil and gas company; and by the rise of new social elites. Internationally, Venezuela became a founding member of theOrganization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). The 1980s in particular were characterised by the flowering of art and culture and by the artistic development of the nation, especially in television. Pioneering media likeRCTV made Venezuela famous with soap operas such asKassandra.
The period following thedissolution of Gran Colombia in 1830 (and thus succeeding theThird Republic of Venezuela) to the establishment of a "Bolivarian Republic" byHugo Chávez on August 5, 1999, is referred to as theFourth Republic of Venezuela by official Venezuelan historiography. The term was coined by Chávez to define the 169-year period.[2]
The term is not universally accepted by Venezuelan historians, however, asElías Pino Iturrieta argues that no "Fifth Republic" was founded in 1999,[2] while Diego Bautista Urbaneja proposes a different chronology for the entirety of Venezuela's republican history: a "First Republic" from 1830 to 1857, a "Second Republic" from 1870 to 1899, a "Third Republic" from 1909 to 1945, a "Fourth Republic" from 1958 to 1999 and a "Fifth Republic" from 1999 to 2013, ending with thedeath of Hugo Chávez (and thus suggesting a "Sixth Republic" underNicolás Maduro).[3]
After a militarycoup d'état on 23 January 1958 sent GeneralMarcos Pérez Jiménez into exile, Venezuela's three main political parties signed thePunto Fijo Pact. The ensuing elections brought Acción Democrática, which had been the ruling partyfrom 1945 to 1948, back to power under its leader Rómulo Betancourt. Betancourt's government halted grants to multinational oil companies, created a Venezuelan oil corporation, and helped establish OPEC in 1960, an initiative led by Development MinisterJuan Pablo Pérez Alfonso. The administration also introduced a new constitution in 1961, dividing the government into executive, legislative, and judicial branches; pursued agricultural reform; and promoted an international doctrine in which Venezuela only recognised governments elected by popular vote.
The new order had its opponents. On 24 June 1960, Betancourt was injured inan assassination attempt led by theDominican dictatorRafael Leónidas Trujillo.[4] Around the same time, the left-wingers excluded from the Punto Fijo Pact (Revolutionary Left Movement andArmed Forces of National Liberation) began an insurgency that was backed by theCommunist Party of Cuba and its leader,Fidel Castro.
In 1963,Raúl Leoni was elected to succeed Betancourt as president. Leoni's government became known for public works and cultural development, but was confronted with continuousguerrilla warfare.
Rafael Caldera won the next election.[5] Before he took office in 1969, theRupununi Uprising broke out in neighboringGuyana. The border controversy was resolved with thePort of Spain Protocol in 1970. Additionally, a truce with the guerrillas allowed their reintegration into political life.
Carlos Andrés Pérez took office in 1974, amid anoil crisis that had begun the previous year and had increased the global price of oil from $3 per barrel to nearly $12 per barrel. Venezuela nationalised its iron industry in 1975 and its oil industry the following year.
Luis Herrera Campins was elected to the presidency in 1979, with the country in deep debt and bound byInternational Monetary Fund demands. In 1983, the Venezuelan currency, thebolívar, was devalued on what became known asBlack Friday, unleashing an economic crisis.[6] The subsequent government ofJaime Lusinchi did little to counter the crisis. Corruption increased, and the Caldas Corvettes crisis in 1987, sparked by a sovereignty dispute in theGulf of Venezuela, generated one of the biggest moments oftension between Venezuela and Colombia.[7]
Pérez was elected again in 1988 and, looking to solve the recession, adopted economic measures that set off major protests, the biggest of which was theCaracazo wave of 1989. The same year, Venezuela held its first direct elections of governors and regional mayors.
In February and November 1992,Hugo Chávez led twocoup d'état attempts, and in 1993,Congress ousted Pérez.Octavio Lepage served as acting president for about two weeks, at which point the historian and parliamentarianRamón José Velásquez took over the interim role.
Despite initially rejecting liberalization policies,[8][better source needed] his economic agenda was later focused on cutting subsidies,privatizations, and legislation to attractforeign investment. Naím began at the lowest rung ofeconomic liberalization, which was freeing controls on prices and a ten percent increase in that of gasoline,[9] which in Venezuela is sacrosantly very low. The increase in petrol price fed into a 30 percent increase in fares for public transport[9] In February 1989, barely into his second term, Pérez faced a series of widespread protests and lootings, which started inGuarenas and later spread toCaracas, known asEl Caracazo. The response resulted in the declaration of astate of emergency and led to a large number of deaths, ranging from the official estimate of 277 dead[10] to over 2000.[citation needed]
TheMBR-200 officers started plotting seriously andon 4 February 1992 they struck.Hugo Chávez was a lieutenant-colonel, but other generals were also involved in the coup attempt. The plan involved members of the military overwhelming military locations and communication installations and then establishingRafael Caldera in power once Perez was captured and assassinated.[11] They almost had him cornered in the presidential palace, but he managed to escape to the presidential residence and from there, loyal troops cornerered Chávez and arrested him. In exchange for prompting his co-conspirators to lay down their arms, Chávez, fully uniformed and unbowed, was allowed to speak on television to the entire nation in a moment that granted him a place on the nation's political stage. On 27 November 1992, higher-ranked officers tried to overthrow Pérez but the conspiracy was easily put down.
Pérez's downfall came when a legal process was begun to force to him reveal how he had used a secret but legal presidential fund, which he resolutely resisted. With the Supreme Court andCongress ranged against him, Pérez was imprisoned, for a while in a detention center, and then under house arrest. He handed the presidency in 1993 toRamón J. Velásquez, a politician from his party and historian who had been his presidential secretary. Velázquez oversaw theelections of 1993.
Rafael Caldera campaigned for the presidency and brand-new political movement, calledConvergencia. The adecos chose the pardoClaudio Fermín. Petkoff had seen the futility of trying again and backed Caldera. Abstentions reached a record of 40%.[citation needed]
Caldera assumed the presidency for the second time in 1994[5] and had to confront theVenezuelan banking crisis of 1994. He reimposed exchange controls, which Pérez's administration had lifted as part of a general financial liberalisation (unaccompanied by effective regulation, which contributed to the banking crisis). The economy had suffered under the falling oil price, which led to a collapse in government revenues. The steel corporationSidor was privatized, and the economy continued to plummet. Fulfilling an election promise, Caldera released Chávez and pardoned all the military and civilian conspirators during the Pérez administration. The economic crisis continued, and by the1998 presidential election the traditional political parties had become unpopular;[citation needed] an initial front-runner for the presidency in late 1997 wasIrene Sáez.Hugo Chávez gained popularity amid the financial turmoil and was elected president in 1998.[12] His administrationpromoted a new constitution, which wasapproved by referendum in December 1999.[13] Theadoption of the new constitution in 1999 ended the bipartisanship, establishing theBolivarian Republic of Venezuela.
The constitution of 1961 divided Venezuela intostates, acapital district,federal territories, andfederal dependencies. Over the years, some territories have been elevated to the status of states, includingDelta Amacuro in 1991 andAmazonas in 1992. Each state has a governor and a legislative assembly.
Significant advances in the medical sciences took place during the Punto Fijo pact period.Jacinto Convit developed vaccines againstleprosy andleishmaniasis,[14] andBaruj Benacerraf was a co-recipient of theNobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1980 for hisimmunological research.[15] In the field of technology,Humberto Fernández Morán invented thediamond knife and contributed to the development of theelectron microscope.
The 1980s and 1990s were also a golden age of television in Venezuela. A number of Venezuelantelenovelas became popular internationally:Leonela (1983),Cristal (1984),Abigail (1988),Kassandra (1992), andPor estas calles (1992), all fromRCTV; andLas Amazonas (1985),Ka Ina (1995), andEl país de las mujeres (1998) fromVenevisión.
Several Venezuelans won international beauty contests:Maritza Sayalero (1979),Irene Sáez (1981),Bárbara Palacios Teyde (1986), andAlicia Machado (1996). Musicians likeFranco de Vita,Ricardo Montaner, andKarina also became known on the international scene.
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