In Search of Hugo Chávez

Michael Shifter

From Foreign Affairs, May/June 2006

Summary:  The debate over Hugo Chávez has been dominated by opposing caricatures -- a polarization that has thwarted a sound policy response. The Venezuelan president has an autocratic streak, no viable development model, and unsettling oil-funded aspirations to hemispheric leadership. But Washington and its allies should ''confront'' him indirectly: by proving they have better ideas.

MICHAEL SHIFTER is Vice President for Policy at the Inter-American Dialogue and Adjunct Professor of Latin American Studies at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service.

A turning point in the increasingly troubled U.S.-Venezuelan relationship came when the Bush administration endorsed the military coup against Chávez in April 2002. Although precisely what happened at the time remains unclear, Washington's rush to express approval for such a blatantly unconstitutional act undermined U.S. credibility on the democracy issue. It also distanced the Bush administration from many Latin American allies who rightfully expressed concern about Chávez's ouster (which proved temporary). Although Washington later shifted its position and Secretary of State Colin Powell made a pro-democracy speech at the OAS shortly thereafter, the damage had been done.

Since then, Chávez has invoked the incident to make his case that the United States is determined to bring about "regime change" in Venezuela. That argument has been made with even greater conviction -- and, for many Latin Americans, with no small measure of plausibility -- following the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Chávez has predictably taken advantage of the hugely unpopular war to pound away even more at the Bush administration.

What has particularly alarmed U.S. officials is Chávez's alliance with Castro, Washington's nemesis for nearly half a century. With his resources, Chávez has succeeded in giving new life to the vision many considered long buried: to export "revolution" (in this case, Bolivarian Revolution) throughout Latin America. In a July 2005 speech at the Hudson Institute, entitled "The Return of an Aggressive Cuban Foreign Policy," Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Western Hemisphere Affairs Roger Pardo-Maurer warned that Castro is essentially working through Chávez, taking advantage of his resources to carry out a strategy that was thought thwarted four decades ago.

Yet even as political relations between Caracas and Washington have deteriorated, Venezuelan oil has continued to flow to the United States. So far, all of the apparent antipathy has not affected that key commercial relationship, which has forestalled a more serious clash between the two countries. The United States gets some 14 percent of its imported oil from Venezuela; more than 50 percent of Venezuela's oil exports go to the United States. At least for now, Chávez's efforts to diversify the markets for Venezuelan oil appear to be meant only to keep Washington on guard. But that could conceivably change. The United States cannot be complacent -- particularly because Chávez is so willing to subordinate economic considerations to political strategy, as his generous provision of oil to Cuba makes clear.

U.S. officials are clearly frustrated. In recent months, senior Bush administration officials, including Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, have alternated between denouncing Chávez and ignoring him. At a House International Relations Committee hearing in February, Rice -- who, to her credit, has usually shown restraint when discussing Chávez -- made her harshest public condemnation of him to date. The Chávez government, she said, is one of the "biggest problems" in the Western Hemisphere, and its association with Cuba is "particularly dangerous." Rumsfeld's rhetoric has been more provocative and far from constructive. Responding to the argument that Chávez has electoral legitimacy, he said that Hitler, too, was elected. (Chávez shot back, "Hitler would be like a suckling baby next to George W. Bush.")

The Bush administration has succumbed to this war of words. Too often, officials have gone for Chávez's bait -- and ended up playing into his hands. U.S. efforts to apply pressure through sanctions -- using Venezuela's record on human trafficking as a pretext, for example -- have amounted to little more than pinpricks. The congressionally funded National Endowment for Democracy has supported Venezuelan civic organizations opposed to Chávez, such as Súmate, but Chávez has adroitly used this as further proof that the Bush administration is intent on toppling his government. His troubling persecution of Súmate officials has sent a message to other groups about the consequences of accepting U.S. funding.

WHO IS AFRAID OF HUGO CHÁVEZ?

Last year, the Colombian magazine Semana, no friend of Chávez, named the Venezuelan president "man of the year" for having "modified the political map of the subcontinent, distributed his oil wealth in every direction, challenged the United States, and gone from being perceived as a tropical clown to the Latin American leader with the greatest political influence." And there is no sign that Chávez has any intention of slowing down. The 1999 constitution allows him to run for two consecutive six-year terms, but with his complete control of the National Assembly, a proposal to permit unlimited presidential reelection could well be adopted.

To be sure, Chávez's capacity to govern the country is not unlimited. A drop in oil prices, although unlikely in the near term, would prove highly problematic for his plans. There are credible reports of large-scale corruption within the regime and, as evidenced by infrastructure problems, major inefficiencies in the economy and the public sector. Shortages in basic commodities have begun to appear sporadically, the result of prolonged price controls. Incipient splits within Chávez's amorphous coalition could become more pronounced and create problems for governance. And although Chávez remains personally popular, polls indicate that the population is becoming increasingly dissatisfied over a variety of key issues.