zein al-abdeen
23rd February 2009, 12:54
Editorial of issue # 5 / Socialist Venezuela Newsletter
Venezuelan transformation towards socialism
The revolution has completed its first decade, and with it came the completion of many figures that mark what has been achieved on the ground of substantial progress in Venezuela on all levels of economic, political, and social fields. Venezuela now possesses its own options instead of being just a follower that works in return for a salary that comes originally from his own production but offered to him by another force that robs his rights to his own resources. Venezuela today is independent, it has marched forward with high competence carrying out the duty of achieving national independence and reinforcing democracy which has already been enhanced and is impossible to be stopped because it has increased its effectiveness and has been put on the right path in order to continue developing and coping with the duties of the next stage of successful transition towards socialism.
Communes are the basis of the socialist state
Leader of the Bolivarian revolution in Venezuela assured the importance of working on the creation of communes which are made of public councils that already exist as an important obligatory step for transition towards socialism. This proposition is not the first of its kind, the communes were defined in the proposed constitution of the year 2007 as 'the basic organizational structure of the state; a self-independent body made of social organizations that are united and regulated as a form of participatory democracy.'
In order to make a revolutionary change in the country, it is not enough to change the relations of the state’s institutions between one another and between the citizens, but a radical replacement should be made on the state's structural and organizational status; this will not be through replacing individuals or writing slogans on the walls, but rather through developing the existing social organizations which exceed bureaucracy caused by representative democracy and finding new structures and organizations that are parallel to the traditional governmental institutions which are full of corruption and bureaucracy in order to get rid of them gradually so that the new social state would replace them.
Building socialism from the bases
In order to achieve the duty of building the socialist state, the revolution had to express itself and its historical experiences which have accumulated through out long decades of popular struggle either in face of dictatorships or against abusive liberal governments.
Venezuelans have learned that the elected representative who cannot be questioned is a corrupted or bureaucratic representative or does not care for anyone at best; they knew that the electoral promises will not continue after the moment of announcing the results of the elections they participated in, and after this person reaches a certain position, he even stops repeating his promises by disappearing in a castle far away from those who have elected him and supported him to reach his position; this way, we realize that the representative democracy is abhorrent to the supporters of the revolution who have started after the events of the Caracazo in the late 80s of the 20th century creating their own social organizations and inventing their own methods of imposing their desires; this stage which continued from 1989 to 1999 was crowned with the arrival of president Hugo Chavez to the government to offer legal legislation for those organizations and extend them with all kinds of support especially financially in order for their role to become more active and so they would provide better than the traditional governmental institutions.
Those revolutionaries who have imposed their own social organizations, the arrival of President Chavez to the government and changing the previous governmental approach, refuse that the new state be imposed on them, even if President Chavez is the one who seeks so; the socialist state will not be built unless through the bases; no one will create it but them; this is what the revolution has expressed by its leader's words when he assured that the successful establishment of the socialist state would not be except from the bases and in order to give the bases their role, the revolution must commit to 'democratic socialism' and develop its democratic model represented by participatory democracy.
Offering the means of production to the people
Noting that the bourgeois democracy emerges from the existence of the class which possesses the means of production, the class whose form of democracy will start vanishing with the disappearance of the form of property linked to it, expecting the existence of a more advanced democracy without changing the property of the means of production will remain an illusion.
Each kind of property has a system that represents it in the leadership of the country, and if the goal in the next stage is to create the socialist state gradually and to get rid of the old state in a systematic and precise method, then we must change the form of property of the means of production in the country.
Because the revolution does not yet own technical, artificial, and administrative experts able to manage all kinds of facilities, it was and is still forced to maintain the private property in such sectors until it is able to own sufficient human expertise to regulate them itself; in this field, Venezuela has succeeded in achieving tangible development and started preparing human cadres that are able to manage many institutions.
In this context, it has nationalized some industries and factories whose property was transferred to the state; however, as we mentioned before, the state in its previous form is unable to fulfill the aspirations of the Venezuelans and in order to change this state, we must change the form of property and therefore the public property cannot be the solution, because history will then repeat it self giving us a result just like previous experiences when the property was converted from the predominant bourgeoisie to the new bureaucratic class which controls the state that owns and administrates everything, or else the public property state.
For this, President Chavez said "offering the means of production to the people is a must."
Not everything was nationalized at once, which would destroy national economy, because the revolution is not ready to own everything; the property of the communes was also not imposed directly, because we must prepare for each stage in order not to fall in deadly mistakes; the private property will continue until the revolution is able to get rid of it; the governmental property will also continue and the seeds of getting rid of both properties, which produce two classes that kill the revolution, bourgeoisie and bureaucracy, exist in the heart of the revolution and the growth of those seeds is a matter of time and depends on the Venezuelans' struggle which feeds those seeds and makes their growth and development strong enough to achieve what is required from them; this growth depends mainly on the success in completing this stage and converting to socialism.
Venezuelan transformation towards socialism
The revolution has completed its first decade, and with it came the completion of many figures that mark what has been achieved on the ground of substantial progress in Venezuela on all levels of economic, political, and social fields. Venezuela now possesses its own options instead of being just a follower that works in return for a salary that comes originally from his own production but offered to him by another force that robs his rights to his own resources. Venezuela today is independent, it has marched forward with high competence carrying out the duty of achieving national independence and reinforcing democracy which has already been enhanced and is impossible to be stopped because it has increased its effectiveness and has been put on the right path in order to continue developing and coping with the duties of the next stage of successful transition towards socialism.
Communes are the basis of the socialist state
Leader of the Bolivarian revolution in Venezuela assured the importance of working on the creation of communes which are made of public councils that already exist as an important obligatory step for transition towards socialism. This proposition is not the first of its kind, the communes were defined in the proposed constitution of the year 2007 as 'the basic organizational structure of the state; a self-independent body made of social organizations that are united and regulated as a form of participatory democracy.'
In order to make a revolutionary change in the country, it is not enough to change the relations of the state’s institutions between one another and between the citizens, but a radical replacement should be made on the state's structural and organizational status; this will not be through replacing individuals or writing slogans on the walls, but rather through developing the existing social organizations which exceed bureaucracy caused by representative democracy and finding new structures and organizations that are parallel to the traditional governmental institutions which are full of corruption and bureaucracy in order to get rid of them gradually so that the new social state would replace them.
Building socialism from the bases
In order to achieve the duty of building the socialist state, the revolution had to express itself and its historical experiences which have accumulated through out long decades of popular struggle either in face of dictatorships or against abusive liberal governments.
Venezuelans have learned that the elected representative who cannot be questioned is a corrupted or bureaucratic representative or does not care for anyone at best; they knew that the electoral promises will not continue after the moment of announcing the results of the elections they participated in, and after this person reaches a certain position, he even stops repeating his promises by disappearing in a castle far away from those who have elected him and supported him to reach his position; this way, we realize that the representative democracy is abhorrent to the supporters of the revolution who have started after the events of the Caracazo in the late 80s of the 20th century creating their own social organizations and inventing their own methods of imposing their desires; this stage which continued from 1989 to 1999 was crowned with the arrival of president Hugo Chavez to the government to offer legal legislation for those organizations and extend them with all kinds of support especially financially in order for their role to become more active and so they would provide better than the traditional governmental institutions.
Those revolutionaries who have imposed their own social organizations, the arrival of President Chavez to the government and changing the previous governmental approach, refuse that the new state be imposed on them, even if President Chavez is the one who seeks so; the socialist state will not be built unless through the bases; no one will create it but them; this is what the revolution has expressed by its leader's words when he assured that the successful establishment of the socialist state would not be except from the bases and in order to give the bases their role, the revolution must commit to 'democratic socialism' and develop its democratic model represented by participatory democracy.
Offering the means of production to the people
Noting that the bourgeois democracy emerges from the existence of the class which possesses the means of production, the class whose form of democracy will start vanishing with the disappearance of the form of property linked to it, expecting the existence of a more advanced democracy without changing the property of the means of production will remain an illusion.
Each kind of property has a system that represents it in the leadership of the country, and if the goal in the next stage is to create the socialist state gradually and to get rid of the old state in a systematic and precise method, then we must change the form of property of the means of production in the country.
Because the revolution does not yet own technical, artificial, and administrative experts able to manage all kinds of facilities, it was and is still forced to maintain the private property in such sectors until it is able to own sufficient human expertise to regulate them itself; in this field, Venezuela has succeeded in achieving tangible development and started preparing human cadres that are able to manage many institutions.
In this context, it has nationalized some industries and factories whose property was transferred to the state; however, as we mentioned before, the state in its previous form is unable to fulfill the aspirations of the Venezuelans and in order to change this state, we must change the form of property and therefore the public property cannot be the solution, because history will then repeat it self giving us a result just like previous experiences when the property was converted from the predominant bourgeoisie to the new bureaucratic class which controls the state that owns and administrates everything, or else the public property state.
For this, President Chavez said "offering the means of production to the people is a must."
Not everything was nationalized at once, which would destroy national economy, because the revolution is not ready to own everything; the property of the communes was also not imposed directly, because we must prepare for each stage in order not to fall in deadly mistakes; the private property will continue until the revolution is able to get rid of it; the governmental property will also continue and the seeds of getting rid of both properties, which produce two classes that kill the revolution, bourgeoisie and bureaucracy, exist in the heart of the revolution and the growth of those seeds is a matter of time and depends on the Venezuelans' struggle which feeds those seeds and makes their growth and development strong enough to achieve what is required from them; this growth depends mainly on the success in completing this stage and converting to socialism.