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Venezuelan National Assembly Passes People’s Power “Law of Communes”
Venezuela’s National Assembly approved on Friday the Organic
Law of Communes, after months of public consultation and just
weeks before opposition assemblymen take their seats in the
legislative body
Venezuelan National Assembly Passes People’s Power “Law of Communes”
By JUAN REARDON – VENEZUELANALYSIS.COM
Mérida, December 13th, 2010 (Venezuelanalysis.com) – Venezuela’s National Assembly on Friday approved two of the five laws that make up the Laws of People’s Power designed and demanded by pro-Revolution activists nationwide.
The Organic Law of Communes, one of the two laws approved as of Monday, consists of 65 articles relating to the establishment and organization of communes in the country, as well as the formation of Communal Parliament which opposition figures fear will one day displace the National Assembly.
Venezuela’s opposition, which takes over 41% of the National Assembly on January 5th, has expressed strong opposition to the new laws and has called them “unconstitutional.” Organic laws are laws that serve as the normative framework for other laws and require the approval of two-thirds of the National Assembly.
The five laws that make up the package under discussion are: The Organic Law of Popular Power, the Organic Law of Popular and Public Planning (both of which were first discussed on 16 December 2009), the Organic Law of Communes, the Organic Law of Social Auditing (both of which were first discussed on 22 June this year) and the Organic Law for the Development and Promotion of the Communal Economy. Together the laws promote decentralization of power, collective property, self government, and the Government Federal Council as the planning organization.
After much discussion on both Thursday and Friday, the Organic Law of Communes and the Organic Law of Social Auditing were passed. All five laws are expected to be passed this week.
PSUV assemblymen Mario Isea on Monday affirmed that the laws in question are designed to help overcome economic inequalities found in different parts of the country by promoting popular participation and development lead by local communities.
“Who would fear such a thing?” asked Isea on the state TV channel Monday morning. “Those who hoard wealth, power, those who have always lived in opulence at the expense of the work done by the majority,” affirmed Isea.
According to Assemblyman Ulises Daal, the Organic Law of the Communes passed on Friday is the result of the systematization of 2,474 public surveys as well as open debates in which over 61,850 communal council spokespersons participated.
In a piece entitled, Another Victory for the People, Venezuela’s Bolivar and Zamora Revolutionary Current affirmed that the passing of the new laws, “represents a strategic advance in the consolidation of People’s Power, which has been the fundamental pillar in the deepening of the Bolivarian Revolution that today marches towards socialism.”
According to opposition assemblywoman Pastora Medina, the Humanist & Ecologist Block along with Podemos voted against the Law of the Communes because they considered the law to be, “divorced from the Constitution,” and that it, “creates a new communal state that promotes anarchy.”
Article 10 of the Law of Communes outlines the process required for establishing a commune: 1) common citizens, communal council representatives and/or social movements in a given region express their formal interest in establishing a commune by putting it in writing to the Ministry of Communes; 2) a Promotional Commission made up of volunteers works with communal councils and other public spaces to inform the entire community of the proposed commune; 3) an election takes place to elect the spokespeople of the Commune, and these prepare a Founding Letter of the Commune; 4) a vote takes place in which all the citizens residing in the commune’s territory have the right to vote, and a simple majority approves or denies the establishment of the commune. As long as over 15% of voters participate in step 4, the election is legally binding.
As reported in Venezuelan daily El Nacional, the Organic Law of Communes defines these social structures as, “local entities made up of several communities that share the same characteristics and interests, with a regimen in which the means of production are socialized property and with an endogenous and sustainable development model.”
Each commune will have Founding Letter (norms defined by the community), a Bank of the Commune, a Development Plan of the Commune and a Council for Planning of the Commune. Local and regional government is to submit to ‘People’s Power”, governing in as much as is required to implement the will of the people as expressed in communes. Nationally, all communes will be represented in a national Communal Parliament.
Ismael Garcia, spokesperson for Alianza Democrática (Democratic Alliance), a member of the opposition coalition Mesa de Unidad (Table of Unity), denounced the Laws of People’s Power as “grave threats to the future of democracy and the Constitution of Venezuela.” Speaking to Venezuelan daily El Universal on Friday, Garcia also suggested that the Venezuelan people oppose People’s Power and communes since both ideas were included in the 2007 constitutional reform that was defeated at the election booth.
According to Garcia, this Communal Parliament will serve only to convert the National Assembly into a legislative body that exists to ratify and pass laws that were debated within the Communal Parliament.
The Organic Law of Social Auditing, also approved last week, puts the auditing of both public and private entities into the hands of organized communities.
The law, according to PSUV assemblyman Oresteres Leal Briceño, is “an instrument created by the National Assembly so as to consolidate a culture of social control as an action mechanism of vigilance, supervision, follow-up and control of public, private and community affairs that impact the public good.”
According to National Assembly Press, the law stipulates, for example, that educational programs be designed so that students at all levels of public education be trained in the doctrine of the Liberator Simón Bolívar as well as “socialist principles related to social auditing”. Auditing in all aspects of social life is to be exercised “individually, collectively and organically” and participation in such audits is to be done “freely and voluntarily under organization structures defined by the community itself.”
Garcia, cited above, denounced the “ideological context in which this social control [law] is inserted.” The new social auditing, according to Garcia, is to be “guided, among other things, by the principles of a ‘socialist ethic’ and a ‘revolutionary morale’.” He also expressed concern that the ambiguity behind the term “public good” might mean that any private businesses could face community-organized audits.
http://venezuelanalysis.com/news/5858
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To get an english translation on "Proyecto De Ley De Comunas", click below:
http://translate.google.com/translat...85%26lang%3Des
This looks excellent, devolution of power to communities. The question is how well it will be implemented.
This seems like a very smart idea; instead of using the Venezuelan state to try and tackle the entire process of empowering the working class, it is enabling the most ready communities to lay a foundation to do so themselves. This way, Chavez escapes some of the "authoritarian" heat from international opponents and the position of being an increasingly threatening/responsible target from the perspective of US elites. Decentralization in (at least in some political/economic elements) is a key element to a smooth transition to giving communities real authority. I'm interested to see where this goes.
"But Chavez is just a bourgeois leader who never tries to expropriate the capitalist class!!!"
When will we start seeing the affects of this? Could it be overturned in the future by the opposition?
Education is the passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today. -Malcolm X
That would be harder than to privatise companies, that is clear. When most of the people are involved, they feel more responsibility and thus also more indignation when resources are stolen from them.
This is actually one of the most socialist experiments ever undertaken.
I'm for anything that gives power to the people
This isn't just 'decentralisation'; it is the construction of a new, parallel state. A state controlled by the working masses. Awesome..
Formerly zenga zenga !
What Dimentio stated, along with the fact that the opposition still holds only minority rule. As long as the revolutionary left remain under solidarity in Venezuela, the opposition has very limited power, if any.
This is great news! Chavez the "authoritarian"; my ass. Giving more power to the people is something im all for and can never be against!
This is great news!
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[FONT=Arial]“While there is a lower class, I am in it, while there is a criminal element, I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.” - Eugene Debs[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana]What are their new powers besides deciding how to spend local development funds? In that function they were a type of [/FONT][FONT=Arial][FONT=Verdana]participatory budgeting council like found in many countries. [/FONT]
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The very large difference is that this project grants self-governance under Community ruling. The Venezuelan State would hold no ruling hierarchy over the Community's governance, unless allowed by the Community. This is power being granted directly in the hands of the working class people. You can't compare that to countries like Brazil.
The details of their powers are pretty vague. I found something a bit more detailed:
So in the main they're bodies for deciding how to spend portions of municipal funds like every other participatory budgeting system.
More info here:
http://www.worldpress.org/Americas/3626.cfm
Last edited by SocialismOrBarbarism; 18th December 2010 at 17:18.
That article's terrible, not to mention it was written in September. This new Commune ruling was passed here in December.
It's pandering to his electoral base, and trying to outmaneuver the opposition. No different than, in the US, Democratic and Republican officials redrawing constituency boundaries to affect the populations that vote in certain elections. The history of 'anti-imperialist' or 'socialist' nation-states is one of numerous types of nice sounding bodies of governance. Hell, Tito enshrined the worker's councils into the state constitution- but they became no different than any other administrative body in any other capitalist nation-state.
Autonomy is nothing new either.
Besides the political maneuvering, the act (despite being extremely vague as mentioned earlier) has curious sounding phrases, such as 'Engine Development Districts', and giving the 'Federal Council Government' (the official government of Venezuela) the ability to decide where investment goes (which city, 'commune', etc)- it sounds like a model based on the 'Special Economic Zones' to turn backward, very poor rural areas into bustling industrialized areas- with a similar result as those in China, Vietnam, etc (ultra-exploitation of the local population for the gain of the national capital)- whether they let foreign investment in or not (as in the case of the 5 year plans in the USSR).
You got all of that from "'Engine Development Districts'"?
Have to admit I'm surprised by this. Gonna be a bit harder for me to hate on Chavez with great stuff like this being passed.
Of course it could be overturned - anything can be overturned. But the right question would be "at what price could it be overturned, and who will handle the bill" - civil war? Massive social unrest?
Of course, the objections that the wording is pretty vague holds, and any projected potential of this development to counteract the pro-capitalist elements would depend very much on similar developments in the region.
And as devoration has mentioned, what you get when one country alone tries to "build socialism" may very well be embodied in phenomena such as "Special Economic Zones", with all of its joys of ultra-exploitation.
Everyone should realize that laws such as this one don't mean anything without corresponding movements and developmnents in the rest of the world, most specifrically in the immediate region.
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