The Path Forward in a Post- Chávez Venezuela

In a post-Chávez Venezuela, the country’s new leaders must address the issues ignored by the deceased president.
The recent passing of Hugo Chávez marks the end of an era for Venezuelans. For nearly 15 years Chávez, fueled by Venezuela's seemingly inexhaustible oil revenues, wielded exorbitant influence within Venezuela, and to a lesser degree, throughout the region. His so-called “Bolivarian Revolution,” a leftist social movement that emphasized Latin American self-determination (or more specifically, independence from U.S. influence) and provided heavily subsidized oil to Venezuela’s allies, won him as many supporters as it did critics. His social welfare programs, which ranged from food subsidies to giving away credit cards, certainly did much to lift many of Venezuela's poorest out of abject poverty. According to a UN Index, Venezuelans’ quality of life improved under Chávez, and the poverty rate fell from 48.6 percent in 2002 to 29.5 percent in 2011.Chávez’s revolution came at considerable cost, however. His untenable macroeconomic policies have left the Venezuelan government far too dependent on oil revenues to sustain its social welfare programs, leaving the country vulnerable to the whims of a volatile global marketplace. Chávez’s inability, or unwillingness, to tackle the mounting violence in Venezuela also poses a significant threat to the country’s stability. Venezuela’s murder rate has tripled in the past decade, reaching approximately 57 per 100,000 homicides in 2009, one of the world’s highest rates. The capital city of Caracas has the sixth greatest homicide rate of any large city in the world, with 98.7 homicides per 100,000 residents. Corruption has also become a major issue, with Venezuela being ranked one of the most corrupt countries on the Corruption Perceptions Index since Transparency International started the survey in 1995. In 2012, Venezuela was given an index score of 19 out of 100 (0 being highly corrupt).It is imperative that Chávez’s successor, whether it is Nicolás Maduro Moros or Henrique Capriles, tackles these issues head-on through comprehensive policy prescriptions. Regarding Venezuela’s economic imbalances, gas and food subsidies should be gradually reduced, and ideally, eventually eliminated altogether. These subsidies, in particular the gas subsidy, have become increasingly costly for the Venezuelan government. While cheap gas has boosted Venezuela’s economic growth, it has also increased consumption to such a degree that the country must now import nearly a quarter of the gas it uses. While Venezuelans would certainly feel short-term pain following normalization of gas prices, in the long-term the country would be better served if government revenues were invested in promising research and development projects instead of these market-distorting subsidies.With regards to Venezuela's skyrocketing violent crime rate, the next president must make it a priority to continue efforts to strengthen the country’s new national police force. These efforts must include enacting strict national standards for training and providing adequate funding for payrolls and equipment purchases. Rampant corruption must also be addressed. The Venezuelan minister of the interior and justice has estimated that police commit one of every five crimes; a trend, which continues to negatively impact police credibility. This trend can be reversed by bolstering internal police review boards and by supporting whistleblowers and human rights defenders. Venezuela must also overhaul and revamp its notoriously corrupt and abusive prison system. In June 2011 alone, at least 25 people were killed and over 60 seriously injured, including prisoners and National Guard members, after clashes between inmates in the El Rodeo prisons near Caracas.The path forward in a post-Chávez Venezuela is certainly not a straight and narrow one. Navigating this path will require extraordinary leadership and a willingness to engage those who had been alienated by Chávez, while simultaneously maintaining the coalitions that he had assembled over the course of his lifetime. These are no small tasks, but the potential payoffs that may follow these reforms are enormous.

Photo courtesy of Presidencia de la República del Ecuador via Flickr.