Abstract
This chapter discusses recent changes in Venezuelan drug policy. We note that, despite the anti-imperialist discourse and the rejection of the policies resulting in the criminalization of poverty, the ruling political group in Venezuela has, in recent decades deepened the strategy of the War on Drugs, fueled by Washington, implementing legal changes and hardening the agency’s resistance to the winds of reform blowing in the region. This model is an instrument of US control in the hemisphere and a mechanism to deepen the exclusion of the poor by way of their criminalization. We suggest some possible explanations for this retrograde rotation of drug policy in the context of an anti-imperialist and left wing government: The persistence of a conservative discourse by the left on the subject, attributing the increase in crime to drugs; the role of the army in the War on Drugs; the US’s accusations of drug involvement to discredit leftist governments in the region; and the attempts by the Venezuelan government to defend against such allegations. Finally, we will attempt to demonstrate how the rhetoric of the War on Drugs, displaces social processes and conflicts and legitimizes symbolic solutions associated with tough policies, at the same time that these punitive measures become an effective means of control of those sectors of the poor who are left out of social inclusion policies.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
1998 marks the onset of a period of accelerated transformations and conflict escalation known in Venezuela as the Bolivarian Revolution under Hugo Chávez’s government. Venezuela was subsequently renamed República Bolivariana de Venezuela , has become Socialist and the term “Bolivarian” has been added to many institutions’ names to highlight this “revolutionary” transformation and its novelty: Fuerza Armada Bolivariana, Gobierno Bolivariano, Policía Nacional Bolivariana. It is not our aim in this paper to analyze or to include these transformations in their complexity; they fall outside the scope of this paper and have already generated an appreciable amount of literature.
- 2.
“The leading consumer of drugs in the world is the US and how little do their governments (…) and institutions do to curb drug use. There are great capitals of drug trafficking in the US and northern countries, banks in those countries that finance drug trafficking (…) how strange that no one discovers them! Having such a great intelligence capability. Having such intelligence assets as the CIA right? Which is able to guess that there are weapons of mass destruction in Iraq?” (Da Corte 2005).
- 3.
The preliminary phase or research, conducted by the Public Ministry (prosecutors), involves the collection of sufficient evidence to decide the cause of the trial and leads to one of three types of final decisions: accusations (which involves passing judgment), dismissal, and tax file.
References
Andreas, P., & Wallman, J. (2009). Illicit markets and violence: What is the relationship? Crime Law and Social Change, 52(3), 253–273.
Antillano, A. (2009). Las drogas ilícitas en la Venezuela contemporánea [Illicit drugs in contemporary Venezuela]. In J. Tokatlian (Ed.), La guerra contra las drogas en el mundo andino [The war against drugs in the Andean world] (pp. 213–254). Buenos Aires: El Zorzal.
Antillano, A. (2012). Seguridad y política en la Venezuela bolivariana: la seguridad en el debate político venezolano entre 1998–2009 [Security and politics in Bolivarian Venezuela: Security in the Venezuelan political debate between 1998–2009]. Espacio Abierto, 21(4), 701–726.
Antillano, A. (2014). Crimen y Castigo en la revolución bolivariana [Crime and punishment in the Bolivarian revolution]. Cuestiones de Sociología, 10. Retrieved from http://www.cuestionessociologia.fahce.unlp.edu.ar/article/view/CSn10a19
Antillano, A., & Ávila, K. (2015). Las políticas frente a las drogas en la Venezuela bolivariana [Drug politics in Bolivarian Venezuela]. In B. C. Labate & T. Rodrigues (Eds.), Drogas, política y sociedad en América Latina y el Caribe [Drugs, politics and society in Latin America and the Caribbean] (pp. 163–186). México, DF: CIDE.
Antillano, A., Pojomovsky, I., Zubillaga, V., Sepúlveda C., & Hanson, R. (in press). The Venezuelan prison: From neoliberalism to the Bolivarian revolution. Crime, law & social change, pp: 1–17.
Antillano, A., & Zubillaga, V. (2014). La conexión drogas ilícitas violencia. Una revisión de la literatura y consideraciones a la luz de la experiencia venezolana [The connection between illicit drugs and violence: A review of literature and considerations in the light of the Venezuelan experience]. Espacio Abierto, 23(1), 129–148.
Arias, E. (2006). The dynamics of criminal governance: Networks and social order in Rio de Janeiro. Journal of Latin American Studies, 38, 293–325.
Astorga, L. (1999). Cocaine in Mexico: A prelude to “los Narcos.”. In P. Gootenberg (Ed.), Cocaine (pp. 183–204). London: Routledge.
Ávila, A. (2012). La frontera caliente entre Colombia y Venezuela [The hot border between Colombia and Venezuela]. Cundinamarca, Colombia: Corporación Nuevo Arco Iris, Random House Mondadori.
Ávila, K. (2014). Proyecto de investigación Homicidios dolosos en Venezuela [Research project on intentional homicides in Venezuela]. Caracas: Consejo General de Policía. Unpublished paper.
Bourgois, P. (1995). In search of respect: Selling crack in El Barrio. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
Bourgois, P., Montero, F., Hart, L., & Karandinos, G. (2013). Habitus furibundo en el gueto estadounidense [Furious habitus in the American ghetto]. Espacio Abierto, 22(2), 201–220.
Buzan, B., de Wilde, J., & Weaver, O. (1998). Security: A new framework for analysis. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner.
Caldeira, T. P. R. (2002). The paradox of police violence in democratic Brazil. Ethnography, 3(3), 235–263.
Da Corte, M. (2005, August, 8). Chávez “cortó” convenios con la DEA [Chávez “shuts down” treaties with the DEA]. El Universal. Retrieved from: http://www.eluniversal.com/2005/08/08/pol_art_08108A.shtml
Del Olmo, R. (1992). Prohibir o domesticar: Políticas de drogas en América Latina [To forbid or to tame: Drug politics in Latin America]. Caracas: Nueva Sociedad.
Del Olmo, R. (1998). Drogas, inquietudes e interrogantes [Drugs, questions and concerns]. Caracas: Fundación José Félix Ribas.
Delmanto, J. (2013). Camarada caretas. Drogas e esquerda no Brasil após 1961 [Comrade masks: Drugs and the left in Brazil after 1961]. Unpublished master’s thesis, Universidad de Sao Paulo, Brazil.
Dezalay, Y., & Garth, B. (2002). La internacionalización de las luchas por el poder. La competencia entre abogados y economistas por transformar los Estados latinoamericanos [The internationalization of the struggles for power: Lawyers and economists compete to transform Latin American states]. Bogotá: ILSA-Universidad Nacional De Colombia.
Gay, R. (2005). Lucía: Testimonies of a Brazilian drug dealer’s woman. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
Geffray, C. (2002). Drug trafficking and the state [Introduction]. In Globalisation, drugs and criminalisation (pp. 46–53). Neuilly-Sur-Seine, France: UNESCO.
Goldstein, P. (1985). The drugs/violence nexus: A tripartite conceptual framework. Journal of Drug Issues, 15(4), 493–506.
InSight Crime (2013). El Cartel de los Soles [The Cartel of the suns]. Insightcrime.org. Retrieved August 22, 2015 from http://www.insightcrime.org/venezuela-organized-crime-news/cartel-de-los-soles-profile
Jelsman, M., & Roncken, T. (1998). Democracia bajo fuego: Drogas y poder en América Latina [Democracy under fire: Drugs and power in Latin America]. Montevideo: Brecha.
Naylor, R. T. (2009). Violence and illegal economic activity: A deconstruction. Crime Law and Social Change, 52, 231–242.
Oficina Nacional Antidrogas. (2010). Cuadro Comparativo referente a detenidos por delitos de drogas en la República Bolivariana de Venezuela. Periodo 2000–2010 [Comparative table regarding arrested for drug offences in the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. Period 2000–2010]. Revista Balance de la Lucha Antidrogas en Venezuela 2010. Retrieved from: http://www.ona.gob.ve/RevistasBalance/Balance_2010.pdf
Oficina Nacional Antidrogas. (2013). Incautaciones de drogas. Años 1999–2012 [Seizures of drugs. Years 1999–2012]. Revista Balance de la Lucha Antidrogas en Venezuela 2013. Retrieved from: http://www.ona.gob.ve/RevistasBalance/Balance_2013.pdf
Consejo Superior Penitenciario. (2011). Diagnóstico Sociodemográfico de la población penitenciaria 2010–2011 [Sociodemographic diagnosis of the prison population 2010–2011]. Caracas: Ministerio del Poder Popular para las Relaciones Interiores y Justicia.
Rodrigues, T., & Labate, B. C. Prohibition and the War on Drugs in the Americas: An analytical approach, in this volume.
Snyder, R., & Durán-Martinez, A. (2009). Does illegality breed violence? Drug trafficking and state-sponsored protection rackets. Crime Law and Social Change, 52, 253–273.
Svampa, M. (2004). Cinco Tesis sobre la Nueva Matriz Popular [Five theses about the new popular matrix]. Revista de estudios sobre cambio social, 4(15), 1–9.
Wacquant, L. (2000). Las cárceles de la miseria [Prisons of poverty]. Buenos Aires: Manantial.
Wacquant, L. (2008). The militarization of urban marginality: Lessons from the Brazilian metropolis. International Political Sociology, 2(1), 56–74.
Wacquant, L. (2010), Castigar a los pobres: El gobierno neoliberal de la inseguridad social [Punishing the poor: The neoliberal government of social insecurity]. Barcelona: Gedisa.
Acknowledgements
We thank Beatriz Labate for being such a wonderful and patient editor, Jennifer Martinez for her review and suggestions and Clancy Cavnar for her precious English proofreading.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2016 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Antillano, A., Zubillaga, V., Ávila, K. (2016). Revolution and Counter-Reform: The Paradoxes of Drug Policy in Bolivarian Venezuela. In: Labate, B., Cavnar, C., Rodrigues, T. (eds) Drug Policies and the Politics of Drugs in the Americas. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-29082-9_7
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-29082-9_7
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-29080-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-29082-9
eBook Packages: Law and CriminologyLaw and Criminology (R0)