The Venezuelan Revolution: Reformism vs. Revolution

 

Two decades ago, the Venezuelan workers and masses were in the throes of the most advanced revolutionary process the 21st century has seen. A struggle for workers’ control and nationalization of industry raged in factories throughout the country. Peasants battled with landlords to seize their enormous latifundios, or agricultural estates.

At the head of this revolution was Hugo Chávez, a man with an unwavering revolutionary spirit. Chávez personified the revolution. He instinctively understood the masses, and they saw their struggle personified in him. But Chávez lacked a revolutionary party. Without an organized revolutionary party capable of amassing the strength of the Venezuelan masses and directing all of their energies to abolishing capitalism and crushing the old bourgeois state machinery, the revolution was strangled.

On January 3, 2026, the US invaded Venezuela and transformed it into a semi-colony. The failure of the revolution meant that the same bureaucrats who, two decades ago, dressed in red and paid lip-service to socialism are now serving as local stewards for the most reactionary imperialist power on Earth. 

But the heroic struggle of the Venezuelan masses will not be forgotten. We will bring the crucial lessons of this revolution to this session at the October L.A. Marxist School.

This discussion will be introduced by Martín Lazos, a leading member of the RCA in New York City.

 

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