Venezuela: The Life and Times of the Party System - Political ...

The combined predominance of AD and COPEI has not been seriously challenged by the
recent elections. The incumbent party has won each time, although since the 1989 elections
incumbents at the national level have been required to share power in broader and more
meaningful senses at the regional and local levels. In part, this is due to the fact that the
municipal and state elections were held less than a year after the national elections (though the
timing of the elections was not stipulated by the law), so that in practice national elections may
have exercised a kind of ‘drag’ on the subsequent contests. Many believe that the separation of
these electoral contests should serve as a kind of plebiscitary mechanism for consultation and
criticism of the incumbent administration. However, the timing of these contests, on the heels of
the national elections, can also be viewed as an attempt by the larger parties to consolidate the
results rendered at the national level.
Although overall assessment of these reforms remains premature, at first glance the
results appear decidedly mixed. Reforms have clearly increased local and regional autonomy,
created new spaces for political competition and participation, and narrowed the distance
between voters and elected officials. At the time of writing, when many national politicians are
encountering severe criticism, polls show state governors with high levels of popularity, much
higher than those going to their counterparts in Congress. At the same time, growing voter
abstention has spurred skepticism about the long-term effects the reform process can have on
the creation of new and effective channels for popular participation.
In general terms, the implementation of these reforms has clearly generated a new set of
dynamics in the Venezuelan party system. Although the overall system remains dominated by
AD and COPEI, the smaller parties and factions are gradually increasing their participation at
lower levels of power. A new generation of leaders is clearly emerging, with careers rooted not in
Congress and national party machinery but in success with state and local-level voters.
Politicians now vie to be candidates for governor and mayor, offices not even open to direct
election ten years ago. These changes, including increased power for local leaders (both within
and independent of the parties) and the emergence of new relations among political forces, now
require party leaders to begin crafting new rules of the game.
Within the party system itself, we can observe the emergence of three political and
electoral subsystems which, although they overlap to a certain degree, are to some extent
independent of one another. At the level of presidential elections, the hegemony of AD and
COPEI has been reinforced in recent contests. At the level of national legislative elections, their
joint control remains but is now accompanied by a growing tendency toward voter dispersion, a
process that permits greater representation of small parties. This has led to new and often
temporary alliance patterns in Congress and state legislatures. Finally, although AD and COPEI
remain dominant at state and local levels, there is a shift in favor of smaller parties. New patterns