2003/01/07

Venezuela: Privilege and ethnicity

On the op-ed page of today's The New York Times, Amy Chua writes that "there is also an ethnic dimension to Venezuela's crisis." The strikers don't represent the country's exploited working class so much as a very privileged group of wage-earners who think they deserve special privileges because they are white. The Ch�vez government has committed several blunders, she says (without specifying what they were), but "[t]he coup against Mr. Ch�vez last April was a classic effort by a market-dominant minority to retaliate against a democratically elected... government threatening its power."

This is an argument that I intend to develop as I continue the series on my website, "Venezuela: Background of the Conflict." Part I, from the first oil exports to the death of Juan Vicente G�mez (1917-1935), and Part II, taking us up to the revolution of 23 January 1958, are up and viewable. I welcome comments.

No comments: