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rfmcdonaldOver at The Power and the Money, Noel Maurer analyzes the failure of radical-left Venezuela and Cuba to federate. The possibility was widely discussed at the time; I made mention of it back in 2006. It turns out that the high-water mark was in 2007.
The reforms failed to promote a Latin American federalism. I would note that, since then, Venezuela has seemed to focus on other Caribbean and South American integration productions, joining the Brazil-dominated Mercosur and aligning with smaller middle American states as a patron.
The more qualitative reports of Cuban officials operating inside the Venezuelan state are harder to measure. But it should be noted that the U.S. was worried about Cuban influence in the foreign ministry and the Cuban presence in Venezuelan ports in 2008. Juan José Rabilero, the coordinator of Cuba’s Committees for the Defense of the Revolution, boasted, “We have over 30,000 members of Cuba’s Committees for the Defence of the Revolution in Venezuela” ... in 2007.
In short, the Cuban-Venezuelan relationship reached its peak around 2007-08. That is not to say that the relationship isn’t an astoundingly tight one. It is. It is to say that it hasn’t gotten much tighter since ‘08.
The second thing to note about Venecuba is that there was a lot of talk of deeper union in 2007. The State Department noted this in an internal cable. The political benefits of greater institutionalization were obvious. It would secure Cuba’s access to Venezuelan resources and make it easier for President Chávez to call on Cuban support to help him cement his control over Venezuela.
[. . .]
So what happened? One possibility is that plans to institutionalize the Venecuban links were just hot air. That was true of a lot of Hugo Chávez’s initiatives.
But that isn’t what happened. What happened was that Chávez put the possibility of a federation before the Venezuelan people in 2007 and got beat at the ballot box. Here’s the story. Chávez proposed a series of constitutional amendments to the National Assembly in 2007. In the Assembly, his party added a series of additional amendments. (This almost certainly occured under the supervision of the executive branch.) Among them were reforms to Articles 152 and 153.
The reforms failed to promote a Latin American federalism. I would note that, since then, Venezuela has seemed to focus on other Caribbean and South American integration productions, joining the Brazil-dominated Mercosur and aligning with smaller middle American states as a patron.
