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Title: Venezuelaâs Communes Author: Katrina Kozarek Date: November 27, 2017 Language: en Topics: Venezuela, Venezuelan communes, communalism, commune, communes, self-management, community organizing, community anti-capitalism, communisation Source: https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/13520
encirclement, Venezuelaâs communes continue advancing in the struggle
for socialism from the bottom up, argues Venezuela Analysis âs Katrina
Kozarek.
Over the years we have all heard a great deal about the great social
achievements of the Bolivarian Revolution, the government subsidized
health program Barrio Adentro, the subsidized food program Mercal, the
housing mission which provides free and affordable government organized
housing to the poor and middle class, the Canaima program which provides
computer to students, Madres del Barrio and now Hogares de la Patria
which provide government subsidies to housewives as a recognition of
their domestic work, Amor Mayor, the government pension program, among
so many other great advances that have moved the country forward in
terms of social justice and closing the economic gap.
Most people, though they may have heard the term mentioned, have heard
very little about the reality of communes in the Bolivarian Revolution.
A commune is made up of the habitants within a self-defined territory
based on a shared historical memory, cultural features, practices and
customs, which are recognized in the territory (geographical space) they
occupy as well as the productive activities that serve as sustenance. To
give that a concrete example, the commune where I live, the Comuna
Ataroa defined the area of the commune because of a common history of
struggle for access to water and health services that was held in the
1980s between several adjacent communities. These communities also share
a central market and a local health center. So there were cultural,
social and economic ties that already bound the community together. In
the case of some rural communes, it could be the type of agricultural
production or communities that were built around large landowners whose
lands were expropriated, as in the case of the Comuna El Maizal in the
state of Lara, or in the case of indigenous communities, it may be
ethnic or family ties that bring a communities together.
But communes are not just geographical areas with a common identity, the
essence of the commune is based upon principles of sovereignty, the
organization of the people in order to define their own destiny. There
are many elements which factor into that principle of sovereignty.
One has to do with self-governance and participation, direct democracy.
The habitants of the commune have the right to plan, define and execute
policies and project within their own territory, and all habitants have
the right to participate in this process. How does that work?
There is an established structure to permit maximum participation, that
starts with smaller community units called communal councils, again
geographical spaces with a common identity (usually about 250 families).
Each communal council is made up of committees, the number of committees
as it see fit for the reality of the community, such as land committees
which define land limitations and property rights, water committees
which organize water access, womenâs committees which address gender
rights, and all councils must include a planning committee, a communal
economy committee and a communal bank. The committees develop policies
and projects based on their communityâs needs, all policies and projects
must be passed through a citizens assembly, where all habitants have the
right to vote. Once the policy is passed, the committees then organize
and execute.
The commune has a replicate structure with the same committees as the
communal councils, made up of spokespeople from the communal councils
that make up the commune, but final decision are made, rather than in
citizen assemblies, in a communal parliament, with spokespeople
representing each communal council. In theory, the decisions of the
parliamentarians, should be consulted in their own citizen assemblies.
However, the principal of sovereignty applied in the communes cannot be
obtained only with participatory democracy, because policies can be
defined, but their execution also requires resources or economy. The
communes are also defined in the organic law of the communes as
socialist spaces, and that implies a socialist concept of economy and
property.
Within the communes, and the Bolivarian Revolution in general there are
several types of property. There is of course private property, what
belongs to individuals. There is public property which belongs to the
state. There is social property, which belongs to the state, but the
people are involved in the control of the property, and there is direct
social property, which belongs directly to the communes or the communal
councils.
This is important for the principle of sovereignty of the communal
system, because it allows the communes to acquire goods, services,
resources and even businesses that do not serve individuals, but rather
the common good under collective administration. And this is necessary
for the execution of communal policies.
Every commune has a communal bank, which is a bank account that is
communal property, and is administrated by the commune for the execution
of its own projects and policies. In theory, at least, the communes
should develop direct social companies which create not just employment,
but resources that can then be used for the execution of policies and
projects.
To give a successful example: the Commune el Maizal, a rural commune
located on and around expropriated agricultural land in the state of
Lara. They have a direct social company where they produce more than
4,000 tons of corn a year, as well varied beans, vegetables, cattle,
milk and cheese. With their earnings, they have built schools, houses,
given money to families in need of specialized medical attention, put up
electrical wires in communities with no access, and maintained roads â
all administrated and executed by the community. A social direct company
also means a transformation, not just in the use of earning, but also in
labor relations. There is no boss, but rather an organizational
structure dedicated to administration, education and training, and
social control. The workers or producers as they are called may or may
not earn the same depending on the reality of the work and the
community, but must be managed in a way that promotes social justice and
equality. That is another profound debate within the commune movement as
to what that means.
It is important to mention, that the contradictory reality of most
communes is that most of the resources allocated to the communal bank
come from the national government on the basis of projects sent to
institutions for their approval, undermining two necessary elements of
sovereignty, production and self-determination.
The organic law of the Communes states that the purpose of communes is
to promote the Communal state, setting up a political, social and
economic horizon for the Bolivarian Revolution and 21stcentury
socialism, the realization of âa system of government that opens with
unlimited amplitude the necessary spaces where the people, the popular
masses, are deployed creatively and effectively, for them to obtain
control of power in order to make the decisions that affect their daily
life and their historical destiny. â as Chavez put it in his manifesto
Libro Azul.
When we talk about the communal state, it means gradually replacing
almost the entire current political and economic system with a new
system based on the communes integrated in communal cities and regional
federations that then articulate policies, production and projects on
national level. It implies going from a concept of government that is
âtop downâ to a concept that is âbottom upâ as well as transforming on a
national level the relations of property, production and administration
of resources.
Well thatâs the theory and the vision, but letâs get back to the reality
of the communes.
This vision or horizon of the Bolivarian Revolution, for a time was
hegemonic at least in discourse; almost everyone from government
officials to community activists talked about the communal state as the
common path. However, several factors gradually wore down this vision.
One has to do with the oil rentier economy and the lack of a productive
culture. Many communes, especially urban communes, have dedicated
themselves to administering government assistance programs and
government-financed projects and have completely ignored the necessary
aspect of production. The other has to do with the resistance within
some ranks of Chavismo to the restructuring of power.
Many Bolivarian governors and mayors (and of course all of the
opposition governors and mayors), once the communes started becoming a
reality, refused to work with these structures, and continued to create
policies and execute projects in communal territories without communal
consultation or participation. One great exception was Julio Chavez from
Carora, Lara state, who placed the entire municipal budget in the hands
of the communes.
The creation of the Ministry of Communes also played an important role
in the degradation of the vision of the communal state, which was later
recognized by Chavez himself in his famous speech âGolpe de Timonâ or
âChange of Directionâ. Having a ministry that created policies directed
towards communes, first of all, allowed for all other government
entities to see the communes as something marginal that did not apply to
them, when, for a communal state to function, it must be seen as a
system that traverses all governmental powers. And of course having an
entity dedicated to creating policies and providing financing for the
communes, once again diminishes the essential element of sovereignty and
self-government.
The impulse and vision of the communal state was so diminished between
the years 2010 and 2012 that only 50 communes were formally created.
Chavez adamantly reiterated the need to revive the communes and their
transversality after having won elections in 2012 and in his last public
speech, commended the communes to Maduro as he ended his life.
Maduro, faithful follower of Chavez made his best effort to promote the
communes. In the first year of his government, those 50 communes turned
into 350. Communes and the communal state once again was the horizon of
Chavismo and the demand was to advance as quickly as possible.
In 2014, the National Presidential Council of Communes was created, you
could say, as a rehearsal for the communal state to come. It served as a
space for national articulation of communal policies and projects
directly with the national government, with regional expressions in each
state. However, the guarimbas or violent protests of 2014 cut short this
national surge, forcing the communes to focus on defending their
territories, and the national government on negotiations.
Soon after the violent protests died down, the dropping oil prices and
intensifying economic sabotage also took their toll.
Though the Presidential Council of Communes resumed, very few proposals
and policies were executed and morale began falling. Between 2016 and
2017, the communes fell almost completely from the national discourse.
The communes, however, did not cease to exist, nor have they ceased to
advance. Amidst the deep complications of the dropping oil prices,
imposed inflation and economic sabotage, many communes have stepped up,
deepening their organization, challenging corruption and sabotage and
creating new models based on their original principles of sovereignty.
Here are just a few examples:
Unios
In March of 2012, shortly after the death of President Hugo Chavez, the
Brahma Beer Factory, belonging to the Brazilian transnational Ambev
located in Barquisimeto, in the state of Lara, illegally closed its
doors, declaring bankruptcy. The workers of this factory did not accept
the premises of the closing of the factory and took over the plant. Soon
after they received confidential information that the factory was in the
process of being sold to the Cisneros family, which holds a large
monopoly of food and beverage businesses in Venezuela. For two years the
workers resisted within the installations of the factory without
producing, until they began a relationship with the nearby Commune Jose
Pio Tamayo, with which they formed the direct social company
âProletarios Unios.â
The association with the commune, not only gave them a legal status as a
company, but also gave them a new impulse to open up production within
the factory. The Commune Jose Pio Tamayo, together with the workers,
began exploring their possibilities to legally reopen the factory and
begin production. Initially, they received legal backing for the use of
the machinery in the factory based on an Agricultural Court order, which
allowed them to use the deep fresh water wells located on the premises
of the factory, which they began distributing to local farmers in the
nearby semi-arid zones, as well as schools and institutions. In their
review of the factory, they found that their silos still contained more
than 8 metric tons of barley, which, although were no longer fit for
human consumption, were apt for animal consumption. With the technical
assistance of the communal council Palito Blanco from the neighboring
state of Zulia, they began using that barley to produce animal feed. It
is important to note, that almost all animal feed in Venezuela is
controlled by private transnational companies and in the context of the
economic war, it has become increasingly difficult to find at a fair
price, causing meat product to elevate in cost and running many small
producers out of business.
The communal council Palito Blanco had already been producing animal
feed for several years in their own social direct company Hugo Chavez
and had considerable experience in all aspects of production, as well as
the necessary licenses for importing raw material not made in Venezuela,
such as soybeans, and they helped Proletarios Unios begin their
production by interchanging barley for soy.
Proletarios Unios, as a social direct company, has not just been
dedicated to producing and selling animal feed. They have had no
interest in forming a mercantilist relationship with animal farms, but
instead they have taken on their production as an opportunity to advance
grassroots organization. The small and medium producers who buy animal
feed from Proletarios Unios are organized in a Producersâ Council
together with workers and spokespeople from the Commune Jose Pio Tamayo,
where together, they make cost structures for the animal feed based on
the factoryâs costs and needs, guaranteeing a price that is fair for all
involved. From that price, they create another structure of costs based
on the cost of animal feed and other agreed upon costs of the producers
to create a final fair price for the meat products. A percentage of the
meat products, agreed upon based on the communities needs and the
farmersâ availability, are then distributed at a fair price to the
communities in the Commune Jose Pio Tamayo and adjacent communes.
The Producersâ Council is also a space where the small farmers organize
and work out common problems and challenges, collectively applying for
technical assistance and credits, and organizing policies for things
such as security.
The alliance created between workers, producers or farmers and the
commune through Proletarios Unios, creates an organic, participatory
economy that has covered part of a communityâs consumption needs at a
price that is fair for all involved. However, there is one link in that
chain that was still subject to private speculation, the raw materials,
primarily yellow corn and soy. The Commune Jose Pio Tamayo and
Proletarios Unios have begun investigating native yellow corn seeds that
are viable for production in Venezuela and came across a native seed
called Guanape. This seed has proven to be highly resistant and requires
no fertilizers or pesticides, eliminating the need to buy these from the
transnational monopolies. It also has 40% more protein content then the
average commercial yellow corn, lowering the amount of imported soy that
would be required for their animal feed production.
After a year of reproducing this native seed, Guanape, Proletarios Unios
has associated with several rural communes who will produce yellow corn
for the animal feed production. These communes will now form a part of
the Producersâ Council and will also receive a part of animal feed
and/or the meat production for the distribution in their communities.
Through the alliance of communes, farmers and workers, the social direct
company Proletarios Unios of the Commune Jose Pio Tamayo has created a
participatory, sovereign and communal economic model that is worth
taking into account as Venezuela continues to struggle against economic
sabotage and the downfall of the oil rentier economy.
Commune El Panal 2021 and the Alexis Vive Movement, is another
incredible example of communal economy. This commune, and the Alexis
Vive Movement in general has had a tremendous ability to view their
development and organization from a perspective of autonomous economy
and planning. Located in the famous and rebellious Barrio 23 de Enero on
the outskirts of Caracas, this commune has its own packaging plant which
packages beans and sugar. The black beans, a staple food in Venezuela,
come from alliances with rural communes and collectives belonging to the
Alexis Vive Movement, called Panalitos. They form communal or
collectively owned social direct companies for production of this
product, which is then packaged in the factory in Panal 2021. The sugar,
also a staple food, which has become increasingly difficult to find and
expensive in Venezuela during the economic war, is bought in bulk
through negotiations with state-owned companies.
Panal 2021 also brings in corn for the production of corn flour for
arepas (the base of most Venezuelansâ diets). They also have a bakery
where they produce bread. All of these products are distributed, house
to house, directly to their communities, using a system that is very
similar to the governmentâs CLAP (Local Committees for Food Distribution
and Production) program that was designed to alleviate the population
from artificial speculation, hoarding and illegal food trafficking. This
communal system in Alexis Vive was put into action at least a year
before the CLAP were even mentioned within the national government. The
Panalitos of Alexis Vive also produce other staple products, such as
soap, coffee, tomato sauce and biological fertilizers, mostly in an
artisanal fashion, on a national level, that also arrive and are
distributed in the Commune El Panal 2021.
This commune has also developed its own cable television company which
has allowed for the people to place security cameras all over their
community which all inhabitants can access at any time, guaranteeing a
collective security. This company also provides autonomous financing for
their communal television and radio stations.
The production in El Panal 2021 has allowed for them to invest in
creating new productive projects as well as building housing and
recreational infrastructures such as basketball courts and stadiums.
The Commune Negro Miguel, located on the border of the state of Lara and
Yaracuy, is not just involved in production and distribution. They have
been involved for several years in a heavy offensive against corruption
and for the collective recuperation of unproductive lands. Their
struggle has been both against large landowners and the state. In the
year 2013, Negro Miguel took over an abandoned farmland called La
Horqueta, belonging to the elite Venezuelan landowners, the Sigalas,
despite heavy repression due to friendly relations with the PSUV mayor
of municipality Jimenez and air-force Captain, Luis Plazas. Within one
year that land was successfully turned over to the commune and began
producing plantains and other tubers.
In the year 2015, as the economic war intensified, the Commune Negro
Miguel and five other communes that work together, stepped forward to
take over 3000 acres belonging to an abandoned cattle and dairy cow unit
of the Venezuelan Food Corporation (CVA). The cattle, expensive imported
milk cows, fertilizers and an important amount of heavy agricultural
machinery had been abandoned for over a year within in the unit. The
commune had denounced this situation repeatedly to the state and having
not received a response, they took over the entire productive unit,
salvaging the sick and starving cattle and dairy cows with voluntary
veterinary assistance and opening up about 300 acres of land for the
production of corn. In the year 2016, the collective corn production
from that land was processed into corn flour for arepas and distributed
in the local communities.
In 2017, Negro Miguel and the associated communes, took over another
abandoned cattle and dairy farm, belonging directly to the now ex-PSUV
mayor and air-force Captain, Luis Plazas. The commune observed that the
farm contained 300 dairy cows, mostly extremely expensive imported
breeds that had been abandoned. Upon entering the land, the commune
found many of these dairy cows in deplorable condition as well as a
large graveyard full of bones and rotting cows. To their surprise, they
also found amongst the overgrown grass, tons of construction material,
everything from support beams to doors, belonging to the government
subsidized housing mission, Gran Mision Vivienda.
Once again, the commune found voluntary assistance with veterinarians to
salvage the dairy cows and immediately proceeded to open the land for
production with different varieties of beans that had been collected in
their communities.
This takeover was also met with repression and threats from the National
Guard,. However, an intense media campaign from other communes and
community media brought this case to national attention that has allowed
the communes to persist in the space and continue production.
The Commune El Maizal, also located in the state of Lara and Portuguesa
has been a model commune since it was born in 2009. Upon expropriating a
large amount of unproductive farmland, Chavez asked the surrounding
community to form a commune that could take on the production of those
lands, and that is exactly what has been done. Over the last several
years, the Commune El Maizal has produced more than 4000 metric tons of
corn on the expropriated lands. That production has created enough
profits for the commune to finance their own housing mission, providing
more than 300 houses for their inhabitants, they have also self-financed
the electrification in mountainous areas that had not had previous
access to electricity, they have paved and maintained roads, built a
school and provided for the maintenance of existing schools, provided
health care for families in need and invested in other communal
companies for dairy production and cooking gas distribution.
That sort of self-sustainability is exactly what Chavez had envisioned
when he presented the communes as the basis of the socialist society of
the 21^(st) century.
But, as the economic war has deepened, the Commune El Maizal, saw the
need to readjust and perfect several aspects of their production and
internal organization in order to truly guarantee their sustainability.
The Commune El Maizal, up until this year, has depended heavily on
government financing and technical support for their corn production.
They financed their crops with government credits and have received the
seeds and fertilizers as part of those credits, and as part of
government-financed production, they have given over more than 80% of
their production to the state for processing and distribution. That has
been a convenient alliance in previous years, providing almost automatic
financing and a guarantee of product sales. However, the economic war
has unveiled a fundamental problem in that system. As access to
processed corn products has become increasingly more difficult,
especially in rural communities, it has become increasingly more
contradictory to turn over the majority of production of this essential
product to the state for processing and distribution, when the community
is not seeing the return of the product. For that reason, the commune
refused to turn over their last harvest to the state and has begun
collecting a percentage of their seeds to continue production in the
following years, without state financing. They have also begun
investigating and reproducing the same native seed, Guanape, with hopes
to dedicate a large portion of their production to this resistant seed
without having to depend on imported fertilizers and pesticides.
Over the next year, the plan is to build their own processing plants for
pre-cooked corn flour as well as animal feed for distribution in their
own communities and adjacent communes, eliminating all middle-men that
can block access or create speculated prices for their rural population.
The communes once again were brought into the national discourse with
the call for the National Constituent Assembly made by Maduro on May
1^(st) of this year. Communes were included as a sector for to be
represented within the assembly and the call was made within Chavismo
that one of the primary proposals of the assembly would be to include
the communes and the communal state within the new constitution to be
formulated.
Though the principles of the communes â direct participation, democracy
and sovereignty â are in the 1999 constitution, they are not formally
named as such, and though several organic laws were created such as the
law of communal councils, the law of communes and the law of communal
economy to back up this system, the laws could be quickly revoked in the
case of the opposition coming to power. The idea to include communes and
the communal state in the new constitution is to give them permanency as
a part of the national principles and project.
The opposition had a violent reaction to this proposal. Almost all of
opposition propaganda against the constituent assembly elections
referred to the ANC as the communal constituent assembly, and arguably,
may have been one of the primary reasons that they decided not to
participate as the communal state is in every way contradictory to their
political and economic vision.
With great effort, amongst deadly violence that left more than 150
people dead, 8 million Venezuelan people crossed barricades, faced
violent attacks and walked for miles to re-located electoral centers in
order to vote on July 30 for the National Constituent Assembly.
Now, three months after its inauguration, though the ANC played an
integral role in quelling opposition violence and bringing to justice
many cases of violence on the part of opposition members, as well as
security forces, the communes and the social movements continue to wait
for their proposals to be discussed.
The only economic proposals that have been discussed and approved up to
this point is the sale of Venezuelaâs oil in Chinese yuans and other
currencies in lieu of the US dollar (which is an interesting one, though
we have yet to see any effect on the dollar speculation) and the
freezing of prices of certain basic food products, which was approved
but not yet translated into concrete action.
The communal movement has not been silent about this lack of action and
debate in the ANC. In September, the National Network of Communards,
took to the streets outside the ANC, demanding debate on a series of
points, first of which has to do with placing the communes in the center
of the debate for the urgent economic measures.
Another key demand was the awaited inclusion of the communes in the new
constitution. The proposal of the National Network of Communards, as
well as many other prominent communal voices is in the inclusion of the
communes as a sixth power added to the five existing branches of
government. That proposal, however, deserves important debate, as the
inclusion as a sixth and separate power within the state, ignores the
original transversality of the communes that is necessary to arrive at a
truly communal state.
---
This article is modified from a webinar presentation given on October
31, 2017 for the afgj.org â Alliance for Global Justice â monthly
Venezuela webinar series.
Edited by Venezuelanalysis.com