The Commune in One Place: Promise and contradiction in the 23 de Enero

• In Event: The Communal State and the Quest of Inclusion in Venezuela: Theoretical Debates and Empirical Challenges

Abstract

Venezuela's experience with communes is nascent, and perhaps because of it, uneven. Examples of flourishing communes coexist with those of highly problematic ones, where contradictions between state dependency and local autonomy abound, and where the question of whether a Communal State can in fact emerge from the foundations of a petro-state remains hotly contested. While debates continue on the theoretical and historical dimensions of the Commune as applies to Venezuela, this paper focuses on what the experience of the commune has been in one place long seen as a center of revolutionary politics: the 23 de Enero neighborhood in downtown Caracas.

Author

• Alejandro Velasco, New York University