There is no third option

A small room in one of the opposition headquarters on the outskirts of the greater Caracas was crowded with many television cameras. Several young people with slightly frightened but determined faces solemnly took off their red T-shirts with a portrait of Hugo Chavez and put on white ones with the symbols of the opposition. In this clear way, exactly a year ago, on the eve of the presidential elections in Venezuela, several young supporters of the president demonstratively abandoned their idol. Then Chavez won the elections decisively - he gained 63%, and the performance with defectors seemed to be a marginal action of dissent.

Chavez then promised: if he wins the elections, in two years he will hold a referendum on amendments to the constitution that will allow the president to be elected for three or more consecutive terms. The victorious president could not bear it: the referendum took place a year later. Just 12 months after the triumphant elections, the continuation of the performance with changing T-shirts led Chavez to a heavy defeat, albeit with a minimal score: 51% to 49. He lost the referendum not only because of the resistance of the liberal opposition, but primarily because some of his supporters , especially from the Venezuelan students, went against their commandant.

Russia is often compared to Venezuela: an oil power led by a popular leader prone to soft authoritarianism and populism, who loves to suppress television and put pressure on business. Therefore, looking from Russia, it seems almost incredible that Chavez lost his life-changing referendum by just 2% of the vote. After all, it is impossible to imagine that Putin would lose any vote with the same score. They would always find him two percent. But there is a big difference between Chavez and Putin.

Vladimir Putin is first and foremost the head of the Russian bureaucracy. Hugo Chavez is the leader of the Venezuelan poor and the enemy of the bureaucratic class. He is the tribune of the plebeians, the leader of the crowd. He can take people out into the streets, gather a giant rally, and encourage them to vote for themselves. Mobilize - almost by force - civil servants, finally. Hugo Chavez is much more like the classical tyrants of Ancient Greece, like some kind of Pisistratus: he leads the common people on a campaign against their own well-fed. Therefore, his “revolution Bolivariana” is indeed similar to a revolution. But Chavez does not have a gigantic administrative resource, expressed in the support of bureaucrats who are vitally interested in him.

Read the full version of the material in the Russian Newsweek magazine (December 10 - 16, 2007) No. 50 (174)