Oil, Influence, and Instability: An in-depth examination of Venezuela’s Oil Dependence under Hugo Chávez

Beckinger, Damien

Oil, Influence, and Instability: An in-depth examination of Venezuela’s Oil Dependence under Hugo Chávez

Persistent URL

http://hdl.handle.net/10456/34245

Author(s)

Beckinger, Damien

Date Issued

April 3, 2013

Abstract

Venezuela is home to the most crude oil reserves in the world. During his presidency, the late Hugo Chávez manipulated Venezuela’s oil wealth to fund a set of social programs that, although not self-sustaining, were incredibly popular. The popularity of these welfare programs made it politically beneficial for Chávez to continue funneling oil funds into his programs even to the detriment of the economy. Due to the mismanagement of the country’s oil wealth, Venezuela is now a country considered to be suffering what is known as the natural resource curse. With historical analysis, I explain how Chávez’s political aspirations led Venezuela’s economy to the resource curse. Lastly, I use comparative analysis of Venezuela’s economy to other oil based economies in order to answer the question of, “What policies can Venezuela implement in order to recover from the economic struggles of the Chávez regime?”

First Reader(s)

Moskwa, Antoni