14. The agrarian revolution: Revolutionary realism versus reformist utopia¶
Core Argument¶
The agrarian question is the decisive battleground of the Bolivarian Revolution. Over 75% of Venezuelan farmland is controlled by fewer than 5% of landowners, a concentration of wealth that makes land reform not merely a matter of social justice but a fundamental test of revolutionary will. President Chávez’s January measures to tax or seize under-exploited estates are modest in scope, yet they have provoked fury from domestic oligarchs and international media alike. The Economist’s defence of the Vestey Group’s 13,000-hectare ranch reveals the real fear: that Chávez is arousing peasants to challenge private property itself. The reforms, we are told, will damage production and scare off investment, but this is the language of a class that has always used violence to hold its land and will sabotage any reform that threatens its grip.
The peasants themselves express universal support for Chávez but are sharply critical of the 2001 Agrarian Reform Law, which only permits expropriation of uncultivated land over 5,000 hectares. They accuse the Agrarian Reform Institute of being so slow and bureaucratic that latifundio owners clear entire forests while it deliberates. Many have received defective seed. Those who occupy land directly find local judges siding with landowners and police evicting them. A peasant conference discussed armed self-defence and the possibility of guerrilla war in the event of a US invasion. They defend collective farms over land division and debate accounting and discipline for those refusing to work. A local mayor’s call for patience was rejected; many insist a “revolution within the revolution” is necessary for genuine People’s Power.
This reveals the dialectical relationship between masses and leadership: the government passes reform under mass pressure, but peasants push it further by action from below. Petty bourgeois groups like PROVEA offer support with conditions—insisting on “rule of law,” compensation, and that only official bodies carry out expropriations. This legalistic approach ignores that landlords have historically used violence and will sabotage reform. A revolution that subordinates the majority’s will to laws made by the rich minority would be a fraud. The bureaucracy is slow, contains counter-revolutionaries, and cannot deliver revolutionary change—only the mass movement can. The peasants’ support for collective farming demonstrates political maturity, not ignorance. The agrarian revolution must challenge oligarchic power entirely, requiring nationalisation of banks and ultimately a transition to socialism, consistent with Trotsky’s theory of Permanent Revolution.