Talk:Venezuela

Independence for Venezuala fought for by the British

Given the latest retoric from Hugo Chavez about the Malvinas and the (now non existent) British Empire, is it not ironic that independence for Venezuela was won in no small part by the British Legions? Has this part of Venezuelan history been lost? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 89.250.190.20 (talk) 23:32, 11 June 2010 (UTC)

In that case, a small part of Bolivian history has been lost. A good turn deserves another. Hugo Chavez has an unmatched memory of what the Spaniards did initially when they colonised the new world. Anyone can tell me that Chavez is by no means of Spanish descentage. Do also tell us that Venezuela has never been one of the 20 most corrupt countries of this world. Anyone can have a warped view on both past and present....as I said: a small part has been lost.--88.89.69.223 (talk) 00:03, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Why is Guyana highlighted on the map?

Why is Guyana highlighted on the infobox map? Yes, the article mentioned that there was a border dispute with the British over the region more than a century ago, but that's the same as an article on Denmark showing Canada highlighted because of its border dispute over Hans Island. Can someone revise the map to remove the coloring on Guyana? 68.146.81.123 (talk) 11:46, 26 July 2010 (UTC)

Guayana Esequiba is currently claimed by Venezuela. --IANVS (talk) 18:08, 21 September 2010 (UTC)

This non-UN-recognized, non-realistic "claim" by Ven. to nearly 1/2 of Guyana should not be highlighted without explanation on the locator map as it was until I added the caption. A more WP:NPOV would be a new map with no light green.DLinth (talk) 17:10, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Recent history

I think that it might be a good idea to tweak some of the subheadings under "History". Currently, the Chavez era is under "Democratic period (1958 - )". I think this may give a slightly misleading impression since reliable sources suggest that Chavez has undermined democratic institutions. Would anybody mind if I tweaked the most recent history subheading, or created a new subheading for 1998 onwards? bobrayner (talk) 11:09, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Yes. Any suggestion that the current situation is demonstrably less democratic than the bulk of the post-58 period is founded on ignorance and/or prejudice. So, feel free to propose changes here, but please don't "tweak" without prior discussion. Rd232 ^talk 11:24, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

I had formed my opinion on reliable sources rather than ignorance & prejudice; but thanks for assuming good faith! For instance:

Laws in Venezuela Aim to Limit Dissent

Hugo Chávez tightens his grip in Venezuela

Venezuelan opposition decries Chavez 'coup'

Venezuelan lawmakers OK Chavez's request to govern by decree

The president closes a critical TV station

Chávez responded by firing nearly 18,000 (PDVSA employees), replacing them with loyalists who swore oaths of allegiance to his government

Hugo Chávez, has succeeded in removing constitutional limits to his indefinite re-election ... threw the entire apparatus of government behind a blitzkrieg campaign to force it through

There is plenty more where those came from.

If you have some reliable source which demonstrates how events such as these are actually fantasies of the ignorant & prejudiced then I will, of course, withdraw my suggestion. bobrayner (talk) 11:56, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Actually, I did assume good faith, and your sources precisely confirm my assumptions about your level of knowledge. Come back when you know something about Venezuela in the 60s, 70s, 80s, etc: you'll need to refer to actual academic books instead of recent US online news sources. Then you'll be able to place these sources in appropriate context and understand why I said what I did. A merest hint of what you'll find in relation to one of the issues you mentioned can be seen here: Enabling_act#In_Venezuela. Rd232 ^talk 12:13, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Taking some press articles and infering that Chávez has "undermined democratic institutions" could be original research. On the other hand, Venezuela is a signatary of OAS Inter-American Democratic Charter which calls from suspention of membership of States where democratic order has been broken, so we may assume that OAS members recognize Venezuela as a democracy. JRSP (talk) 12:19, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

It is unfortunate that rd232 still accuses me of ignorance rather than presenting even a single source. That makes it difficult to discuss the issue productively.

Even if Enabling_act#In_Venezuela supported rd232's point - it says "he passed 49 decrees in rapid succession, many of them highly controversial" - I would rather cite a reliable source than another wikipedia article which rd232 edited.

I would only wish to reflect what reliable sources say. If sources say that Chávez has undermined democratic institutions then it is not OR to say so. However, it would be OR to say that today's Venezuela must be democratic because it hasn't been kicked out of an international organisation yet.

I would agree with rd232 that other parts of Venezuela's history have seen profoundly undemocratic behaviour. However, that's other stuff. Previous sins by others do not absolve today's sinners. If current sources give a rather undemocratic message about the Chavez government, why is it under a "Democratic" heading? Why not just a heading about "Chavez" instead? I'm not seeking to make a WP:POINT in the heading; merely to adjust headings so to remove a rather severe conflict with what some reliable sources say. bobrayner (talk) 12:39, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

I wasn't giving Enabling_act#In_Venezuela as a source, it was an indication of the context you appear to be missing and will find in academic sources about post-1958 Venezuela. Bottom line, many countries normally considered "democracies" are highly imperfect democracies, and that is true of Venezuela then and now, and also for example of Honduras, which curiously despite rather worse human rights violations recently seems to arouse rather little media interest. On the role of "message" from US news sources, see also Manufacturing Consent. Rd232 ^talk 12:48, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

PS for a starting point for reading, you could do a lot worse than The Paradox of Plenty by Terry Lynn Karl. Rd232 ^talk 15:46, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

English

My mother tongue is Spanish and yet I am shocked at the English level of this text. A lot of the sentences were written by people with very limited knowledge of English. It would be nice if some native speakers could help in improving the article. Please, take a special look at the part about "demography".

--Periergeia (talk) 08:59, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Well spotted; that section badly needs fixing (it also has what look like wrongly copied footnotes, perhaps by translation from the Spanish version). The rest of the article is OK I think. Feel free to help!. Rd232 ^talk 15:03, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

Incomprehensible

The text states:

With the start of oil exploitation in the early twentieth century, established companies and citizens from much of the United States.

This string of words is not a sentence. What is it intended to mean? It seems that the writer was trying to assert that somebody or other established oil-related conpanies. But how can anybody "establish" citizens? P0M (talk) 07:04, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

I think it should be "established by," but even then the English is poor. 64.180.40.100 (talk) 23:11, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

WP:SOFIXIT --JRSP (talk) 23:48, 15 June 2011 (UTC)

And the very next sentence in the paragraph is:

Later, during the war, he joined the Venezuelan society a new wave of immigrants from Italy and Spain, and new immigrants from Portugal, the Middle East, Germany, Croatia, the Netherlands, China, among others, are encouraged both by the immigration and colonization program established by the Government.

Who is this mysterious "he" and exactly which war are we talking about? World War II? I'd clean up the language but don't trust/can't comprehend the content.

J.R. Labrador (talk) 06:53, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

I've just done a major re-write of that section. My guess is that the information was taken from another language (possibly es.wikipedia) and incompletely translated into English. Unfortunately, most of the info in the section is unsourced; I've tagged it as needing citations, but it should probably be removed if we can't get details. I removed those details that were most specific (percentages) and which seemed less likely until they could be cited. Qwyrxian (talk) 01:47, 15 December 2011 (UTC)