Our current and past foreign policy and the one we need
o say that Venezuela does not have and never had
a foreign policy has become something quite common. Undoubtedly, the argument
requires fine tuning. If we define foreign policy as foreign action, there is no way that
a country may not develop some kind of a relationship with the world. In that sense, the
most elaborate argument asserts that the country has lacked a continuous and consistent
foreign policy, inasmuch as it has not had a project embracing and guiding its foreign
relations.
This traditional and certainly not new discussion is again at issue now, in times
when an post-international environment þto use James N. Rosenau's well invented
term, when he refers to the global change's speed, uncertainty and deepnessþ raises
unprecedented challenges in the States' foreign policies. The nature of the challenge
is quite important and visible in Venezuela's case, in view of a huge social, political and
economic disarray seemingly reproducing, on a domestic scale, the known features of
global post-international turbulence.
The purpose of these lines is to pick up the discussion, trying to bring into
perspective something that, in my opinion, is fundamental: Venezuela has had indeed
a relatively consistent and continuing foreign policy; it persisted in leaving it behind and
it must be reinstated urgently starting from its foreign policy guidelines and going as far
as to the procedures and institutional grounds for its promotion.
Foreign policy as a transactions system
It is not my intention to "demonstrate" nor to "explain" anything in a definite way.
My wish is to present and to argue, as a summary, in favor of an interpretation that has
provoked þand most likely will keep provokingþ rebuttals and criticism.
Let us start by conceiving foreign policy þfollowing Robert Putnamþ a two-level
game, i.e. a game where statesmen must deal with two boards simultaneously: the
domestic board and the international one. Thus, foreign policy is the result of a
complex system of domestic-world transactions where the country's leadership must
achieve the most favorable combination of agreements þor the least unfavorableþ for
the domestic program, agenda or project that is also þby itselfþ the result of an Initial
and permanent negotiation. The point is well summarized by Peter Evans when he notes
that agreements at an international level modify the nature of domestic limitations,
whilst the movement of domestic policy opens new possibilities for international
agreements. Domestic goals are reached through international plays and domestic
political activity is central to international negotiations. Under this perspective, then,
the role of international and domestic factors in the determination of results is
"simultaneous and mutual".
As things stand, one has to review some kind of common place in the
governments' official discourse according to which foreign policy must be and is a
reflection of domestic policy. By its extraordinary simplicity, this assertion leaves room
for the worst conceptual simplifications and practical perversions. My starting point is
that foreign policy is not a bridge connecting us to the world in order that we may file
our requests, interests, needs; on the contrary, it is part of a complicated system of
domestic-world transactions where one is required to play þwith ever increasing
dexterityþ amongst parameters of adaptation and innovation.
Our past foreign policy
The relation between the world system the Venezuelan social, political and
economic one and the characteristics of the country's foreign policy has been the subject
of þnot very abundantþ important studies.
A schematic review of Venezuela's foreign policy's main guidelines and
initiatives since 1959 allow us to sustain that the foreign policy has not necessarily
changed every five years; that changes in guidelines and emphasis on certain issues and
strategies may not be explained just by a change in government party, or in the head of
government, nor only simply by reference to the international environment's
determinations. The very same evolution of the national domestic political system as
to the ability to operate its social transactions system weighs heavy when looking for
explanations.
Thus, during the administrations of Presidents Rómulo Betancourt (1959-1964),
Raúl Leoni (1964-1969) and the beginnings of Rafael Caldera's (1969-1974), the search
for democratic political stability was the leading Line of Venezuela's foreign policy. It
was clearly evidenced through several strategies, from the most strict application of the
Betancourt Doctrine and Venezuela's positions at the OAS in the Dominican Republic
and Cuba issues, up to its turn towards flexibility, its gradual abandonment and the
appearance of the ideological pluralism thesis. The latter, of course, was a new strategy
to reach the same goal of democratic stability and consolidation, under changed and
changing national and regional circumstances.
The truth is that since the beginning of President Leoni's government, an item
had appeared in the administration's agenda: concern for the diversification and
reordering of international economic relations þas part of the government program of
the coalition known as "Wide Basis" ["Ancha Base"]þ and, consequently, for the search
of more flexible criteria in international linings. In the area of oil, Venezuela's active
participation in the forming of OPEC had drawn early master lines for foreign oil
policy. Now then, the participation in negotiations to promote regional integration
(LAFTA) and referred to world trade problems (UNCTAD) were signs of the growing
weight of the international economic relations issue. This is reflected in the gradual
growth of what, in my opinion, may be accurately called "foreign policy system", referred
not only to traditional organizations and procedures, but also to the increasing set of
actors, sectors and agencies that, inside or outside the traditional system (Presidency,
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Congress) play their own role in the shaping-up of foreign
policy. Under the general guideline of seeking a healthier link with the international
economic system þand within the sameþ as a formulate consolidate the Venezuelan
social and economic system, foreign policy becomes more and more active, covering a
growing number and variety of issues under its agenda.
This kind of enlargement and diversification of links between the domestic and
the foreign game, peaks during the first term of President Carlos Andrés Pérez
(1974-1979) when there was a search for a New International Economic Order, under
most ambitious terms and huge expectations, the desire to reach a favorable insertion
in the world economy starting from its fundamental transformations that were
requested by the third world.
We see very important changes in the world, hemisphere, regional and domestic
scene, leading to an accelerated reduction process in Venezuela's international agenda
since early 1977, with the foreign policy then concentrating in the quest for political and
economic stability within a regional environment. Thus, the governments of Luis
Herrera Campins (1979-1984) and Jaime Lusinchi (1984-1989) gradually reduce the
intensity of Venezuela's international presence, with a tendency to concentrate on
issues that seemed indispensable and inevitable, such as the pressure of foreign debt,
conflicts in Central America and some acute regional crisis.
At that time, there is no way to hide the loss of clear references for foreign
policy. The curious thing is that, between 1989 and 1992, during the initial period of the
second Carlos Andrés Pérez government, a foreign policy project appears. Its
formulation is closely associated to the logic of an economic adjustments plan. Within
this strategic reference frame, the "Great Turn" foreign policy tries to redefine
Venezuela's international insertion under the general objectives of economic overture,
new integration and democratic solidarity. With this redefinition of guidelines and
strategies the new spectrum of issues and fronts attended to, widens þin numbers and
diversity. It is a matter of retracing the economic and political connection between the
domestic and global boards, by promoting quite diversified policies, not without a
certain degree of risk, in order to neutralize threats and potentialize opportunities.
Under this vision, foreign policy no longer is a "bridge" that may be enlarged, reduced
or even almost blocked at will. It is, on the contrary, a central part of a domestic-world
system of negotiations seeking to create conditions to enable democratic way of
government for the country's social-politic and economic modernization.
The coup d'état attempts of 1992, President Pérez' dismissal and the provisional
government resulted in the spectacular fall of the adjustments program and, with it, of
an intent to reformulate the guidelines and the very same role of foreign policy. Thus,
the second Caldera administration inaugurates under a discourse of severe criticism and
revision --and sometimes even reversion-- of the foreign policy associated to the same
adjustments program and, generally, to the Pérez government. There is a reappearance
of the void that was evident since the late seventies, together with the old formula of the
two games' connection, according to which foreign policy is a bridge þbeing controlled
at willþ that allows for a reflection abroad of national, needs, interests and demands.
With that in mind, the scope of international; action is reduced, with a new aim and
concentration of foreign policy on low risk fronts, at least until early 1996, when
financial urges begin to force the government to commit itself, both globally and
domestically to the "Venezuelan Agenda".
This schematic review notwithstanding, it would be ingenious and not serious to
assert that this evolution has not been conditioned by the leaders' personal
characteristics, nor by the political parties' international platforms. In fact, there is a
lot to be reviewed in Venezuela as to contrasts in ideas, perceptions and variables of the
Presidents and their closest advisors who have influenced crucial issues of Venezuelan
foreign policy. In all events, beyond ideological, doctrinaire and idiosyncratic factors,
one may outline these cycles' features þfrom more stress in political stability, to priority
for economic diversification and back to the attention of democratic government ability
problemsþ from a transcending vision of those differences.
The foreign policy we have
The new orientation, the reduction and reordination of problems attended by
foreign policy since 1994 have been clearly the result both of dominant perceptions in
the Executive as to global opportunities and threats particularly those related to the
hemisphere and the regionþ and of the domestic political and economic problems.
In the new guidelines of the foreign policy agenda's problems there was
evidence of particular way of assuming domestic and global limitations and of moving
within them. These redefinitions were, to start with, quite visible in the Venezuelan
proposals to the Summit of the America's agenda. The insistence on specific issues:
corruption, poverty and oil cooperation, revealed new orientations that were
evidenced by foreign policy actions. The fight to maintain democracy kept being
rethought, in Miami and other international forums, in terms of fight against
corruption and poverty, in concord with the domestic discourse.
On its side, the oil issue was treated with lessened ties to internal political
dynamics: both the approval of the oil industry's open policy, as the proposals for
hemispheric energy cooperation followed a rather continuous line and adapted to the
international market's new realities. As to issues such as the financial one
--particularly the decision to resort to the IMF; drug traffic; the Minister of Defense's
tour and the agreements with the USA-- it became indispensable to achieve a healthier
balance between quality, resources, time and internal-external supports associated to
the initiatives required to attend to them. This is how new orientations and
adjustments have been occurring as a result of government made redefinitions, but
also of the dynamics tied to certain issues and/or of the weight and seriousness of the
problems been laid.
As to reduction, from the point of view of changes in foreign policy's big fronts,
there is an evident alteration in the attention levels required by the different political
and economic spaces. On a hemispheric level, notwithstanding the agreements with
the USA in the area of the fight against drug traffic and corruption, the participation
in the creation and chartering of the Caribbean States Association, of tensions and
recent closer approaches to Cuba, overture with Guyana, the annual þalbeit not
without debateþ renewal of the San José Agreement and the closer approach to Peru,
the priority focus of attention has kept moving towards the activation of relations with
Brazil and with the Mercosur member countries, starting from a set of bilateral
agreements for the development of trade, cooperation and permanent care for
common interest issues, relations, including Venezuela's support of Brazil as a
permanent member of the UN Security Council.
In this sense, one may talk of a reduction on certain fronts' attention, and not
just as a matter of lessening their intensity, but specially with regard to the variety of
issues being treated. Colombia, as a matter of fact, has enjoyed permanent and quite
intense care; this, however, has occurred mostly with reference to border security
problems. A sequence of frequent incidents with their most serious expression in that
of Cararabo, extends to late June 1995 and threats to continue beyond, mixing with
tensions at the trade level and to a minimal continuity of the mechanisms provided in
the 1989 and 1990 agreements.
One could even argue that, notwithstanding the forcibly intense relationship
with the United States, the common agenda has been reduced, precisely and specially
þand in consonance with the evolution of the hemispheric context and the
redefinitions of the Venezuelan agendaþ with regard to issues related to trade and
investments,
As to the reordination, reorganization of the fronts where fundamental
problems must be attended to. has been on a consolidating path during these years.
The President's expressed idea of converting Venezuela into a "hinge" in the
integration process between the Andean Group and Mercosur by means of an initial
relationship with Brazil, picks up quite well the new reordination of spaces and issues
in the Venezuelan agenda. If a few years ago the relationship with Colombia was
considered a key piece in the "hinges system", now it is the turn of the relationship with
Brazil. This is not merely a question of geography, a review of the integration policies'
priorities seems to be implicit therein. Needless to say, in this reordination process the
displacement of some spaces by other ones is not simply the effect of what the
Venezuelan government has perceived and answered to, it is also the result of
circumstances where some agreements have become weaker, as it has been the case
with the Group of Three and the Andean Group, both of them quite important for
Venezuela, even under a point of view of mere sub regional and hemispheric weights
and counterweights.
The foreign policy being reshaped after 1992 is a policy that, in summary,
proposes to reinstate foreign relations starting from a diagnose where domestic
urgencies tend to predominate over those of the foreign environment that is mostly
seen as a threatening one.
Because of the vision of foreign policy as a system of transactions on two
separate boards, it is of the utmost importance to consider the basic change that has
been happening since 1992 in the relationship between government and public
opinion.
Many years ago, Hans Morgenthau wrote that a passionate foreign policy
overwhelmingly approved by public opinion may not be considered solely for such
reason as a good foreign policy. It is a wise remark, always opportune and particularly
relevant under circumstances where fear of political opposition has caused the search
for support through exaltation of foreign enemies' threats to become a real
temptation.
There are some recent indications in Venezuela of the not so healthy nature of
the connection between what is domestic and is global. The criticizing expressions on
the IMF or on the former government's collaborators is an example of it. We have the
arguments pointing out the interest of the new relationship with Brazil, not for its
substantive contents but "alsoþ" because Brazil is a bit less than a modelþ not like
Colombia. Think of the quite numerous allusions of government spokesmen to threats
from Colombia, specially after the deplorable facts of February 1995.
If foreign policy is seen as part of the domestic-external political game, the link
between internal and foreign policy may assume --as it has indeed assumed in
Venezuela-- three basic forms suggested by a recent study of Joe Hagan.
-Adaptation and evasion of controversies: we are dealing with a situation where leaders
avoid controversial actions that might show them as weak in front of certain internal
adversaries, or threatening to break the political coalition holding government together.
The result is an adaptation foreign policy, under compromise and little assertiveness.
The foreign policies of the backing cycle þbetween 1978 and 1989þ fit substantially this
condition.
-Isolation: In this case, the leadership's preferences as to an issue are quite clear
and they create such a level of commitment that the leader is ready to assume, from
government, the political risk of promoting them. That is why opposition may be
ignored, or convinced through concessions in other issues. The outcome is a foreign
policy with a relative degree of commitment and assertiveness, with a high degree of
independence from political opposition and currents of opinion. The foreign policy of
Pérez' second government would grossly fit this picture; there was a gradual isolation
of opposition as to key issues of the Great Turn's domestic-external program. As a
consequence, very few of these issues resulted in commitments making them
sustainable beyond the imperatives of the domestic and world bureaucratic
inertia.
-Legitimization: In this slope the leaders face the opposition mobilizing popular support
for the regime and its policies. Foreign policy is then associated to the concern for
government survival and --in the second place-- for the regime's. A feature of this
formula is the promotion of popular (nationalist) foreign policies, the endeavor to show
strong leadership, and the turning away of attention from internal problems dividing the
supports towards foreign threats that, among other things, allow to confront internal
opponents. The foreign policy of President Caldera's second government is
fundamentally comprised within this frame, since it has been characterized by a formula
where a good portion of the foreign actions þeven without the need for itþ ends being
justified with arguments moving the sensibility of several population sectors.
Norgenthau wrote also that government, as a leader and not a slave of public
opinion, must indicate what is convenient to the nation and not to demagoguery. In
effect, it is necessary, urgent þand close to inevitableþ to develop a fourth formula, one
that recognizes responsibly and democratically the diversity of opinions, one that
enriches with them the process of identifying and evaluating formulas, that serves as a
support for healthy leadership and that, in summary, allows to project a sensible foreign
policy and a responsible and credible country, inside and outside.
The foreign policy that we have and have had as from 1993 þand more formally
since 1994þ is meant, inevitably, to change. If the parameters where government action
is supposed to move in the coming years do come close to the "Venezuelan Agenda" and
to the wider "Ninth Nation Plan", it will be indispensable to once again lay out the
foreign policy --under the most restricted sense referred to its orientations, fronts and
strategies-- and the whole system of transactions related to such policy.
The foreign policy we need.
The foreign policy we have is not at all what we need. Just like that. Such
appreciation is not the result of the writer of these lines' wishes and views. It derives,
rather, from the characteristics of a foreign policy that þas a public policy should be
oriented towards the promotion of the postulates of the "Venezuelan Agenda".
In effect, the "Venezuelan Agenda" is technically what we could call a public or
government agenda. This kind of agendum is the result of the most important of
government decisions: the choice of issues to decide upon, the conception and definition
of these issues and of how to attend to them.
The articulation of all this never occurs in the void and, on the contrary, it is
conditioned by what is generically called the environment . In the specific case of
Venezuela, the interaction with this domestic-world environment has been
extraordinarily complex þbefore, during and after the announced Agendaþ and foreign
policy has played quite an inefficient role in it.
What has been fundamentally done in connection with the Agenda is to initiate
and push forward negotiations with international financing agencies an to promote the
new orientation of economic policy, jointly with some of its concrete initiatives
(restitution of guarantees, open oil policy and dismantling of controls) with regard to
those entities, governments and potential investors. This has been done by an economic
team that, not without hurdles and contradictions, has formulated and promoted the
strategic orientations of foreign economic policy.
In the meanwhile, the causes that have been more enthusiastically promoted by
the traditional foreign policy system þfrom the Foreign Ministry to the Presidencyþ are
the fight against corruption and the relationship with Brazil. Without lessening the
specific importance of each of these issues, they are not really laid out in terms that
provide efficient support to the "Venezuelan Agenda". As to corruption, it is not hard
to verify that the government commitment to fight corruption, including the active
patronage of the issue in the hemispheric agenda, is directly and almost exclusively
linked to a domestic political crusade. With regard to the relationship with Brazil, so
hurriedly promoted, it is not difficult either to ascertain that þalthough its implications
would overflow this government's motivations and actionsþit obeys to a too simple
geopolitical and economic calculation, one that is extremely isolated from the whole
picture of the international insertion that a country such as Venezuela must face.
Be it by deliberate omission or mere lack of policies, there are areas where
Venezuela's absence or weak presence is evident. Just to mention a dimension, in the
several fronts where integration negotiations are been developed, Venezuela's weak and
unequal participation is a known fact. Whatever is done, is the result of the so called
"issues networks", where officers, advisers and consultants keep working on specific
agendas.
Once again, one must point out that it is not as matter of judging the omissions
and voids as to personal preference. Although the "Venezuelan Agenda" does not
include direct provisions as to matters of foreign policy, its most important points have
a natural and inevitable external dimension. Moreover, we have the clear
considerations of the "Ninth Nation's Plan", its supporting document: there, Venezuela's
international agenda has free trade and diversification of reactions as its first
component. My criticism is precisely that there has not been such diversification of
relations; what we have had is an enormous concentration and an ostensible reduction
of links.
A superficial and rather rough look at the map surrounding us lets us visualize
Venezuela's retirement from many scenarios where its presence would be vital to
promote "the intelligent insertion into globalization trends". The poor attention to the
relations with Colombia and with the United States is an excellent sample of the
dangerous government fantasy of a strategic retirement.
Without the due consideration and systematic attention of the connection
between Venezuela and the world, there is no future for the "Venezuelan Agenda". nor
for any other government agenda formulation. There is no value in railing against
globalization: one must be prepared to suffer the least damage from it, and that may be
achieved only inasmuch as Venezuela is present --with participation-- in the spaces
where the new world, hemispheric and regional agendas are being defined. In order to
do that, the country must become a consistent/flexible, trustworthy and quite active
interlocutor.
In order to be both a consistent and flexible interlocutor a true team must be
formed committing itself without vacillations and deviations to the international agenda.
This international agenda, a part of the "Venezuelan Agenda", is made of specific
agendas of which the conception and treatment must be congruent with the frame
program. Consistency derives from sharing that reference frame; flexibility arises from
disposition to negotiate, to learn as the process goes on, and to adjust and modify
strategies.
To be a trustworthy interlocutor, conspirative obsessions must be set aside and
a commitment with the modernization agenda must be generated from within. As to
this, the leadership belongs to the executive, within the government, but there is in it a
particular responsibility of those who must attend to þever in larger numbers and more
dispersedþ the links with the world. In this environment, there is a need to set up the
formerly mentioned working team of which, naturally, a Foreign Ministry being able to
understand what its new mission it would be a central part. In order to do that there is
a need to break with the recurring fantasy of seclusion and with the cycles of a return
to the bridge metaphor: at this moment --and for sometime already-- the fact of been
present at, and to efficiently participate in, the shaping up of new world agendas is not
an eccentricity, it is a necessity.
Translation by Carlos Armando Figueredo>/a>
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