Electing Chavez: The Business of Anti-neoliberal Politics in Venezuela

APPENDIX C.POLITICAL BIOGRAPHIES

A P P E N D I X C . P O L I T I C A L B I O G R A P H I E S To examine the degree to which business was prominent in Venezuela’s twoparty democracy (–), I collected biographical data on two sets of political leaders: cabinet ministers responsible for economic policy and congressional leaders who had some business experience. The sample of economic ministers included all those who held that position in a subset of ministries responsible for economic policy during the period of Venezuela’s two-party democracy. They included the following six ministries that were in existence throughout the entire period of two-party dominance: () Agriculture and Animal Breeding, () the Central Bank, () Public Works (–)/Urban Development (–), () Development, () Finance, and () Mining and Hydrocarbons. The data set also included all those individuals who held the highest official post at the Central Office of Coordination and Planning (Oficina Central de Coordinación y Planificación, or CORDIPLAN) from  until , even though this agency was not elevated to cabinet-level status until ; CORDIPLAN was widely believed to have been critical in making economic policy long before . The sample also included all individuals who held the top post in two of the most important public agencies, even though they were not initially elevated to cabinet-level status: president of the Venezuelan Corporation of Guayana (Corporación Venezolana de Guayana, or CVG), –, and president of the Venezuelan Investment Fund (Fondo de Inversiones de Venezuela, or FIV), –. Finally, I included individuals responsible for specialized economic policy concerns in their role as ministers for the following entities: International Economic Affairs, Development in the Eastern Region, Economic Reform, and Basic Production. Table C. shows that this sampling procedure yielded a total of  economic cabinet posts held by a total of  individuals (not shown on the table) over the period of two-party dominance. There are more posts than persons because some individuals held more than one ministerial post, sometimes even within the same administration. The economic cabinet posts represent nearly half (. percent) of all cabinet posts during the two-party political period.  The sample of federal legislators on whom I collected biographical data included all those identified by business leaders and several experts on state-business relations as having been businesspeople before being elected (they are among the interviewees listed in appendix A). Each of these interviewees graciously agreed to review a list of all , members of congress from  to  in order to identify the individuals they thought had been businesspeople. For each of these ,, when possible, they also identified the name of that person’s firm, primary economic sector, and any affiliation with one of the nation’s major economic conglomerates. Those interviewees willing to complete this task included business leaders from a range of business sectors. Most had at one time served as president of one or more business associations. Table C. indicates that this sampling method produced a list of  individuals in the federal legislature who were sufficiently visible as businesspeople for the interviewees to recollect them as such. Many of these individuals were elected multiple times, holding on average . elected posts as federal legislators with a maximum of seven terms in office. As table C. indicates, these  individuals collectively held  posts as federal legislators, or . percent of the total positions in the federal legislature during the two-party period. Although we might anticipate that the interviewees would have been more able to recollect individuals in the recent past, table C. illustrates that these posts held by businesspeople were fairly evenly distributed across all years in which Venezuelans elected their federal legislators. Appendix C  TABLE C.1. Economic cabinet posts Number of Economic cabinet posts Presidential Number of economic as a percentage administration cabinet posts cabinet posts of total cabinet posts Betancourt (1959–1964) 35 16 45.7 Leoni (1964–1969) 35 16 45.7 Caldera I (1969–1974) 32 13 40.6 Pérez I (1974–1979) 51 22 43.1 Herrera Campins (1979–1984) 45 18 40.0 Lusinchi (1984–1989) 56 22 39.3 Pérez II (1989–1993) 70 26 37.1 Velásquez (1993–1994) 27 11 40.7 Caldera II (1994–1999) 61 30 49.2 Total 412 174 42.2 For each of the political leaders in both samples I compiled a professional biography drawn primarily from biographical dictionaries (Fundación Polar ; Gavalda ; Gran Enciclopedia de Venezuela...