Authoritarian Government V. the Rule of Law. Lectures and Essays (1999

This book is a collection of all the Essays of Professor Allan R. Brewer-Caras on the Venezuelan Authoritarian Government and the Demolition of the Rule of Law, written during the past fourteen years (1999-2014), in which he has analyzed not only the most important aspects of Venezuelan constitutional law provisions according to the 1999 Constitution, but also how the authoritarian government installed in the country since its enactment, has ruled it against the rule of the Constitution, subverting the democratic regime from within by using its own institutions and tools. The process began with the convening of a Constituent Assembly in 1999 against the provisions of the then in force 1961 Constitution, seeking to supposedly impose people's sovereignty over the principle of constitutional supremacy. What resulted was the intervention and takeover of all branches of government, being the Constituent Assembly the main tool used for assaulting the State's powers, imposing in the country an authoritarian, centralistic and militaristic government, eliminating, any sort of check and balance framework, subjecting the Judiciary to strict political control, and consequently, dismantling the rule of law. In addition, the Constituent Assembly assured that the main provisions of the new Constitution, particularly on the decentralized form of government, the principle of separation of powers, the independence of the judiciary and the representative democratic government, were to be suspended in their effective enforcement due to an endless transitional constitutional regime it imposed. It was the same "formula" of convening Constituent Assemblies departing from the Constitution then in force, that a few years later was also applied in Ecuador (2007), and ten years later was tried to be imposed in Honduras (2009), in a failed presidential attempt that in that case the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional. The idea, in any case, continues to be a recurrent one that in many countries has been proposed. The consequence of that process in Venezuela has been that since the election of the late President Hugo Chvez Fras in December 1998, whose only electoral program and proposal was to convene a Constituent Assembly, the country, formerly envied because of its democratic tradition and accomplishment during the second half of the 20th century, suffered a tragic setback regarding democratic standards, experiencing a continuous, persistent and deliberated institution demolishing process and destruction of democracy, never before occurred in the constitutional history of the country. At his death, and after fourteen years in power, the main political legacy of Chvez was no other than a country lacking the most essential elements of democracy as they are defined in the Inter American Democratic Charter, namely the assurance of the access to power and its exercise subject to the rule of law; the performing of periodic, free and fair elections based on universal an...