Venezuela is in freefall after years of recession, inflation and a formidable food crisis, sparking protests. It’s pushed Venezuelans to take to the streets and force a government crackdown.
As Venezuela slides deeper into crisis, inflation, food and medicine scarcity, and insecurity seem to escalate endlessly. Amid the chaos, families are struggling to hold their lives together.
Since Hugo Chávez's death in March 2013, Venezuela has spiraled into a crisis. Now as the social, economic and political deadlock deepen, the future seems ever more uncertain.
The economic disaster in Venezuela caused by low oil prices is also an environmental one.
With potential treatments for Huntington's disease on the horizon, questions of responsibility towards Latin American communities are being felt acutely. Will they ever reap the benefits of research?
In Venezuela, falling oil prices have crippled late President Hugo Chavez's social and economic programs.
Philip Fearnside, a biologist who studies the relationship between human activities, such as agriculture, and the protection of tropical forests, says that soy production threatens the Amazon forest.
Latin America now faces the challenge of coping with the potentially devastating impacts of climate change.
Hugo Chávez's sweeping election win may be read as a simple mandate for the demagogic Venezuelan leader to push on with his plans to transform his country with what he calls "21st-century socialism," designed to empower the impoverished masses with state-controlled oil profits, as described in my article last week. But for the region and the world, his victory could mean much more.
World Politics Watch International News Editor Guy Taylor interviews Jose Orozco (pictured above), a freelance journalist based in Caracas, Venezuela. Orozco is already well-known to the world media who cover Venezuela because he works for many prominent news organizations as a "fixer." Fixers play an indispensable role in foreign reporting, serving as guides and translators, and providing all-important contacts for reporters looking for local stories.
The populist leader who has often infuriated U.S. officials while cutting a wide swath through world capitals was just as dominant in the frenzied campaigning leading up to his bid for re-election on Dec. 3 -- on television, barnstorming through poor barrios, leaving his supporters enthralled and his detractors enraged. One thing no one disputes is that Hugo Chavez's outsized personality commanded center stage.
The country's national flag, the posters of revolutionary leaders like Simon Bolivar and Che Guevara, the glee with which politicians and citizens alike poor abuse on Uncle Sam -- all proof that President Hugo Chavez has succeeded in stirring long-dormant strains of Venezuelan nationalism.
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