El poder totalitario: El caso de la revolución bolivariana

Abstract

Political science, history and philosophy have focused their attention at one of the most striking phenomena during the twentieth century: totalitarianism. These disciplines have made of totalitarianism a fundamental concept, but unexpectedly they have also underscored its scientific poignancy. Facing this scenario, it will be handed on the systems theory with the purpose of mobilizing distinctions which allow us to search deeper into the totalitarian phenomenon. Unfortunately, systems theory itself offer few departure points for this project, which enforces us to hand on the political theory of totalitarianism. Within this realm, Claude Lefort will help us to discover that totalitarianism refers to the paradox constitution of the political system, resulting in a form of tautological self-description. This kind of self-description becomes a political program affecting coding, symbolic, instrumental and organizational inflation of the medium and, through the shortening of the sense-making horizons, the autopoietic reproduction as well. All of these theoretical improvements would serve us to demonstrate how, in the case of the Bolivarian revolution, totalitarianisms evolve and adapt to different political contexts.