Venezuela and Cuba under the “Donroe Doctrine”: Context and Prospects

Dr. Gabriel Hetland is Associate Professor of Africana, Latin American, Caribbean and Latinx Studies at SUNY Albany. He is the author of Democracy on the Ground: Local Politics in Latin America’s Left Turn and numerous articles on Venezuela and Latin American politics in outlets such as the Washington Post, The Guardian, The Nation, and The Intercept.

Mikael Wolfe, Associate Professor of History at Stanford, will comment on Dr. Hetland’s talk and moderate Q&A.

The January 3rd U.S. attack on Venezuela has produced a novel form of regime change without a change of regime, what could be termed “Madurismo without Maduro.” The U.S. decapitated Venezuela's government but left much of its structure intact while commandeering Venezuela's oil sector in brazen neo-colonial fashion. Ironically, while Trump has been obsessed with oil, U.S. oil companies have been reticent to invest significantly in Venezuela. This talk will examine the political and economic contradictions of this dangerous and unusual situation, its implications for Latin America, and Cuba in particular, where the Trump administration is ratcheting up its efforts at regime change, a longstanding bipartisan goal since the 1959 Cuban Revolution now rebranded as the “Donroe Doctrine.”