[Iraida Morocoima and Juan Carlos Rodríguez are spokespeople for the Campamentos de Pioneros [henceforth Pioneros], an autonomous Chavista initiative dedicated to self-organized housing construction, but whose struggle goes beyond individual housing solutions. Pioneros is part of the larger Movimiento de Pobladoras y Pobladores [Settlers’ Movement, henceforth Pobladoras], a platform bringing together several organizations fighting against the logic of capital in the urban environments.]

Part I

[In Part One of this interview, Morocoima and Rodríguez talk about grassroots democracy’s importance in making a city for people and not for capital.]

Cira Pascual Marquina: The aim of Pobladoras is to transform the urban environment in favor of the people. It is not limited to a struggle for the “right to the city.” Instead, it works toward a profound urban revolution. Tell me about the political motives that inspire the movement.

Rodríguez: Ten years ago we presented the “Manifesto for the Urban Revolution.” Its core idea, which remains our driving force, is to reclaim the city for the majorities. Modern urbanization processes have excluded the majorities from being able to make and plan the city, and even live in it. What we have today is an exclusive city that follows the capitalist model.

The Manifesto goes beyond the struggle for the right to the city, which is essentially about socialization and access to the city that exists: the modern city. For us, the objective is to have the excluded people think and plan the city, produce it in a new way, and thus produce a new city and a new way of life.

In the Manifesto we also propose struggling against three central actors in the urban development logic that was implemented in Venezuela in the 20th century, along with the model of accumulation based on appropriating the oil rent. The three sectors are financial speculators (banking), construction capitalists, and urban landowners. In concrete terms, these are the main economic actors linked to the production of urban space. In this way, the project of the urban revolution sets objectives and it lays out how those who are historically excluded, the urban poor, can reclaim the city to produce another way of life.

On January 8, 2011, we had a historic meeting with Chávez. Ten years have gone by, and in spite of the contradictions that have emerged along the way, we have made huge progress. Evaluating the past ten years, we can proudly point to laws that guarantee access to urban land. Eleven years ago, this was not on the revolution’s political agenda.

A lot of land has been reclaimed for working-class housing, and this is the result of the Pobladoras’ struggle. We broke with the earlier paradigm: we made progress in the struggle against the urban latifundio, and there were important victories against real estate and rent speculation. In the struggle against banking, however, we have not made as much progress.

Unfortunately, it is unlikely that we will be able to do so in the current context. What we have to do now is a struggle to avoid setbacks. As we speak, the real estate sector is stagnated, but if that sector were formally opened to dollarization, it would open up a field of speculation that would surely mean setbacks for us.

CPM: Participative and protagonist democracy is at the core of the Bolivarian Process. For Pobladoras, this goes hand in hand with grassroots democracy. Let’s talk about Pobladoras and its concept of organization.

Morocoima: Grassroots democracy is fundamental to our movement. We understand grassroots democracy to be at the center of any true revolution: people governing themselves and producing their own life among equals. That is also how the Campamentos de Pioneros work.

In the campamentos [literally “encampments,” the reclaimed spaces where Pioneros self-build housing and communities], people self-organize, think about housing collectively, plan, and build. However, as a revolutionary organization, our objectives go beyond reclaiming the land and constructing of housing units. Our aim is building a new society.

When we cast our lot with grassroots democracy, we are opting for the construction of real popular power. Thus, Pioneros is not really about self-management in the production of housing units, which would be equivalent to solving particular problems. Our goal is collective grassroots democracy as a concrete step in the construction of power, as a new way of doing politics and a new way of organizing.

When our organizations came into being, they were self-created [i.e. not created by decree, from above]. The Comités de Tierra Urbana [Urban Land Committees] that preceded Pobladoras emerged from below and not from above. Thus, we conceive emancipatory politics as emerging from below and as a permanent movement towards popular power.

In our campamentos, this perspective means that people are dreaming and producing the city collectively, among equals, and in a self-managed fashion. Self-government becomes a daily exercise: we organize ourselves in assemblies where we propose, debate, settle our differences, and build consensus. This is how the new subject of transformation is born.

Chavez understood our project, but most politicians understand self-management as simply self-construction [of housing]. No! Self-management is grassroots democracy, communal self-government in process and without privileges. When grassroots democracy – or self-management – is practiced, no one is excluded. We all have the same obligations and commitments.

CPM: Pioneros is building a new way of urban living. Of course, this doesn’t happen in a bubble: Pioneros is part of the Movimiento de Pobladores, which is itself part of the Bolivarian Process. What is the importance of solidarity in the organization?

Morocoima: Solidarity and mutual support are fundamental in Pobladoras. The Movimiento de Inquilinos [Tenants’ Movement], the Movimiento de Trabajadoras Residenciales [Residential Workers’ Movement], the Movimiento de Ocupantes [Squatters’ Movement], the Campamentos de Pioneros are all struggles that are interrelated. If emancipation and grassroots control is one’s goal, you can’t go the road alone. It’s a collective process.

In our more than ten years of struggle, we have witnessed a transformation. Ten years ago, when we occupied a piece of urban vacant land, most forces were against us. The hegemonic conception was that the poor had no right to live in the city. Now things have changed: we have legal instruments for reclaiming land and have rescued many vacant plots. In some of them, we have already built housing for dozens of families, while in others we are working so that the state will provide the necessary inputs for us to build the actual structures.

With regard to principles, beyond our commitment to solidarity and grassroots democracy, Pioneros is also organized by three core Aymara principles that guide community building: we will not steal, we will not be lazy, and we will not lie.

When we talk about theft, it is not just about somebody taking something away from a compañero or compañera. We are also concerned about “stealing” time from the collective. We all make a commitment, and if the assembly agrees that we have to work ten hours a week, we work ten hours a week. Not to do so is to steal time from the group. Everything is collective: recovering the land, participation, decisions, and work.

In the buildings that have been built, people are already living in a different way: individualism steps to the side and solidarious communities emerge. That which is new and good in these communities may be small, but it is real. It is not a distant dream or a vague goal!

CPM: Can you explain to us, step by step, how the organization of a Pioneros encampment works?

Morocoima: What brings people together is the need for housing. We have a location where people with housing needs can go. Every Tuesday up to 200 families come by. They are families without a home who are willing to build their own. First we explain the process and the core values of Pioneros. If they continue to be interested, we see if there is a campamento already set up near where they live.

Right now we have 11 active campamentos in greater Caracas. If the conditions are right, interested families will become part of an existing encampment. But there is also an inventory of vacant lots, and when there is a group of committed and prepared folks who are willing to go the distance, we do a popular “rescue” of the land. To do so, people need to be highly organized and ready to defend the takeover from those who oppose the settling of poor people in the city.

After a takeover, territorial control is established. This comes along with making political bonds with the communal councils in the area.Then we attempt a collective construction of the project – not as mere housing units, but rather as communities for life. The final stages in the process are earthmoving, the dispute for access to building materials from the state, and the self-construction of communities.

Right now the timing for each stage is slower because the state is less forthcoming with building materials. Naturally, the crisis of the economy’s rentier model and the sanctions have reduced the state’s resources making building materials less available. However, the overall support to self-managed initiatives has also practically dropped to zero.

Nevertheless, in spite of the processes being long-drawn, people in the encampments cooperate and are educated in the assemblies and shaped by the struggle. Of course, some tire out and leave, while new people join the struggle.

Rodríguez: The process of reclaiming urban space is very important for us. It is a direct struggle against capital.

When we met with Chávez in 2011, the need for a new understanding of the city came up. A few months later, Gran Misión Vivienda Venezuela was launched, and this gave us legal instruments for reclaiming [vacant] urban land.

However, our conception is different from the institutional conception. In the latter, the state intervenes with the security agencies. By contrast, in our project, we are the ones who reclaim the land. Also, the state intervenes to merely create housing solutions, whereas we aspire to build communalized spaces for a new society. As we said before, our ultimate goal is collective emancipation.

CPM: An organizational model that breaks with capitalist logic is sure to run into many challenges. What are some of the challenges that you encounter in the processes of self-organization?

Rodríguez: Indeed, grassroots democracy and self-management present challenges from day one: a key challenge is to overcome individual needs and turn them into collective strength, into a collective project, into collective action, into collective work. That is a permanent challenge in all the Pioneros encampments.

After all, the prevailing logic in society leads towards individualization and isolation. Everyone aspires to solve their own personal problems. Pioneros works the opposite direction, in the direction of collectivization. We are going against the current, and that presents challenges. However, nobody ever said that building an alternative societal model would be easy!

Morocoima: Indeed, social conditioning and the existing structures in society go against our proposal’s logic. However, if you go to a Pioneros encampment, you will see that people are politically educated, and this happens through struggle and debate. Living in this city is not easy, and neither is maintaining a Pioneros encampment. It takes organization and a high level of awareness.

That is why participation is key. From participation comes mutual recognition and community. And that is where the logic of the capitalist city – where people don’t know their neighbors – breaks down and communalization happens.

Part II

[Here, Morocoima and Rodríguez talk about two conflicting models of the state, and about their proposal for building a radically new communal society.]

CPM: In the Bolivarian Process, there are two paradigms: one that is grassroots and popular vs another that is statist and clientelistic. The Great Venezuelan Housing Mission [henceforth GMVV] is an umbrella project including some grassroots initiatives such as Pioneros, but with an overall paradigm that is statist and clientelistic. How does Pioneros fit into this?

Rodríguez: There are indeed two paradigms in our society. The dominant paradigm conceives the modern state as a provider of goods and services, and in this case as a housing provider. In fact, the paradigm of the state as a housing provider dates back to the 19th century. Here, in Venezuela, the Banco Obrero [Workers’ Bank, a state institution] was founded at the beginning of the 20th century to provide housing for the working class.

This paradigm prevails in much of the GMVV. In fact, the mission is an umbrella that covers many initiatives, including housing construction with the direct participation of popular power, and even the Pioneros initiative. However, the overall GMVV vision is not linked to the construction of popular power. Instead, it tends toward consolidating the welfare state as a guarantor of people’s rights.

Pobladoras is not about satisfying needs, since we aim to build power from below: popular power and communal power. Our struggle is not just about individual housing rights. Rather we work to produce a context for communal living.

Thus, what we struggle for are means for communal living and not the houses themselves. We fight to take the land away from capital. We also get the construction materials from the state, which centralizes them. On our side, we democratically organize the struggle, the production process, and we produce housing collectively. At the end of the day, we are fighting to place the means of production in the people’s hands.

This is how the Pioneros housing developments have been built: through processes that are participatory, popular, collective, communal… and through struggle!

Of course, this runs up against the state as provider and guarantor of welfare. Tension arises because our vision implies transferring power to popular organizations, the organized pueblo, whereas the bureaucracy resists this.

Even when Chávez was alive and there were abundant resources, the bureaucracy resisted. Still, the popular movement managed to twist its arm to obtain materials and other support. Now, however, the resources managed by the state are meager and the dispute has become very tense.

However, the root of the contradiction is really not the availability or lack of resources. The contradiction emerges because there are two different political conceptions. The question is: with limited resources available, are you going to continue building houses by contracting with capitalists, or are you going to build communities with the people to open another political horizon?

Morocoima: As an autonomous and grassroots initiative, we had to fight for recognition and to be part of the GMVV.

Chávez put the construction of three million houses in motion to ensure that the poor would have roofs over their heads, but he also opened the doors for us. In fact, Chávez also listened to our proposal to wrest vacant land from the “urban plantations.” The law now legitimizes such actions.

However, the situation has changed. Although we continue to maintain and defend the rescued plots taken from the “urban plantations,” there are bureaucratic forces that – with the aim of dividing the movement – have either threatened or offered “alternatives” to some of our initiatives. This is geared toward dismantling our popular, grassroots work.

CPM: Every revolution involves an internal struggle between grassroots and statist approaches. Here, in Venezuela, the contradiction expresses itself as a conflict between the bureaucratic leadership and the currents committed to popular power. The popular movement must decide whether it will operate within the schemes of established power or question institutional structures. How does Pioneros see this dilemma?

Morocoima: These differences are important and have consequences downstream. When a family receives the keys to their home, the house becomes a space that can potentially separate them from the rest of society. Family members can participate in the communal council or not, they can vote or not, they can commit to the collective or not. By contrast, a Pioneros project has collective work as part of its DNA and the commune as its horizon.

Rodríguez: Popular, self-organized projects will always struggle for resources from the state. However, when it comes to Pioneros, the dispute with the state has a special character. There is a permanent struggle over the land because someone will always want to “be government” in any territory-based project. This entails a permanent power struggle.

Nonetheless, I should highlight that our main struggle is not with the state or with constituted powers. Our main struggle is to build a new subjectivity. Actually, there is an ongoing dispute over subjectivity within the organization. Sometimes people opt for an individual solution. That, of course, tends to imply breaking with the organization. Yet while some people give up self-organized living, others are continually incorporated into the grassroots process.

CPM: For about two years now, you have been promoting the “Law for Self-Organized Production of Popular Housing and Habitat” [Ley de Producción Autogestionaria de Hábitat y Vivienda Popular]. What can you tell us about this project?

Rodríguez: This law would open up the possibility to self-produce popular habitats and, more importantly, pave the way for the collective production of life in general.

The law would bind the state so that resources and support be made available to grassroots initiatives. This would provide a legal basis for more and more people joining the struggle.

I should highlight that our conception, as reflected in the legal initiative, does not focus only on the state and its resources, but on all forms of established power. It used to be that the state managed most of the nation’s resources. Now, however, the state has seen its resources shrink, with the private sector growing. Hence, although we will continue to struggle so that the state’s resources are channeled to popular, self-managed initiatives, we will also have to struggle to wrest resources from the private sector.

Morocoima: With Chávez some ten years ago, the collective, grassroots production of life through housing really got underway. Now, however, we must work to consolidate the project, since there are many forces – economical, political, and ideological – that conspire against popular, self-managed initiatives.

Also, as Juan Carlos was saying, the law is not only about self-managed construction of popular housing. It is a law that promotes a collective and grassroots conception of life.

We hope that the current National Assembly, with its overwhelming Chavista majority, will pass this law favoring participative and protagonistic democracy.

CPM: In concrete terms, what can you tell us about the law’s content?

Rodríguez: First, the law would guarantee some “minimums” for popular self-construction. The law would commit institutions to making resources available for grassroots initiatives. As it is now, it is up to the political will of people in institutions to support them. The law would guarantee a minimum of support for popular and collectivized projects.

The law would also establish how self-management initiatives should operate in relation to the state. Pobladoras is a self-governed and autonomous organization, but that does not mean that there should not be a regulatory framework governing the relationship between the state and the organization: a kind of pact. Otherwise, the tendency is for the institutional logic to impose itself on popular, self-managed projects.

One thing to note is that institutional factors can sometimes intervene in popular initiatives with good intentions. However, they always bypass internal processes, and thus bureaucratic power tends to break the organization. This is because the self-managed form of organization and production responds to a logic that is quite different from that of the state.

The law would make it possible to establish relations that would keep the bureaucracy from “colonizing” grassroots initiatives.

CPM: Finally, let’s discuss the communal project. As I understand it, a communal society is the ultimate goal of Pioneros and Pobladoras.

Rodríguez: Pobladoras prioritizes the construction of communal life as an alternative to the life imposed by capitalist, colonial, and individualist modernity. For us, it is fundamental to consolidate a way of life that is collectively produced. At the end of the day, this way of life is needed if we are to advance in building a communal society.

This has civilizational implications: we are working to build an alternative way of life!

The communal spirit actually expresses itself in the grassroots and self-managed processes taking place in the Pioneros encampments and in the new model for living that we foster within Pobladoras.

Our strategic horizon is a communal one. For that reason, our project enters into contradiction with the modern capitalist city.

I bring this up because a debate about the “Communal City Law” is currently underway at the National Assembly. However, communal cities cannot emerge if the state favors capitalist modernity and the latter continues to organize urban space. Therefore, it is necessary to think about how to organize life, which also requires analyzing power.

We need to analyze the logic of public power, distinguishing it from communal power. Sometimes people confuse the two. To give you an example, some people argue that the commune is a structure that should be subordinated to the local town hall. It would be a very serious error to incorporate the commune into the structure of public power in the regions. Public is not the same as communal. The commune is the alternative to capitalist modernity.

Modernity has eliminated the commons. It committed genocide against communitarian forms of life. The communal is precisely what our comrades in Bolivia and in many parts of Latin America are recovering: the communitarian way of life as an alternative to the project of modernity.

It is time to analyze and transform power, which requires a radical transformation of the economy, of our subjectivity, and geography. This implies questioning not only the public sphere but also the private sphere of accumulation. We don’t argue for a transition from public to private management.

This may sound very abstract, but in concrete terms, we are talking about control of the territory, of politics, and of the economy – all based on the logic of the common as opposed to the individualistic liberal logic. They are antagonistic. All this is complex. It is not a two-day exercise.

Morocoima: Now that the old model is exhausted, it’s time to advance. But the process must be true to Chávez’s proposal: it must overcome the old bureaucratic logic of power.

We must always remember that, as we move toward a communal society, we are defending the commons and Chavez’s legacy. Conversely, if we abandon the communal proposal, we are abandoning Chavez. That is why it is urgent to advance in building popular unity: we must break down barriers and eliminate privileges. We must recover Chavez’s slogan, Commune or Nothing!

(Cira Pascual Marquina is Political Science Professor at the Universidad de Bolivariana de Venezuela in Caracas and is staff writer for Venezuelanalysis.com. Article courtesy: Venezuelanalysis.com, an independent website produced by individuals who are dedicated to disseminating news and analysis about the current political situation in Venezuela.)