I’ve posted a paper I wrote on Venezuela for an Anthropology class this summer on my Other Writing page.
I’ve done my best to keep this paper as balanced as possible, trying to show how the current political culture in Venezuela has defined how the nation interacts with American corporations in certain cases. I do not intend to pass any judgment on Hugo Chavez. This was part of a group project in which we each wrote our own papers on the issue of Ethics and Global Marketing in a country of our choice, all addressing the topics of the Western diet, cigarette smoking, and safe sex.
Please feel free to leave feedback on the paper in comments to this post. I’m not presenting this as any sort of masterwork – it was for an undergraduate class and is largely based on my own unsourced experience in Venezuela and as the political and cultural situation has been related to me by my family. I am, however, really interested in doing more research on Venezuela, as it’s a great laboratory for media studies.
Other sources on Venezuela:
- It’s always interesting to watch Wikipedia swing back and forth as pro- and anti- Chavez folks revise the entries on Venezuela and Hugo Chavez.
- Flickr’s Venezuela Tag
- Venezuela News on Topix.net
In general, I find the Venezuelan blogosphere to be pretty stridently anti-Chavez. I wonder what things would look like if someone taught a handful of articulate Chavistas how to use blogs to get their message out? Of course, my reading is completely limited to those publishing in English, which should throw my numbers WAY off. Anyway, I’m not linking to any Venezuelan blogs for this reason: the ones in English tend to tell only one side of the story. If there are any Chavista bloggers out there writing in English, feel free to send me your URL.
Comments
2 responses to “Ethics and Global Marketing in Venezuela”
Maybe you might ask yourself WHY the blogosphere is stridently anti-Chavez. Does it ever occur to you that they might be that way for a reason?
This is pure speculation on my part, but my hypothesis is that the percentage of Chavez-supporters with internet access and knowledge of the existence of personal publishing tools is far lower than the percentage of those opposed to Chavez with internet access and knowledge of personal publishing tools.
I think it’s a problem of class, and it’s something I’m extremely interested in studying further. I plan to write my Master’s thesis on Digital Divide themes: How does Internet access affect participation in public debate? I’m interested in who is using the Internet (and more specifically, weblogs) for political discourse and who is not, and why.
For the record, I don’t consider myself strident in any of my opinions about politics in Venezuela. My knowledge on the topic is limited, and I’m always looking for good information that doesn’t come with a strident point of view.