The Right and Democracy: Rethinking the Relationship.

The Right has historically opposed democracy and provided support only when democracy was made "safe" for elite interests. This makes the actions of the Right in Venezuela between 2006-2013 highly surprising. During this time Venezuela was in the midst of a radicalizing period of left-populist rule. The Right had earlier opposed this project by supporting a military coup, amongst other things. But from 2006-2013 the Right not only failed to work to end democracy, but actually worked to deepen democracy at the local level. This paper argues that this occurred because of the presence of leftist hegemony in Venezuela during this time. This restructured the political rules of the game such that the Right was compelled to play on the Left's terrain. The paper uses this case, in comparison with Bolivia, to advance a novel theory of the relationship between the Right and democracy, centered on the Right's contrasting behavior towards democratic leftist threats in situations where leftist hegemony is present versus absent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]