RECONSTRUCCIONES IDENTITARIAS EN EL PROCESO BOLIVARIANO: LOS AFROVENEZOLANOS (1998-2008)

Venezuelan black organizations have advanced in a profound processof identitary reconstruction, structuring new social movements in thecontext of hegemonic struggle and political-institutional change in thecountry since the late 1990’ decade. This process is beyond thetraditional defense of the right to cultural diversity to set a new ethnopoliticaldiscourse aimed at the decolonization of the state and nationproject under the Bolivarian revolutionary process. Our paper attemptsto make an approach to the analysis of the main factors which haveinfluenced in the identitary construction of “African descent” in theperiod 1998-2008 in Venezuela. It is based on interviews with leadersand members of Afro Venezuelan organizations, and reviewingliterature and various documents which were produced anddisseminated by their activists