Amílcar Jesús Figueroa Salazar

On December 7, 2008, Commander Chávez, at a meeting held at the Venezuelan Military Academy, before all the leadership of the newly formed United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) [1], those who held elected office, and those responsible for the most important aspects of the state apparatus, announced that: “… we have entered the third stage of the Revolution, the stage of the Communes and the Communal State” [2]. He thus introduced the most defining element of the varied path of the advocated Venezuelan socialist transition, where the anti-capitalist nature of the process can be most clearly expressed.
Indeed, the question of how to build socialism, which has been present in the debate among revolutionaries throughout history, is incorporated into the current experience as a concrete proposal that imbues the Bolivarian model with a particularity; the progress or lack thereof of social transformation will depend on its development.
Challenged by this possibility, we must recognize as a failure the fact that the Venezuelan process has not promoted a broad debate, incorporating all 21st-century revolutionaries, on how to understand the socialist transition, and even less so, how the Commune positions itself in relation to the hegemonic economic model in present-day Venezuelan society.
Of course, many questions arose. The old but little-known exchange of ideas between the radical current of Russian populism of the 1880s and Karl Marx [3] reappeared among militants with a communist background. Could it be, as Vera Ivanovna Zasulich wondered, based on the social formation that existed in her country at that time, that the Commune could be the basis for the society to be built in Bolivarian Venezuela?
Above all, in our case, a central concern lies in the field of economics: to what extent can the Commune generate productive forces capable of satisfying the material needs of the population as a whole? (Figueroa S., A. 2010:14); and how can we avoid the kind of autarky to which communal action can be reduced? [4].
At present, there are many concerns stemming from the objective fact that the Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela (CRBV), approved in 1999, enshrines different types of property with an indisputable preeminence of the private over the collective. Moreover, the successful examples of the economies of Asian countries, led by Communist Parties, point in another direction.
However, by that time, Chávez, the undisputed leader of the process, had become convinced of the need for the Revolution to create spaces where socialism would cease to be an abstraction, and that space was none other than the Commune.
This was indicated by his universal theoretical explorations, and even though he was convinced that the Bolivarian Commune should be a new construction for the current century, he drew on our historical past, so that our Commune would have to start from the experience of communal life of our indigenous peoples, driven by the examples of Manuela Beltrán Archila, José Antonio Galán Zorro, and the communal insurgency that, in 1781, swept through the Colombian-Venezuelan Andes with the slogan: “Union of the oppressed against the oppressors” [5]. In addition, it should emulate the class-based content of the Cabimas Commune of 1935 [6] and, in general, the collectivist practices developed at different times by our people.

What was the context in which the Commune became the new feature of the Bolivarian Revolution?
An unavoidable premise for understanding the emergence in Venezuela of embryos of Popular Power and productive initiatives under social ownership during the early 21st century is the fact that the Bolivarian process was built on a society fractured in its structure of domination following the events of February 1989 and the military insurrections of 1992 (4F and 27N), which significantly challenged the power bloc. The electoral triumph of Hugo Chávez Frías in December 1998 was nothing less than the political victory of those rebellions, which the old Republic had managed to contain. But its significance in historical terms was that it opened the floodgates to profound reforms and revolutionary possibilities.
Therefore, the conditions existed for the process to move from one set of contents to another in a short time, all marked by an increasing radicalism. From the “rescue of the identifying values of the homeland” and the substantive expansion of democracy [7] to the beginning of the Communes movement, there was a theoretical and practical effort guided by the need to reduce the nation’s historical deficits, settle enormous social differences, include humiliated and offended human contingents, and attempt to build a new societal model. Different political moments followed, characterized by democratic expansion, with spaces emerging where the protagonism of the majorities was put into practice.
In such circumstances, and especially since 2003, initiatives by pre-existing local powers—which had emerged from the grassroots and were very weak until then—were strengthened, and many others were promoted by the state. Thus, spaces began to be built where collective praxis prevailed (cooperatives, Socially Owned Enterprises (EPS), worker-controlled factories, and communes).
When the commune was launched in December 2008, there was a special moment of revolutionary momentum. It was a time of greater possibilities for collectivist and community alternatives, as material resources were combined with political will to promote a new economy. Subjective factors favored the search for structural changes (Figueroa S.:2013). This is evidenced by the fact that, having proclaimed the socialist nature [8] of the Bolivarian Revolution, Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías won the December 2006 election with 62.84% of the vote.
With a favorable correlation of forces and the presence, within the collective consciousness of the masses, of the search for collective solutions to overcome their material needs, there were unbeatable conditions for the commune to become the organizational form of this collectivization.

The first formulations
It can be said that the practical beginning of the formation of communes ran parallel to the theoretical elaboration of an existing commune. The document that served as a guide for that training workshop in December 2008 contains the following initial statements:
The Commune is a unit that implies a territorial dimension. Its formation obeys parameters agreed upon by several Community Councils that, after organizing themselves and conducting a territorial study, decide to form a Commune. [9]
The Commander-President’s Robinsonian practice [10] of building, making mistakes, rectifying, and moving forward led him to develop a theory about the construction itself, without neglecting theoretical references. Hence, his recurring calls to arm oneself with knowledge and his concern about the scarcity of theoretical elaboration existing at that time regarding the commune. This dissatisfaction was expressed, for example, in the program “Aló Presidente Teórico” No. 1, on June 11, 2009, where he stated:
We must articulate, encompass, clarify, and unify criteria, even within the diversity and great creative flexibility of any revolution. But we have to build the Commune as a revolutionary entity, as a territorial, social, political, and moral base, and if we don’t even articulate it, how are we going to build it? [11]

Combating the metabolic reproduction of capital
It is clear that, from the moment Hugo Chávez Frías proposed promoting the communes and the Communal State, his thinking had reached its most radical point. Thus, in the Plan for the Homeland presented by him as a government program to the National Electoral Council (CNE) when he registered his candidacy for a second re-election, in Objective II, he said:
…Promote new forms of production organization that place the means of production at the service of society and promote the generation of a productive fabric under a new metabolism for the socialist transition. (Chávez, 2012a:51)
This approach must be assessed in its proper context: his thinking on the productive model points strategically toward overcoming the reproductive logic of capital (Mészáros, 2008). With it, Chávez and the Bolivarian Revolution made a contribution by helping to decipher and promote the development of keys to the socialist transition. This was a quest to overcome the shortcomings pointed out by Che Guevara, when he noted the lack of in-depth studies on the political economy of known socialist experiences. [12]
Of course, this formulation is a result. A non-linear path of search and experimentation had already been traveled, with trials and errors, where welfare-oriented economic measures were practiced, guided by a sense of benevolence; capitalist-style productive ventures, support for small family businesses, nationalization of industries, and—most significantly—some productive trials where social ownership was promoted.
It was nothing less than ensuring that, alongside the various forms of property enshrined in the Bolivarian Constitution and the different ways of life that necessarily coexist during the transition, our socialism could find its effective space for realization in the commune. (Figueroa S., A., 2014:39)
The theoretical elaboration presented at the time dispelled fears about the isolation of communal experiences, based on the understanding that an interconnected network of communes must gain space in the whole of social relations.

“Commune or Nothing!”—A battle cry in a space of balance
In real terms, the construction process was far from the theoretical formulation. The Commune was attacked from several flanks, and weaknesses and shortcomings in its development began to become apparent, at least not at the pace required by the socialist transition.
Alongside the growing siege of U.S. imperialism and, in general, of the capitalist system against the nation, and the internal reaction of bourgeois factions and the so-called “middle classes” who saw their privileges threatened by the possibility of significant structural changes, the lack of internal strength became palpable, expressed in a lack of clarity and/or commitment in collective terms, largely as a subjective factors, regarding the leader’s proposal to advance in overcoming the reproductive logic of capital.
The revolutionary figure called upon to lead the process did not take sufficient advantage of the 2001 Land Law, which made it possible to expropriate idle estates of more than 5,000 hectares, in order to expand the radius of the rural commune. This law recognized the historical struggle of the Venezuelan peasantry to gain land. However, it did not have the organic capacity to enforce it as extensively as it allowed. Peasant communes were established only in some recovered areas.
In addition, there was concern about the ways in which state structures related to the embryos of Popular Power, their hesitant decision to support the popular economy, and, above all, the limited understanding of where the search for transformation was headed. Hence Hugo Chávez Frías’ anguished battle cry, “Commune or Nothing!”, during the Council of Ministers meeting on October 20, 2012.
In his own words, it was necessary to form:
…a network that would spread like a giant spider web covering the territory of the new, otherwise it would be doomed to failure; it would be absorbed by the old system, swallowed up by it, which is a giant amoeba, a monster called capitalism. (Chávez, 2012b:16)

Time of resistance and readjustments
Between that assessment in the Council of Ministers in October 2012 [13] and the present moment, there have been a series of circumstances that have shaped the development of the commune, its content, and its historical perspective. The change in situation is expressed in:

• The systematic, escalating siege of Venezuela by U.S. imperialism, which is currently even considering direct military intervention, has had an impact on the nation’s economy. We are facing the decision of the imperialist hegemonic elite to return to a fundamental axis of its policy: the Monroe Doctrine. This elite could not accept that, during the first decade of the 21st century, much of the continent slipped out of its control. In this sense, it has deployed a counteroffensive with a clear purpose (Bigott, 2010:19).
• Attempts at dialogue and normal trade relations with the United States are undermined, apart from its supremacist mentality, by the objective situation of its economic decline and the accelerated loss of the global hegemony it enjoyed until recently, the recovery of which, for them, requires the appropriation of the remaining reserves of strategic materials that the planet still possesses (Bigott, 2005:44). In this sense, the imperialists’ motivation to take control of Venezuela’s fossil fuel deposits and other materials is clear.
• The attack on the economy, the need to respond immediately to food shortages and meet the material needs of the population, together with the permanent threat of military aggression and a compromised balance of power, paved the way for the emergence of conservative positions, marked by conceptual and theoretical weakness. In the interests of national unity, the struggle of ideas and classes was suspended. This has contributed to the dilution of the anti-capitalist content of the process.
• Furthermore, it is necessary to understand that imperialist war, in recent decades, has introduced important changes in its modes of intervention (Beinstein, 2014:49), which is why it now has a cultural front-line element (López and Rivas, 2012:24). And, in this way, among other things, the capitalist system has managed to reposition individualism in many of our people, which is an element of great importance for the negation of collective pursuits. To this end, it has made use of an overwhelming campaign deployed through its formidable media apparatus.

Therefore, we must be aware that, following the impact of the capitalist crisis on Venezuela, the fall in oil prices, the siege of capital, and, in general, the context of the Comprehensive War [14] declared by U.S. imperialism against the Venezuelan nation, the conditions for deepening the collectivization of the economy were profoundly altered.
Nevertheless, the commune continued its march in a process of uneven development. On July 1, 2020, President Nicolás Maduro Moros announced a relaunch of the commune, revalidating its role in the socialist transition:
We must continue to build socialism in the territory; that is the goal. Why the communes? Why the communal councils? … To build socialism in the territory, to build socialism in concrete terms… Socialism is built with the people, or there is no socialism; socialism is built in the commune. (Maduro, N., 2020)

Previously, on April 25, 2019, through Official Gazette No. 6,453, Nicolás Maduro Moros had decreed the founding of the Bolivarian University of the Communes.
Then, a renewed process began for the construction of the comune, where it is necessary to highlight that the almost 50,000 institutionally registered community councils are spaces where the exercise of direct democracy has advanced and, through a process of aggregation, form Community Circuits and Communes.
In line with this process, on December 30, 2024, the Organic Law of the Communes was enacted, Extraordinary Gazette No. 6,872; legislation that marks the reforms promoted by the State for the Commune; and gives it its current form, incorporating elements such as the concept of a Commune Government, which synthesizes the forms of organization, administration, and articulation in the territorial space where it is based. It expands democracy by establishing that the Citizens’ Assembly has the power to decide. It also establishes that the Commune Government must be structured with the following bodies: the Commune Parliament, the Commune Executive Council, the Commune Comptroller’s Council, the Commune Justice of the Peace Council, the Commune Electoral Commission, and the Commune Bank.
The Commune Government is responsible for planning, administering, and executing Commune Management, establishing a kind of mediation between the State and the Commune for the implementation of public policies. For example, projects approved by the community, upon receiving resources from the State, are administered by the Commune Bank, with participatory democracy being exercised in both instances.
At the same time, the Commune Government establishes a hierarchical division by implementing a political vanguard, to which it grants the status of the Commune Executive Council, made up of commissions according to the needs and levels of organization within the Commune. Commissions are established for Planning, Economy, Supreme Happiness, Security and Peace, and any others as required by specific circumstances.
Thus, between the theoretical formulations achieved by 2012 and the guidelines for “the Commune that actually exists” in 2025, there is both continuity and change—an expression of uneven, complex, and contradictory development, where its presence has spread to almost the entire territory, most of them established in urban centers. [15]
Now, although the Commune today discusses and votes on projects that, for the community, are financed by the State and, in addition, administers those resources through the Community Bank, if the final say rests with the Citizens’ Assembly, then we are facing progress in terms of democratic participation. The Commune is gaining ground in the conduct of public affairs, but where stagnation is evident is in the struggle for greater space for social ownership. On the contrary, the national and international counteroffensive, sustained by capital, has succeeded in preserving and strengthening its reproductive logic throughout Venezuelan society.
This has given rise to a fundamental problem for the socialist transition, which in Venezuela has the simultaneous tasks of overcoming extractivism (not only oil) in the economic sphere and moving towards a diversified productive economy, while at the same time fighting for the strategic goal of overcoming the alienation of labor.

Socialist embryos in the territory
Given this reality, the communes continued its march, now with new tasks imposed by imperialist interference, such as the Milicia Comunal (Communal Militia), a key component of the defensive strategy within the territory. In addition, emblematic communes have developed in various parts of the country, with two distinctive characteristics: productive capacity and the drive toward collectivization. A revolutionary subject remains determined to prefigure, from now on, embryos of a Communal Society—spaces where, in parallel with the exercise of direct democracy, the struggle for the emancipation of labor continues: “the assault on heaven,” to paraphrase Marx [16]. Below, I will describe some of these constructions, those whose development I have been able to follow up to date:

• Comuna Agua de Obispo (Torres Municipality, Lara State): it has established itself as a national model of agricultural innovation and efficiency. Supported by funding from the Federal Council of Government and the Lara State Government, this commune experienced a qualitative leap in its onion production; diversifying its activities, it now includes sheep and goat farming. It encourages the creation of strategic alliances with other communes and economic circuits, promoting a model of comprehensive development that benefits the entire region.
• Comuna Socialista 5 de Marzo Comandante Eterno: located in the populous parish of El Valle in Caracas, it is an expression of the urban organization model. Its name, which commemorates the date of the death of President Hugo Chávez Frías (March 5, 2013) and honors him as “Eternal Commander,” reflects its deep roots in the ideology of the Bolivarian Revolution. Its development includes 2,035 families: 2,811 women (52.1%) and 2,584 men (47.9%). The Commune maintains national and international alliances with educational and social movements, standing out for its focus on public health projects, including an epidemiological surveillance system for Human Papillomavirus (HPV).
• Comuna Ernesto Che Guevara (Tucaní, Mérida State): with the Direct Communal Social Property Company (EPSDC) of the same name, it is dedicated to cocoa cultivation and chocolate processing. It organizes coffee production through the Colinas del Mirador Cooperative (Colimir). With years of experience, it has managed to directly market its production to other regions of the country; it is a good example of direct democracy in action, with its Community Parliament.
• Comuna El Panal 2021, whose territory is located in the working-class neighborhood of 23 de Enero in Caracas and in the Miguel Peña Parish in southern Valencia, Carabobo State: it is an example of how community autonomy and the practice of assemblies are exercised. A commune established in an urban area that has managed to sustain various productive activities. It has advanced various initiatives, including a local currency for community exchange.
• Comuna Junco Unido y Socialista (Cárdenas Municipality, Táchira): it emerges as a living expression of Popular Power in the heart of Táchira, standing out for its capacity for transformation through the active participation of its inhabitants. It has primarily promoted its Community Bank, a social and community financial institution that supports productive initiatives, strengthening the local economy. It holds regular community assemblies where the organized Popular Power presents reports on the projects underway. This mechanism of accountability and collective planning ensures that initiatives are aligned with the real needs of the community and aim to strengthen the socioeconomic fabric of the territory.

We cannot conclude this overview without a brief review of what is undoubtedly an emblematic commune: El Maizal, the Commune-School, where the puzzle of the transition economy—increasing productivity—is reflected in the growth of its herds, dedicated to producing cow and buffalo milk, or in its corn crops for top-quality flour, alongside short-cycle crops such as beans and peas—production that involves some 3,500 families, members of 37 community councils. All this, with social ownership taking precedence. This line of work has been sustained since the moment the peasant families occupied the land. Its ongoing training schools for young community members guarantee its strategic projection. Its example radiates across many corners of the Patria Grande, from the municipality of Simón Planas, Lara State.
These are some examples of the constructions achieved by the working people, where social property proves its viability in the struggle against other types of property, especially in confronting hegemonic private property. It is necessary to spread awareness of its existence, recognizing its shortcomings, as stated on March 5, 2019, during the 10th anniversary of El Maizal, when the need to overcome isolation between communes and to interweave efforts was raised. [17] (Figueroa, 2019)
Undoubtedly, the potential of the commune in these emblematic spaces, in terms similar to those described by Álvaro García Linera, is perceived as follows:
…the community will not only have to preserve itself, but will also have to recover its primary conditions of association and control of production by producers; and, best of all, it will do so under new and superior conditions due to the existence of new productive forces and wealth as well as the global presence of the proletariat, which enables the incorporation of that wealth and its social, common, and community control by direct workers, thus overcoming the old conditions that for centuries had pushed the community toward its slow dissolution. (García Linera, A. 1989, “Introduction to the Kovalevsky Notebook -1879-” in Marx, Unpublished Texts, 2018:106)

By way of conclusion
When thinking about the future of socialism, we discover in Hugo Chávez Frías’ proposal the idea of grafting social property onto a model where different types of property are juxtaposed—an approach that constitutes a reference point to be presented on the battlefield of ideas in today’s world. Even though this thesis, due to real circumstances, has not achieved the necessary understanding, concreteness, and extension, the commune has served as the means through which an attempt is being made to prefigure the Venezuelan path to the construction of 21st-century socialism.
Building, from now on, spaces where socialism can be realized—rather than waiting to pass through multiple stages before finally reaching a new society—is a programmatic element to be promoted by revolutionary subjects during the crisis of hegemony that is upon us. It should be borne in mind that the global restructuring is undergoing rapid development, but, to date, it does not envision overcoming the exploitative, oppressive, and hierarchical essence of present-day society.
Therefore, it is up to community members, workers, and peasants, compelled by the magnitude of the crisis of systemic decline, to continue building an autonomous project, independent of class, whose substantive element is collective property. This is the role of the commune, with its specificities, in the present historical moment. In this sense, it is urgent to review this issue from the perspective of working humanity, which is none other than the socialist/communist perspective.
Similarly, proletarians from other regions of the planet will find, in the study of the collective experiences developed in Venezuela during the current process—even with its shortcomings—valuable lessons and elements for both theoretical and practical construction. Undoubtedly, this is an invaluable contribution to the purpose of reconstructing and updating a strategic horizon for humanity, insofar as the proliferation and/or extension of war, the overexploitation of labor, and the destruction of nature, imposed by capitalism in its phase of historical decline, call for the emergence of a new civilization where the Commune, communal society, and communist utopia are called upon to resurface. Hence the emblematic importance of the embryos of socialism, which foreshadow such a society.
It is a debate that has been raised, where collective historical subjects will have the last word.

Notes

[*] Amílcar Jesús Figueroa Salazar is a historian and graduate of the Central University of Venezuela (UCV). He was President of the Municipal Institute of Publications (2000–2002) and Director General of the Mayor’s Office of Caracas (2002–2006); Alternate President of the Latin American Parliament (2007–2009 and 2009–2011). His written works include: El Salvador, elementos de su historia y luchas (1932–1985) (1987); La Revolución Bolivariana, nuevos desafíos de una creación heroica (The Bolivarian Revolution, New Challenges of a Heroic Creation) (2007); Reforma o Revolución en América Latina –El caso venezolano– (Reform or Revolution in Latin America: The Venezuelan Case) (2009); Chávez, la permanente búsqueda creadora (Chávez, the Permanent Creative Quest) (2014); Piar, la contradictoria lectura de la historia (Piar, the Contradictory Reading of History) (2022). He has combined social and political struggle with editorial work and is currently the General Director of Editorial Trinchera.
[1] The United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) was founded on December 15, 2007.
[2] Hugo R. Chávez F.: Thesis presented for consideration at the Training Workshop, 12/7/2008.
[3] On February 16, 1881, Vera Ivanovna Zasulich questioned Karl Marx about the possibility of the Russian rural commune serving as a starting point for building socialism. Finally, on March 8, 1881, after several drafts, Marx completed a response intended for publication in the newspaper Anales de la Patria. In it, he summarized that the key to the development of socialism in countries that have resisted colonialism and industrial capitalism can be found in communal society, and that prior capitalist development is not necessarily a prerequisite. (García Linera, A., “Introduction to the Kovalevsky Notebook –1879–” in Marx, Unpublished Texts, 2018:105).
[4] Of course, there were opinions that expressed doubts about the possibilities of the Commune. For example, in the column “Un Grano de Maíz” (A Grain of Corn) (9/29/2010), it was stated: “If they integrate society, they are good; if they contribute to its fragmentation, they are bad.”
[5] In 1781, the El Socorro communal rebellion took place, led by Manuela Beltrán Archila and José Antonio Galán Zorro, which spread across a significant portion of New Granada (today, the Republic of Colombia) and part of the Venezuelan Andes.
[6] Professor Leonardo Rodríguez, drawing on Rodolfo Quintero, stated in his as-yet-unpublished work Primeros Congresos Obreros de Venezuela (First Workers’ Congresses of Venezuela) that oil workers in Cabimas, amidst the wave of demonstrations that took place when the death of dictator Juan Vicente Gómez was announced (December 17, 1935), formed a commune in practice by seizing power (December 21) and appointing authorities from the proletariat. They were able to control power for only three days. The response of the representatives of the old state resulted in 37 workers being shot. (Figueroa S. A., 2014:34).
[7] The goals of the Bolivarian process can be summarized as follows: to develop a constituent process to refound the Republic, to change the quality of democracy, to dignify the political process, and to rescue the values that define the identity of the homeland.
[8] It was at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre in January 2005 that Hugo Chávez Frías publicly acknowledged the need for socialism for the first time. However, the beginning of the transition can be traced back to the moment when it became state policy to transfer part of the oil revenue to the promotion of the social economy.
[9] Hugo Chávez Frías: cited document.
[10] This refers to Samuel Robinson, the name assumed by Simón Rodríguez on the passport that allowed him to leave the country for the United States of America after failed emancipation efforts that preceded the open process beginning with the proclamation of Venezuela’s independence in 1810. Rodríguez (or Robinson) was part of Hugo Chávez Frías’s guiding trilogy (Rodríguez, Bolívar, and Zamora) at the time of building the MBR-200. The depth of his thinking allowed him to develop a societal proposal for the peoples of America. His method of practical verification led him to formulate the axiom: “Either we invent or we err.”
[11] Chávez Frías, Hugo. (06/09/2009). Todo Chávez en la Web, Aló Presidente Teórico No. 1.
[12] See: Ernesto Che Guevara, Algunas reflexiones sobre la transición socialista, in Retos de la transición socialista en Cuba (1961–1965), p. 220.
[13] The moment when the axiom was born: “Commune or Nothing!”
[14] The war currently being waged by imperialism in different parts of the world has been called by various names (Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Generation Warfare, Multidimensional Warfare, Hybrid Warfare, Unrestricted Warfare, etc.). For the purposes of this work, the nomenclature used in the study by Angiolillo and Sangronis (2020) has been adopted, as it clearly reflects the attack to which Venezuela is being subjected.
[15] The construction of the Commune in urban spaces is fundamental in a country where the majority of the population is concentrated in cities. However, to tell the truth, until now, the productive scope of most that have been formed is small-scale, focused on family and territorial self-consumption, and their impact on GDP is negligible. Nevertheless, their cognitive influence on communal reality is noteworthy: the process of moralization and repoliticization is greater than the nominal value of logistical and financial operations.
[16] For Marx: “The Commune was, in essence, a government of the working class, the result of the struggle of the producing class against the appropriating class—the political form finally discovered to carry out within it the economic emancipation of labor. Without this last condition, the communal regime would have been an impossibility and a sham. The political domination of the producers is incompatible with the perpetuation of their social slavery. Therefore, the Commune would serve as a lever to extirpate the economic foundations on which the existence of classes and, consequently, the domination of class rests. Once labor is emancipated, every man becomes a worker, and productive labor ceases to be a class attribute.” (Marx, C., 1971:62, 96—emphasis added).
[17] In 2022, a movement emerged in Venezuela from the communes themselves, with the aim of articulating and promoting communal social ownership of the means of production: La Unión Comunera (The Communal Union). With greater autonomy, the communal subject must take into its own hands the struggle for the construction of a new power.