ANALYSIS OF THE INFLUENCE OF THE POLITICAL SURVIVAL OF NICOLAS MADURO TOWARDS THE VENEZUELAN SOCIO-POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC CRISIS (2013-2024)

Abstract

This thesis explores the relationship between Nicolás Maduro’s political survival and Venezuela’s socio-political and economic crisis between 2013 and 2024. While external factors, including declining oil prices and international sanctions, deepened the crisis, the persistence of Maduro’s presidency highlights the internal dynamics of authoritarian governance. Using a qualitative case study approach and guided by Jonathan Gerschewski’s Autocratic Stability Theory, the research examines how legitimation, repression, and co-optation have shaped regime’s survival. This thesis shows that Maduro employed practices of institutional manipulation, clientelism through the state-owned Oil Corporation, PDVSA, and coercive measures enforced by Bolivarian Intelligence Body to weaken opposition and maintain authority. These actions secured his political survival despite hyperinflation, migration issues, and economic collapse. Economically, limited relief emerged when Maduro restructured diplomatic relations with the United States and Europe, resulting in partial lifting of sanctions and renewed oil exports. In the end, this research suggest that Maduro’s survival is sustained less by effective governance than by authoritarian strategies that prioritize regime security over national stability. Consequently, Venezuela remains locked in a multidimensional crisis where short-term economic openings fail to resolve deeper structural and political breakdowns.