Abstract

GONZALEZ OQUENDO, Luis J. Petróleo y cambio social como programa de investigación en Venezuela. Revista de Ciencias Sociales [online]. 2006, vol.12, n.3, pp.476-495. ISSN 1315-9518.

Throughout the twentieth century, petroleum was the element that explained the structuring of Venezuelan society. A corollary was that Venezuela was what petroleum-related activity allowed it to be. This paper purports to study how the construction of Venezuelan society has been possible from the viewpoint of intellectual social scientific products, using not only a theoretical but also an epistemological approach to determine whether or not a research program exists. José Padrón’s VIE Model is used to analyze the work of five key social scientists who have studied the social impact of oil on Venezuela: Rodolfo Quintero, Carmen Vallarino de Bracho, Roberto Briceño León, María Sol Pérez Schael and Fernando Coronil. In conclusion, it was possible to demonstrate that the unique common element in these research studies was the object, although each one had different theoretical constructions regarding it. Therefore, “Petroleum and Social Change in Venezuela” is not yet a research program.

Keywords : Epistemology; research program; petroleum; social change; Venezuela.