Resumen

CORDOVA JAIMES,, Edgar. Administración Pública en Venezuela: Aproximaciones a los cambios y transformaciones. Revista de Ciencias Sociales [online]. 2006, vol.12, n.3, pp.496-518. ISSN 1315-9518.

This work purports to study the changes in Venezuelan public administration in the framework of the conditions that originated them and their structural elements, from the reform of the State (1991-1998) up to those produced after the triumph of President Hugo Chávez. Revision of the bureaucratic-centralized administrative model (characteristic for the period of democratic re-establishment 1958-1991), the theoretical focuses for its modernization, as well as the lines on which changes have been introduced during the Chávez era, allow for differentiating three models that can be identified in the Venezuelan case: 1) the model of centralized bureaucratic-populist administration 1958-1989; 2) the decentralized model of the state, 1990-1998; and 3) the model of bureaucratic-populist administration with a military basis 1998- to present. The changes observed in the administrative models are centered fundamentally on: 1) displacement of key mediators: in the state reformation model, the traditional parties give way to the managerial stratum, and in the case of the model for Chávez’s administration, to mediation by the military force, which has operated since the beginning of his government; 2) structuring of a parallel public administration (in the most recent stage, with the creation of the missions) of centralized social programs led by the military, reproducing characteristics of the centralized bureaucratic-populist model.

Palabras clave : Public administration models; public management; Venezuela.