Opposite sides, same means: How did Venezuela use clientelistic practices to get international support to its anti-American foreign policy?

Abstract

In this article, we introduce the concept of international clientelism and discuss how it was a tool used by Venezuela since Hugo Chávez took office to get political support from several Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) countries in international fora. We operationalize the concept, claiming that it is broader than the vote-buying strategy discussed by the existing literature, then apply it to the Venezuelan practices in the region under Chávez‟s rule. An empirical test using data for all LAC countries for the period 1991-2015 confirms that clientelistic linkages produced political support to Venezuela at the United Nations General Assembly, while also moving its partners away from the United States at the institution.