Germán Carrera Damas's book on Rómulo Betancourt (published originally in Venezuela almost a decade ago as Rómulo histórico: La personalidad histórica de Rómulo Betancourt vista en la instauración de la República popular representativa en la génesis de la democracia moderna en Venezuela) is a very important addition to contemporary revisionist scholarship on the former Venezuelan president and Punto Fijo–era democracy. Carrera Damas argues that Betancourt's political life was consciously historical because he was acutely aware of his actions' significance: the institutionalization of a liberal democracy in Venezuela that was socialist but pluralistic, nationalistic but not anti-imperialist, reformist and yet revolutionary. This vast essay, which might be difficult for those unfamiliar with Carrera Damas's work, has been thoughtfully translated by Elizabeth Lowe and is prefaced by historian John V. Lombardi's glimpse into his collaborations with Carrera Damas and the latter's standing in Venezuelan historiography.
It would be hard to overstate...
