It has been over ten years since Hugo Chavez first took power in Venezuela as well as becoming the leader of the leftist social movement and political process in Venezuela, The Bolivarian Revolution. The revolution is named after Simon Bolivar, an early 19th century Venezuelan and Latin American revolutionary leader, who was prominent in the South American Wars of Independence. As soon as Chavez took office, he immediately made major changes in Venezuela, one of which changed the named the Republic of Venezuela to the "Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela"(Clark 2009). Not only did he change the name but also Chavez immediately converted the Venezuelan Government and society into what he calls the Bolivarian Revolution. The Bolivarian revolution has produced a new legislature, a new supreme court, a new constitution and electoral authorities and the removal of Venezuela's armed forces and state-owned oil industries. The policies united Chavez's domestic authority but produced a great deal of opposition in Venezuela (Trinkunas 2005).
While trying to keep Venezuela's founding fathers alive, Simon Bolivar and Simon Rodriguez, Chavez's interpretation of their thinking is that this revolution bonds sets of ideas that defend a populist and maybe an authoritarian attitude to government, the combination of the military into domestic policies and an effort on using the state's resources to serve the poor, which was the president's main concern (Brookes 2005). Even though, the Bolivarian revolution is mainly geared towards domestic policies, there is substantial foreign policy aspect. "Bolivarian foreign policy seeks to defend the revolution in Venezuela; promote a sovereign, autonomous leadership role for Venezuela in Latin America; oppose globalization and neoliberal economic policies; and work toward the emergence of a multipolar world in which U.S. hegemony is checked,"(Trinkunas 2005).