From oil rents to urban rents: The inconstant regulation of private investment in the built environment in Caracas, Venezuela, 1950-199

Investment in the urban built environment is an essential element of economic development, yet global economic restructuring is rendering the conditions of such investment more and more uncertain. In Latin America, this tension between the fixity of investment and the mobility of capital has reached a critical stage, as the institutions and practices that have historically regulated this relation are undergoing fundamental change. The objective of this dissertation is to examine the changing dynamics of investment in urbanization on the basis of an historical case study of the private market for the provision of built property in Caracas, Venezuela during the period 1950-1990. This study has three interrelated parts. The first part is a macroeconomic and political analysis of the intersectoral allocation of capital to the private market for investment in urbanization. The second part is a study of the internal dynamics of the market, with a specific focus on the strategic relations among agents engaged in the urban development process. The final part is an analysis of the geographical practice of private development in Caracas. The principal finding of this study is that, contrary to widely-held assumptions, there has in fact been no constant relation between the global flow of oil revenues and patterns of urban development in Venezuela. Rather, the relation between oil and urbanization has undergone a series of profound changes since 1950, as the Venezuelan state has shifted the site of its intervention from direct investment in the local conditions of development, to the mediation of the social relations of the private market, to, presently, a global concern for the valuation of capital. The theoretical contribution of this study is in broad support of the development of a conceptual and methodological approach to the study of urbanization that couples structural and strategic modes of analysis within an historically-specific context.