Hard lessons from Venezuela: How an erosion of property rights accelerated the rot

JOHANNESBURG — Professor Sary Levy-Carciente had to travel a circuitous route from her home city Caracas, Venezuela to get to Johannesburg, South Africa this week. Because her country's national airline has so few direct routes these days, she had to first fly a series of connecting flights north to New York, and only then onto an SAA plane all the way back down to OR Tambo International. However, I'm glad she made the long journey to attend a Free Market Foundation (FMF) event on property rights in Rosebank this week as I've had the privilege of conducting one of her first-ever media interviews in English (she's done plenty in Spanish). A member of the Board of Directors of the National Academy of Economic Sciences in Venezuela and a Full Professor at the Central University of Venezuela (UCV), Levy-Carciente knows full-well the reasons for the economic damage done to her country. She's already made an impact in South Africa as an article she wrote on the stages of Venezuela's economic freefall went viral across various local media outlets in recent days. And in this incredible interview, she explains the day-to-day struggles of life in Venezuela. She also explains how populism, centralism, patronage and diminishing property rights have led her country down a very depressing and destructive path. However, she remains hopeful that her country and other countries can learn lessons from how not to do things in the 21st century. - Gareth van Zyl