ABSTRACT
Rafael Caldera Rodríguez, President of Venezuela 1969-74 and 1994-99, was born in San Felipe, Yaracuy, in 1916 and educated in the Colegio San Ignacio de Loyola and the Central University, graduating in law and political science in 1939. As a student he took an active part in politics, founding the National Student Union in 1936 to promote Christian social principles. In 1945 he was invited to join the Acción Democrática Government as Attorney-General, but he resigned from it in 1946 to found the Partido Social-Cristiano, coming second in the 1947 presidential elections. He was arrested and finally exiled for his opposition to the dictatorship of Marcos Pérez Jiménez, on whose fall he concluded with Rómulo Betancourt the Pact of Punto Fijo to maintain the restored democracy. In December 1968, at his fourth attempt, he was elected as President. In office he adopted a conciliatory stance, recognizing the Soviet Union and legalizing both the Partido Comunista de Venezuela and the Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria. After the serious decline of the Venezuelan economy in the 1980s, he was again elected to the presidency in 1994, running in opposition to his old party under the banner of Convergencia Nacional, but was unable to change the system he had helped create.
