Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in ...

is divided into 23 states ''(estados)'', 1

Capital District A capital district, capital region or capital territory is normally a specially designated administrative division where a country's seat of government is located. As such, in a federal model of government, no state or territory has any politi ...

''(Distrito Capital)'' and the

Federal Dependencies The Federal Dependencies of Venezuela ( es, link=no, Dependencias Federales de Venezuela) encompass most of Venezuela's offshore islands in the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Venezuela, excluding those islands that form the State of Nueva Espar ...

''(Dependencias Federales de Ultramar)'' that consist of numerous Venezuelan islands. These administrative divisions are grouped into

regions In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as zones, lands or territories, are areas that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and the interaction of humanity and t ...

Historical subdivisions

Prior to the

Federal War The Federal War ( es, Guerra Federal) — also known as the Great War or the Five Year War — was a civil war (1859–1863) in Venezuela between the Conservative party and the Liberal party over the monopoly the Conservatives held over govern ...

(1859–1863), Venezuela was divided into provinces rather than states. The victorious forces were supposed to grant more autonomy to the individual states, but this was not implemented. Between 1863 and the early 1900s, there were numerous territorial changes, including the merger and splitting of states. Thereafter, until the late 1990s, the states were left unchanged. Recent years have seen the creation of three new states:

Delta Amacuro Delta Amacuro State ( es, Estado Delta Amacuro, ) is one of the 23 states of Venezuela, and is the location of the Orinoco Delta. The Paria Gulf and the Atlantic Ocean are found to the north, Bolívar State is found to the south, the Atlanti ...

, Amazonas, and Vargas (in that order).

States

Areas with special status

Capital District

Federal Dependencies

Municipal organization

Venezuelan states are subdivided into "

municipalities A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the ...

" (

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: ** Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Ca ...

''municipios''), which may correspond to either or both of

county A county is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposes Chambers Dictionary, L. Brookes (ed.), 2005, Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, Edinburgh in certain modern nations. The term is derived from the Old French ...

and

city A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. It can be de ...

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national id ...

-speaking countries. ''Municipios'' are the fundamental unit of

local government Local government is a generic term for the lowest tiers of public administration within a particular sovereign state. This particular usage of the word government refers specifically to a level of administration that is both geographically-lo ...

in Venezuela.

External links

Feature at CityMayors.com
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