From 2005 to 2016, against the wishes of both the country’s ruling and opposition parties, the small Venezuelan municipality of Torres underwent a radical experiment in democracy, giving residents direct power over the budget. It worked.

If you’re looking for successful cases of municipal socialism, Torres, a municipality in the Venezuelan state of Lara, deserves to be high on the list. From 2005 to 2016 Torres was one of the most deeply democratic cities in the world. During these years, ordinary citizens exercised an extraordinary level of control over local political decision-making. Their most powerful tool? A participatory budget, which gave residents binding control over the full municipal investment budget.

In district-level assemblies, predominantly working-class participants (ag

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