Hugo Chávez is back. A seemingly endless stream of commentators insists that the way to understand Donald Trump is by analyzing the practices of the late Venezuelan president. The argument usually pivots around the idea that as a “populist strongman” Trump draws from the same playbook as Chávez.

We have been conducting fieldwork in Venezuela since the early 2000s, and like many of our colleagues, we reject the Trump/Chávez comparison. For starters, such comparisons rely on cultural stereotypes. The notion that Americans need to look outside of the United States to understand Trump’s authoritarianism, racism, or manipulation of stark class inequality reflects an enduring belief in American exceptionalism. More importantly, such comparisons sidestep the content of politics; they render insignificant the differences between an anti-capitalist who sought to build a type of socialism and a billionaire real estate developer who wants to further deregulate Wall Street.