The thorns of Colombian violence : 60 years of constructing national identity

(1)

The Thorns of Colombian Violence

60 Years of Constructing National Identity

Maria José Montaña Correa 10449728 majito55@gmail.com

Supervisor: Erella Grassiani Readers: Marie Louise Janssen, Rob van Ginkel

Social and Cultural Anthropology Master’s Program

27th of July 2013

(2)

This process would never have been possible without the support, love, critiques and great energy of my family. To my father Andrés Montaña: thank you for being the most amazing father and teacher throughout all of this time. To my mother Claudia Correa: thank you for making me feel as if you were here, even if you were not present; you are my strength. For you both: thank you for all the patience, for always trusting in me, for all the efforts and the opportunities that made me grow up as a human being and as an academic. Thank you for all the amazing anthropological conversations; I feel proud to be a colleague of admirable people like you. To Juanita Montoya: thank you for being always there for my dad, my little brother and sister and me. To Ania Montaña and Alejandro Montaña: thank you for the laughs and beautiful times. The thought of you growing up in a different Colombia makes me work harder and with love everyday: son la luz de mi vida. For the rest of my family: thanks for being what you are every day.

To Erella Grassiani; thank you for your constant support, patience and the chance of making this piece better. To Eric Bosch dank je wel: you were always the biggest supporter of this dream. Without your enthusiasm and support, this process would not be as special as it was. I have the best memories of those library days. For my friends from Colombia, who kept giving me support all the time and helped me in their own way: Paola, Maria Angélica, Lorena, Mauricio and Paolo, thank you. Thanks to Diana and Leonardo: you thought me a Tercera Mirada. My PHK girls: thank you for making this year an amazingly happy experience. Special thanks to Paula and Marta—my family. Thanks to the class and the amazing teachers who were part of this process. Amazing lectures full of knowledge and dinners full of love.

Gracias a toda la gente que no solo hizo posible esta investigación, sino que hizo de este proceso un cambio de vida. Gracias a todos y cada uno de mis entrevistados, disfruté cada segundo de nuestras conversaciones. Gracias Freddy por abrir las puertas de Bogotá para mi. Gracias a cada uno de los chicos del Redentor, que hace unos años me mostraron la verdadera cara de este país y llenaron mi alma de esperanza. Gracias a cada Colombiano que me regaló un pedacito desu corazón: me siento parte de cada parte del territorio.

Finally but not less important, thank you, Colfuturo, for making this dream come true.

(4)

The Thorns of Colombian Violence

1. Introduction

Medellín is located in the northwestern part of Colombia and is the second largest city in the country. Diana was born there, but she moved to Bogotá—the capital city—a few years ago with her only daughter. Her family house is located in las comunas, which are extremely poor illegal neighborhoods in Medellín. Las comunas are known for their constant violent confrontations between gangs and the absence of the rule of law. They are territories abandoned by the government in which law is established by criminal organizations. I met Diana in 2011 when I started working for a foundation that helps youngsters in reformatory centers and orphanages. In February 2013, she wrote me an e-mail saying:

“My mum lives in la comuna 13 in Medellín, and my husband and I were staying here for a few days. We were working when, suddenly, we heard tons of gunpowder exploding. I asked my mum, ‘what is it?’ and she answered, ‘Don’t worry, it is just the way in which they [the criminal groups or gangs] warn people to clear the streets for the coming shoot-out.’ All the neighbors were on their terraces to decide what to do; they wanted to confirm whether it was a shoot-out or not. My mum was completely calm, and I was terrified. In the end, it was a shoot-out in el Socorro, one of the neighborhoods. It is horrible in here.”

Later, she told me that the shooting lasted for hours; people from both gangs were killed. The shooting was reported in the newspaper, but nothing changed in la comuna 13. According to Diana, there were no police around, so most likely, there will never be an investigation.

The situation that Diana described is an everyday reality for a significant portion of the Colombian population. This is not just the case in Medellín; similar events happen in Bogotá, Cali, Barranquilla and many other cities around Colombia. In rural areas, the situation is not that different, aside from the fact that the actors there are the national army and armed groups. Even if most Colombians have the opportunity to live normal lives—to

(5)

go to work every day, attend school, enjoy free time, travel, etc.—violence1 has been a reality for at least the past 60 years. Political violence, drug trafficking and the rise of armed groups gave way to a new, violent age that has not yet ended. Violence is so deeply entrenched in people’s lives that it is reflected in most common, daily situations. I aimed to show in this research the evident role that violence plays in people’s identities and, more specifically, in the people’s national identity construction process. Because Colombians have to address violence every day throughout their entire lives, their personal experiences and their proximity to violent situations and environments in part comprise their national identity. Because violence has become normalized, the generations of Colombians who grew up in the country over the past 60 years react to violence as if it were an unchangeable reality. Violence became normal, making people resilient to their situation. This research will describe the manner in which Colombia’s violent history, the normalization of this violence, and some of its people’s resilience has marked the conception and sense of Colombia’s national identity.

Following from these aims, the main question driving the research is the following: In what ways do internal Colombian migrants in Bogotá address violence, conflict and post-conflict perceptions in the process by which they construct their national identity? The sub-questions are as follows:

i. How do regional identities separate or unify individuals around a national Colombian identity?

ii. How do official and popular discourses about national identity interact? iii. In what ways do people perceive and construct violence and conflict?

iv. How has the reaction to violence changed for the various actors over the last 60 years?

To propose possible answers to the main research question, it is first necessary to analyze regional identity feelings. Colombia has been conceived as a country of regions because of the specific and varying characteristics that compose each one of the regions. People identify with each other through these regional characteristics and the images that have been projected for each region. These images are relevant because of the strong

1_{When describing violence, I am making reference to the generalized wave of political violence,}

drug trafficking, human right’s violations and criminality that took control of Colombia 60 years ago and marked Colombians’ reality. This violence will be explained later in the coming chapters.

(6)

influence of violence in establishing regional identities. Most regions that have been home to armed groups are still recognized as dangerous places, even if the situation has since changed.

Colombian violence is expressed in many different ways, often because of its long history. Some of these ways include kidnapping, threats, family abuse (with abuse toward children and women being the most common), bomb explosions, land mines and generic crime, among others. The different forms of violence are applied with the intent to hurt a specific individual or group (e.g., a family, community or political party). Every time that one of these tactics is used, someone’s future becomes limited and someone is newly stigmatized—i.e., the victim status becomes applied to the target of the violence, which is accompanied by social consequences to be elaborated upon later in this paper. Felipe—a forty-year-old man whose father was killed by la guerrilla—said that we all have a “big destiny” that can be somewhat, but not radically, modified. In the case of violence aimed at a Colombian victim, this destiny is already written, and the chance of having normal opportunities disappears, driving the person to a constant and endless struggle.

Felipe has been carrying this conflict in his memory and trying to understand why his life was not the same as his friends; however, he never did anything to internalize his father’s assassination or to act out against the perpetrators. His main objective in life has been to get a well-paying job and to be able to establish a wealthy life. He is building a future, which he said:

“Is easiest for people like you [the author], who never had to live such a situation.” What we know as La Violencia started in 1946, and some intellectuals recognize its end in 1953 (Sixirei, 2011). In this paper, this ending date in 1953 will not be adopted because one of main arguments of this research is that La Violencia has not yet ended; instead, it has changed just as people and the country have, with its dynamic and manifestation merely having changed over the last 60 years. After Gaitán’s death, the social environment was extremely tense, even if during the mid-1950s, rural subversions became less common. This change is what made people believe that La Violencia was over, in addition to the fact that statistics showed a decrease in the number of political assassinations (Bushnell, 1994: 311). The Frente Nacional divided power between both parties successfully but families’ circumstances and individuals in the rural areas were still

(7)

not an issue for them. The campesinos2 felt the abandonment of their national and regional governments to the point that they considered an armed fight for territories, food and political participation as their only option. This is how the first formal guerrillas—the FARC (Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces) and the ELN (National Liberation Army)—were born. This is why I do not agree with Bushnell when he affirms that the biggest achievement of the Frente Nacional was to successfully put an end to La Violencia (1994: 311).

The research setting and population

There are all types of Colombians, each having different stories and different reactions to their past and present. This multiplicity of situations, feelings and circumstances together construct the feeling of the nation. Nations are constructed by their people’s national identity. The nationalistic feeling creates for the nation an “imagined political community” (Anderson, 2006: 6). In this case, I will try to understand and analyze the process by which Colombian national identity has been constructed.

In the case of Colombia, this identity construction process makes sense only if connected to the context of violence. People who have experienced violence have built their identities through these experiences. All the stories are different but, at the same time, are related to each other. The consequences of being involved in a violent situation and society’s reaction to it make the victims of different types of violence belong to a shared group. All such victims must address the same circumstances of abandonment and, sometimes, misery. The role that violence plays in Colombians’ process of national identity constructions is mostly unconscious. Normally, people do not recognize the active role violence plays in their lives. One of the consequences of long-term conflict is the normalization of violence and conflict (Koonings and Kruijt, 2002). Because people do not know a different reality, panoramic violence appears to be a normal circumstance. When people normalize violence, they typically find ways to adapt to it when dealing with its reality. One of the ways in which some Colombians address their surroundings is by being resilient (Rutter, 1985). The resilient attitude offers the path away from participating in the violent context and toward living a “normal life.”

2_{Campesino is the label given to a person who lives in a rural area of the country and whose life is}

(8)

The identity construction process includes certain elements that together make a whole and unique identity. Some of those elements are contained in the history of the territory, in diverse and changing individual identities and in the everyday dynamics of the people. These are known as national symbols. Examples of these are vallenato3, the sombrero vueltiao4, beer and joy (Vignolo, 2008: 104-105). Identity is dynamic, just as the elements that compose it. Some elements remain constant over an extended period; others disappear or lose importance, such as the condor, which appears in the national emblem. This emblem, for example, did not change, but condor lost its representative power among Colombians, becoming merely a symbol. In the specific case of Colombia, violence is included in this symbolic process; however, its role is highly relevant, in comparison with other elements.

Population

In this research, I aim to describe the national identity construction process through 1) the historical context of violence and 2) internal Colombian migrants’ lifes experiences. I analyze people’s anecdotes and life experiences to understand how they have built a national identity. The idea of national identity was constructed considering both official and emic discourses, integrated within the historical context of violence. Therefore, this reflects an amalgamation of the discourses of the people and the way in which they actually behave.

To accomplish this goal, a fragment of the Colombian population was contacted. The targeted population was people who were born in any region of Colombia apart from Bogotá but who now live in Bogotá as internal migrants5_{. These targeted individuals ranged}

in age from 35 and 75 years. Colombia is among the countries with the greatest number of daily internal migrants in the world (UNHCR, 2012: 13). The main cause of these human movements in Colombia is violence, but it is not the only cause. Lack of opportunities is another and, in Colombia’s case, ranks second on the list of causes.

3_{Vallenato is a kind of music original from the Atlantic coast of Colombia. Although it has a}

regional meaning, people tend to recognize it as a characteristic kind of Colombian music. Media also use it when trying to reference to the country as a whole.

4_The_{Sombrero vueltiao is a hat, also originating on the Atlantic coast, which was chosen as a}

national symbol.

5_{Internal migrants are those people moving from their hometowns to other cities and villages within}

(9)

Internal migrants had to leave one life to start a new one in a place that is—most of the time—unfamiliar to them. In the process, people have had to struggle with feelings related to regional identities and belongingness while simultaneously dealing with their traumatic situations. These people confront a new regional identity during their adaptation process, being forced to confront the dynamics of a new city. In some cases, individuals change with regard to their nationalistic feelings. The dynamism of their identities creates a new discourse of nationalism that likely differs in how national identity normally spreads. For people above the age of 35, this process likely is clearer and becomes more evident in everyday life than for younger individuals. Once internal migrants, they now are part of the Bogotá community and are conscious of this identification process.

Main Actors

This research had many participants, but some of them played a significant role in comparison to the rest. Next I will give a short description of them, which does not mean that the rest of the information was not used:

Felipe: 40 year-‐old man; social stratification 3; lives in Usaquén; decided to move from Chinchiná (Caldas) to find a better way of living for him and his family after the assassination of his father by the guerrilla; he wors for a public institution and studies Law.

Oscar: 63 year-‐old man; social stratification 3; lives in Usaquén; decided to move from Chaparral (Tolima) to study Veterinary; he works as a rural veterinary, treating patients all around the country.

Arturo: 55 year-‐old man; social stratification 3; lives in Chapinero; decided to move from Palmira (Valle del Cauca) to study Engineering; works as a consultant engineer in an independent little business.

Camila: 50 year-‐old woman; social stratification 4; lives in Usaquén; decided to move from Medellín (Antioquia) to study Anthropology; she works in an international found investing in childhood and environment.

Beatriz: 52 year-‐old woman; social stratification 2; lives in Usaquén; she moved from Supatá (Cundinamarca) when she was a child because his mother was living already in Bogotá, looking for better job opportunities; works in the National Prosecution.

(10)

Verónica: 57 year-‐old woman; social stratification 3; lives in Usaquén; decided to move from Ocaña (Valle del Cauca) to study Veterinary; she has a veterinary clinic in the north of Bogotá.

Julio: 64 year-‐old man; social stratification 4; lives in Usaquén; he moved from Subachoque (Cundinamarca) when he was a child because his whole family went to Bogotá looking for better opportunities; he was politically active until he was threatened by corrupt politicians; worked as a teacher his whole life. Lina: 55 year-‐old woman; social stratification 4; lives in Chapinero; decided to move from Barranquilla (Atlántico) to study engineering; he works in a government’s department.

Javier: 65 year-‐old man; social stratification 1; lives in Usme; decided to move from Armero (Tolima) looking for any job that, not being able to get one there; is a victim of government’s abandonment and exclusion; has a workshop in his home where he makes doors.

Laura: 67 year.old woman; social stratification 2; lives in Usme; decided to move from rural Usme (Cundinamarca) looking for a job; lives with a sister and lives from her pension.

Gaviria family

Marcela: 74 year-‐old woman; social stratification 4; lives in Chapinero; moved from Simacota (Santander) when she was 16 years old because her father was being persecuted by the Conservative party; she is the oldest of eight brothers and sisters; she didn’t study a professional carrier; she helps her husband with little family business.

Lucero: 72 year-‐old woman; social stratification 5; lives in Chapinero; moved from Simacota (Santander) when she was 14 years old with her family; she studied Law in Bogotá and made graduate studies in France; works today in human rights and children rights defense.

Eliana: 62 year-‐old woman; social stratification 6; lives in Chapinero; moved from Simacota (Santander) when she was 1 year old; studied Arts in Bogotá and a Master’s program in France; she worked her whole life in the Nacional University of Colombia as a teacher and as an administrative.

(11)

Flor: 67 year-‐old woman; social stratification 6; lives in Chapinero; moved from El Socorro (Santander) when she was 15 years old looking for a better future in Bogotá; she is Eliana, Lucero and Marcela’s cousin; she studied Odontology but she never practiced it.

Focus group

Diana: 44 year-‐old woman; social stratification 5; lives in the city center; moved from Medellín (Antioquia) when she was 40 years old because of a job opportunity; she has her own enterprise.

Lorenzo: 45 year-‐old man; social stratification 5; lives in the city center; moved from Cali (Valle del Cauca) when he was 20 years old looking for a job and study opportunities; he has his own enterprise.

Guillermo: 53 year-‐old man; social stratification 4; lives in the city center; moved from Medellín (Antioquia) when he was 18 years old to study Economy; works in an international found that invests in childhood and environment.

Open conversation

Martha: 40 year-‐old woman from Bogotá; worked in the administration of one of the most important male jails in the country: Bellavista Jail in Medellín. Afterwards she worked with the victims of the armed conflict in one of the government’s programs.

Setting

The chosen population was concentrated in specific areas of Bogotá. I choose three main areas in Bogotá that are recognized as localidades (locations): Usaquén in the north, Chapinero in the center-north and Usme in the south (figure 1). These places are composed of all six socio-economic classes (called estratos socio-económicos or socio-economic stratifications) 6 and are home to a major part of the country’s internal migrants. Usme is mostly home to families displaced by violence that have to start from nothing and have no place to live or resources to afford it, as is the case in the northern part of Usaquén.

6_{Colombia has been officially divided into socio-economical classes since colonial times. During}

the colonial period, the division was based mainly on race and provenance (españoles, criollos, mestizos, indios, negros and mulatos). These divisions changed over time, making social classes more economically based than racially based. However, because this change was gradual, the racial differences persisted for an extended period, informing some social and political dynamics.

(12)

Chapinero and the southern part of Usaquén include internal migrants who have the resources to afford new residences and do not have the need to ask for government subsidies. The locations are still mixed localities, which means that migrants have to interact with the natives of Bogotá regularly. This is important because the interaction between locals and migrants strongly influences the adaptation process, constructing a piece of people’s national identity.

Felipe describes Colombia as “a country of miserable people”—making direct reference to the upper classes—characterized by the extreme differences between individuals’ life conditions. This idea of extreme differences is actually a fact in Colombia, and it is eminently visible in the country’ capital. Next, I will show some pictures of the neighborhoods in which I did my fieldwork to exemplify such differences.

#1

#2

These first two pictures were taken in Usaquén, in two different neighborhoods. The upper picture (#1) was taken in the northern part of the locality and corresponds to social stratifications 1 and 2. It is possible to see the houses at the bottom constructed solely with tinplate and bricks.

The second picture (#2) shows the Autopista Norte, where the locality starts to change drastically and the neighborhoods are composed of social stratifications 3, 4 and 5. At the right, it is possible to visualize one of the biggest malls in the country and some recently constructed buildings.

The following two pictures (#3 and #4) were taken in Chapinero. The first one (#3) is a picture of one of the most crowded streets of Bogotá called “la 13.” Informal traders, all located in front of legal businesses’ doors, surround the street. This street is marked by the presence of thieves and the chaos surrounding the public

(13)

#3

#4

#5

Picture #4 was taken in Rosales, one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in the capital city. It is part of Chapinero as well, but public transportation does not reach this place. Locals typically get there by car or taxi, and their servants (coming from the poorest neighborhoods) get there by walking.

The final pictures (#5 and #6) were taken in Usme. Even if the differences between its neighborhoods are evident, the whole locality is radically different from the rest of the city. Picture #5 shows a street from one of the neighborhoods in which the roads are paved. There are no buildings and the houses’ structures are very basic.

(14)

#6

The final photograph (#6) shows one of the poorest neighborhoods in the city. In this kind of neighborhood, streets are unpaved, and most residences are constructed with the most basic materials. People do not have access to all public services; the services they do have were illegally installed before the government decided to legalize the neighborhoods.

(15)

Figure 1 Map of Colombia. Instituto Agustín Codazzi, 2013.

500 km

(16)

Figure 2 Map of Bogotá and the study area. Map from La Silla Vacía, 2012 The area delimited by the polygon is the fieldwork area. Usaquén Chapinero Usme A ut op ist a N or te A ve nid a C ar ac as Ca rr ete ra U sm e

(17)

Relevance

This research is academically relevant because, in the past decade, most of the academic work related to violence in the case of Colombia has mainly been constructed from the point of view of marginalized groups of people. Other studies are mostly about a single marginalized group. One of the main objectives of this research is to consider the points of view of different social groups from different socio-economic stratifications in Bogotá. This makes the perspective less focused on marginalized individuals and closer to the country’s social dynamic—reflecting the fact that Colombians are constantly migrating and coming into contact with different social groups.

These people’s opinions are mediated by a cultural component. Their regional identities and socio-economic positions influence the ways in which they see and understand their environment. This research attempts to consider the diversity of these points of view, marking the first step in the process of understanding Colombia as a whole and not as a group of individuals whose stories are unrelated to each other.

At the same time, this research turns out to be important because of its anthropological relevance. This research exhibits a clear reliance on what Geertz (1984) calls “experience-near” concepts: the actor’s experience becomes crucial to understand certain aspects and behaviors, but in an active way. “Natives,” following Geertz (1984), talk about and explain their lives in a natural way and maintain a distance from the conceptual academic world: who knows the experience of being Colombian better than Colombian civilians? In this case, the actors are not defined by their spatial locations but by means of the fragment of the population that they belong to; actors are personalized, acting and being recognized as individuals, thereby becoming an ideal type (Weber; 1922).

Developing this type of research can help people reconsider their roles in society. They are sometimes interested in topics that directly affect them, but they see them as impossible to reach. People feel that their government is the only one that has to and can actually react to those issues. As regular citizens, they believe that they have no tools and no authority to solve or even discuss the country’s most important issues. If some people consider the possibility of speaking out loud, they can start a critical analysis of their daily experiences, instead of simply accepting their reality.

(18)

Methodology

The fieldwork devoted to this study lasted three months. Initially, I made contact with individuals who live in the neighborhoods of the above-named localities. These were my “gatekeepers” and were not included in the population being studied. In terms of access, Usme was the most challenging locality in which to work because of several security issues—the situation there is known to deteriorate to the point that locals are unable to walk the streets safely during the day. This situation is as critical for the locals as it is for visitors, although the locals know how to address it. In addition, having the physical appearance of a visitor worsens the risk. Individuals informed me that it is obvious if someone comes from the northern part of the city, and it makes that person an immediate target for robbery—in the first instance. For this reason, I was always accompanied by Freddy Páez—one of my gatekeepers and an Usme local—when going into the field.

The case of Usaquén was different in the sense that I was able to visit it by myself because I was born there. However, I had to be accompanied by my gatekeeper to one of the interviews because, at the time, a significant security issue had arisen: two criminal groups had control over the area, and there were constant armed confrontations. The fact of being accompanied by a local does not completely eliminate the risk of becoming involved in a violent situation. However, going alone to these neighborhoods definitely increases some of the risks. In Chapinero, I went to the wealthiest neighborhoods, where the risk is not that high. This area of the city is very busy, and it is safe in comparison with the rest of the city. Nevertheless, it is still part of Bogotá, so it is never fully secure.

Methodologically, I was able to form a focus group and conduct twenty-one semi-structured interviews, as well as one extra interview with a violence expert; these contacts always included both direct contact with and observation of the participant. The initial idea was to form more than one focus group; however, participants were unable and unwilling to give their time to other people. The focus group had as its main objective the construction of a collective perspective on violence and national identity in Colombia. At the same time, I wanted to look for group definitions of violence and colombianidad (Colombianity). The contextual interview was a semi-structured interview with Maria, a person who worked directly with victims and victimizers in the current conflict. The semi-structured interviews were intended to be life histories; consequently, I decided to conduct semi-structured interviews and family histories.

(19)

The analysis stage had as its starting point the categorization of the entire database of information, followed by discourse analysis and a comparison between the theoretical framework and the collected data. This analysis constantly intersected with the concepts that had driven the research process since its inception: violence, La Violencia, conflict, post-conflict and national identity. Definitions of these were built from the individual’s point of view and were analyzed with respect to the historical context of the country.

The analysis of the collected data was performed mostly as a comparative and categorizing process. The information obtained was organized in different categories: personal experiences, colombianidad (as a group and as an individual), violence and reactions. Through the categorization process, it was possible to consolidate the information gathered in each interview. Having done this, the obtained data were compared with the information previously taken from the media and from academic theories. During this comparison phase, it was important to raise the historical data to the same level of importance as the collected information.

2. Historical Context

To understand the current Colombian conflict clearly, it is first necessary to understand the steps individuals had to take to reach their extant situations. Next, I attempt to construct the history of violence in Colombia. I will tell a version7 of the armed groups’ history, describing the Colombian government’s actions and civilians’ situations during the same periods. Following this contextualization, I will describe how civilians address violence and history in contemporary quotidian life by including their perceptions and some personal experiences.

History of La Violencia

The history of violence in Colombia is not an easy story to tell; it has multiple versions coming from many different sources. As with others’ histories of violence and conflict, this one depends on people’s perceptions and close experiences, which is why the versions can

7_{By “telling a version of history,” I mean to establish a narrative constructed from the information}

gathered from my informants; personally, I consider it to better reflect reality. The history of Colombia, like those of other countries, is marked by official versions and modified ones. These modified ones exist because someone considers the official version to be unreflective of reality or because the people involved in the history consider it inconvenient to expose the truth themselves.

(20)

differ considerably from one another. The version exposed herein is a mixed version, generated from both official (i.e., public) and popular accounts. It is also important to point out that this version includes strongly personal content because I have been constructing and trying to make sense of Colombian history during the last decade. The current analysis considers the era of violence known as la Violencia, which is normally cited as occurring between 1948 and 1958. For the purposes of this work, I place la Violencia between 1948 and the present because—for me—this stage of history never really ended; it merely changed across time. Therefore, it is necessary to revisit almost a century of history to completely understand the facts.

Since 1810, when Colombia declared itself free from the Spanish Empire, the conflicts between political figures, military leaders and the civilian population became an issue. However, in the mid-1800s, the political and civil crisis exploded. The country was radically divided into two parties: the Liberals and the Conservatives. The Lparty was composed of the poorest elements of the country, a fraction of the middle class and a few individuals from the upper class; the Conservative party was composed of the richest class and a smaller number of individuals from the lower classes. The choice of being part of one or the other depended on family traditions, social pressure and, of course, life histories. A murder or attack on a family member could prompt someone to change from one party to the other. This also could lead someone to stay in one party officially but support the other one surreptitiously. The oligarchy was definitely Conservative; the lower class and families in rural areas were mostly Liberals; and the middle class was split between both parties. Allegiance to a party had to do mostly with family tradition: a person’s political ideology was determined by his family’s inclination.

During the second half of the19th century, the differences between the parties drove the country into a civil war known as la Guerra de los Mil Días (The Thousand Days’ War), which ended during the second decade of the 20th century. Although the end of the war was declared, the conflict remained latent. In urban centers, the situation was neutralized, but in the rural areas, members of both parties continued killing, torturing and excluding each other. From 1944 to 1953, the national situation worsened: violence between parties was complemented by class violence that killed at least 194,000 people from all around the country in a trend that awakened the syndical representatives (Sixirei, 2011).

(21)

During this same decade, a new hope for the lowest classes was born under the figure of a caudillo8: Jorge Eliecer Gaitán established himself as the main figure of the Liberal party and gained the support of thousands of Colombians. Because they had all tired of being socially and politically excluded, the people extended their support to him as never before, and they also responded to his political aptitude (Bushnell, 1994: 278). However, after three years of hard work and upcoming democratic elections, Gaitán was assassinated by Conservatives during a public appearance in Bogotá on April 9, 1948, the day that the country devolved into complete chaos. After the shooting, furious Liberals or gaitanistas9 took control of the city. The supposed shooter was killed by the masses, and the city center was set ablaze; this day became known as the Bogotazo. At the same time, the Liberals in other cities and rural areas immersed the country in violence and bloodshed. This general reaction explains why Colombians sometimes prefer to reference the day as el 9 de Abril, thereby reflecting the events that took place across the country in general rather than merely Bogotá proper (Bushnell, 1994: 278). This continued during the days immediately following the crime until life suddenly returned to normal. However, normality came to the cities before it came to the rural areas, where violent manifestations continued for a longer time. Even today, it still has not been possible to identify the person directly responsible for that crime.

Living conditions for Colombian campesinos became critical as they had to face extreme poverty and abandonment by the government. The FARC and the ELN were born as left-wing armies inspired by communist ideology; they were composed of these campesinos from all around the country. During the Frente Nacional10, the economic pacts established between Colombia and other countries, such as the United States of America, increased the importation of basic necessities—especially food (Bushnell, 1994: 316-328).

8_{The word “caudillo” makes reference to a popular leader. It normally occurs in the context of}

Latin American revolutions.

9_“_{Gaitanistas” is the name given to Gaitan’s followers, just as his ideology was known as}

gaitanismo. Gaitan’s principal argument was that Colombia was divided into what he called the political and the national country. The political country was composed of the oligarchy, which concentrated all of the country’s wealth, and the national country was composed of the Colombian masses, who lived day-to-day in crisis. His arguments referenced equal treatment, opportunities and political participation.

10_{The Frente Nacional was a Conservative and Liberal coalition that fairly divided periods of}

governance. The coalition consisted of four-year periods of governance of one party, followed by the same duration of governance by the other. This coalition persisted for sixteen years.

(22)

These necessities were produced in Colombian fields and were the primary and only sources of survival for the campesinos and their families. The import deals benefitted the wealthiest segment of the Colombian population and placed the rest of the country in a more critical situation. The campesinos had no access to education, which meant that they would not easily be able to transition from their main industry to a new one.

The revolutionary groups fought for access to fair living conditions. The first active participants were men whose families were starving and dying, having been excluded and abandoned by the national government. Both the ELN and the FARC were officially founded in 1964. The FARC was born of Liberal leaders who took arms against the Conservative government and recruited peasant farmers around the country, especially in the South-East (los Llanos and Tolima). They were divided into limpios (clean Liberals) and guerrilleros. Manuel Marulanda Vélez (alias Tirofijo) was its first and principal leader and ran the organization together with Raúl Reyes, Alfonso Cano and Jorge Briceño Suárez (alias Mono Jojoy) (Guzma Campos, et al, 2005: 66, 303).

From the moment in which these groups were born until the present day, their ideology has been mostly limited to discourse: they claimed their army to be communist and willing to liberate the country, but their violent acts have largely affected the Colombian civil population. They have kidnapped and murdered civilians, members of the national police, soldiers, congress members and government officers in general. They have entered the drug trafficking business, have violated human rights, and have threatened and tortured their victims. The FARC and the national government have attempted negotiations on multiple occasions; however, none of these has been effective. The FARC has taken advantage of the open space that the government has left for negotiating peace while, at the same time, some members of the government have not actually been willing to give benefits to the armed group.

The ELN’s story begins with the ideology of the Cuban Revolution and its leaders. The ideology of Ernesto “Ché” Guevara and Fidel Castro made some young opposition Colombian leaders go to Cuba to complement their studies. After this experience, some of them returned to Colombia and established alliances with the Colombian Communist Party, after which they were expelled when recognized as “left-wing extremists” (Medina Gallego, 2010). Fabio Vásquez Castaño and Victor Medina Morón were the main leaders. Pedro

(23)

Gordillo and Fabio’s two brothers, Marco and Antonio, supported them from the organization’s inception. The event that marked their recognition as an armed group was the occupation of Simacota, a village in the department of Santander. During this occupation, they proclaimed their principles, robbed a bank and killed all the members of the police force.

Three of the people I interviewed were originally from Simacota. Marcela, Lucero and Eliana were born there and had to leave because of the wave of violence that the village faced during the 1960s. Flor, their cousin, was born in el Socorro (a village located 45 minutes east of Simacota), but she vividly remembers the day on which the ELN occupied Simacota. They were all together in the family house, and they started to hear shots and people screaming. She said that they were very scared, even if they were not in the main square where the aggressors were gathered. The ELN killed all members of the police force and, afterward, fought against the national armed forces, who arrived to liberate the village about two hours after the occupation.

Left-wing armed groups like the ELN took up arms to mobilize their families and fight against the national army. They were fighting for the government’s attention and to gain political participation. At that time, the national army already was characterized by the abuse of power, illegal murders11_{, and the violation of human rights. This was in stark}

contrast to their main role, which had always been to defend national lands, civil society and public figures. During the next decade, the country saw the expansion and strengthening of the already formed guerrillas and the intensification of confrontations between these groups and the national army.

At the same time, some members of the Colombian rural high class, among them landowners and some drug traffickers who had been victims of left-wing guerrilla attacks, decided to hire members of the national army illegally to protect them and their properties from the left-wing groups. This became common approximately 1950 and, during the mid-1960s, was completely normal (Wide Angle, 2008), albeit undercover. These protection armies were recognized as paramilitary forces. The first organized paramilitary groups were the ACCU (Peasant Self-Defense Groups of Córdoba and Urubá) and the MAS (Death to

11_{I call them “illegal” murders because were against civilians. The assassination of armed groups’}

(24)

Kidnappers). Fidel Castaño and Carlos Castaño, who wanted to avenge their father’s murder by guerrillas, were the first leaders. This group had as its main role the defense of the drug business (in certain parts of the country) and other illegal businesses. Some politicians and army members created other paramilitary groups to defend civil society from the guerrilleros. They were looking to encourage the Colombian population to take arms against these revolutionary groups (Huhle: 65-67)

The paramilitary groups continued to grow in number and expanded around the country. They have continued to be embroiled in scandals, the biggest involving their close relationships with active Colombian politicians (InSight Crime, N.d.; Semana, 2012). Álvaro Uribe Vélez, Colombia’s most recent ex-president is the protagonist of one of the biggest current scandals; he and his family have been accused of links with specific paramilitary groups, mostly from Antioquia—where he originally comes from. According to the accusations, he and other politicians who worked during his presidential period had their campaigns sponsored by these illegal groups. Likewise, he has been accused of authorizing illegal contracts inside the government and of spreading the available positions between his friends and relatives, some of them likewise involved with the paramilitary forces.

Going further back in time to 1974, after Misael Pastarna Borrero was declared president, many supporters of the opposition accused him of electoral fraud when he ran against Gustavo Rojas Pinilla. Some of his supporters were certain that those elections were not the actual result of a fair democratic exercise (Bushnell, 1994: 315-316). This is why Jaime Bateman (a former FARC militant) and Carlos Toledo (the socialist representative of the ANAPO12 movement) created M-19 (the 19th of April Movement), claiming political justice and promoting communism (Guzmán Campos, 2005: 305). This revolutionary group was, at first, recognized by its symbolic acts, such as stealing Simón Bolivar’s sword from a museum and constructing an 80-meter tunnel to steal arms from a national army garrison. However, not every act was symbolic. Bateman first agreed to negotiate with the Colombian government after being held responsible for kidnappings and assassinations.

12_{The ANAPO is the Nacional Popular Alliance, which was funded by Rojas Pinilla after being in}

(25)

The meeting was supposed to take place in Panamá but was cancelled after Bateman’s death in an airplane accident.

Image 1 The Palace of Justice occupation

In 1985, M-19 occupied the Palace of Justice in the city of Bogotá, taking hostages and demanding the president’s immediate presence (Image 1). What happened during that day is still mysterious in many ways. The government’s version says that M-19 started the shootings and that it was the army’s duty to stop them and defend the civilians in the crossfire. Ex-militants of M-19 say that the national army shot first. The fact is that the occupation was long enough to take at least 53 innocent lives, with both the national army and the rebels being responsible (El Espectador, 2013b). The victims were both the army’s and the rebels’. However, the disappearance of an undetermined number of civilians was and still is the main curiosity. Apparently, the national army took prisoners, torturing and murdering them in the search for information about those responsible for the criminal act. Some of those people never returned to their families.

(26)

M-19 had a short life. In March 1990, they gave up their arms and demobilized their troops. Afterwards they founded a political party known as the Democratic Alliance M-19. Currently, some of the ex-militants of the revolutionary group are politically active, being part of the Democratic Alternative Pole party. One of them is the now Bogotá’s mayor, Gustavo Petro.

These groups all violently displace people from their lands, making them go to larger villages and cities. I will expand on this topic; meanwhile, it is important to keep this displacement process in mind. The active presence of these groups in Colombia makes people live under constant threat. Displacement, mines and occupations became the everyday routine for some individuals in places like Cauca, Chocó and Santander, for example. These violent acts changed people’s everyday reality. The areas that some of these groups occupied became systematically violent. Assassinations are common, both for locals and for the rest of the country. A few of my informants made reference to places such as Putumayo as areas in the country where it is not safe to go or where armed groups have control over public order.

Armed groups’ original ideologies are still present but, as I said before, mostly at a discursive level. During one of the firsts public speeches that the FARC gave in Havana, Cuba—where a peace negotiation is taking place right now— the FARC demonstrated such discourse. Tanja Nijmeijer, one of the spokespersons of the FARC at the peace tables, said: "We, the guerrilleros, are very hopeful about this peace process that is taking place here in the city of Havana. We are telling you that peace for us is peace with bread, peace with a roof, peace with education, peace with land, and finally, peace with social justice. And we are willing to do everything possible to achieve it13." (Tanja Nijmeijer, November 8th, 2012, La Habana, Cuba)

However, on December 12, 2012, Colombian media officially communicated that the FARC, after having promised a cease-fire, attacked the departments of Cúcuta and Antioquia, killing members of the national army and occupying villages. The cease-fire was supposed to be valid between November 20th and January 20th, but it was not honored.

13_“_{Nosotros los guerrilleros estamos muy esperanzados con este proceso de paz que se va a dar}

aquí en la ciudad de la Habana. Decirles que la paz para nosotros es paz con pan, paz con techo, paz con educación, paz con tierra, en fin, paz con justicia social. Y nosotros estamos dispuestos a hacer hasta lo imposible para lograrlo”

(27)

Today, the FARC continues to occupy rural areas, killing soldiers and civilians and burying landmines, and there is also the suspicion that they persist in kidnapping people (El Espectador, 2012c).

The ELN, at the same time, is trying to join the peace process. Since the beginning of the current year, ELN leaders have communicated their desire to participate in the peace construction process. However, they kidnapped two German citizens, assuring that their liberation will not be an option (El Espectador, 2013a). The government said already that the ELN could enter the peace process in May of the present year, but nothing further has been said about it.

The AUC’s situation is a more complicated one. Its connections with Colombian politicians make every attempted dialogue a futureless, corrupt process. Uribe Velez created the Peace and Justice Law (Congreso de la República, 2005: 1) during his government, which offered the armed groups the opportunity to demobilize their troops, give up arms and collaborate with government intelligence to clarify crimes and responsibilities. The AUC has been the most participative group in this regard. The fact here is that, if they do what the law says, their members’ sentences will be greatly reduced (in some cases, with no sentences at all), and their members will be reintroduced into civil society through social projects. Most of them take advantage of the Peace and Justice Law but continue with different criminal lives. One of the people I talked with is Martha. She was the sub-director of Bellavista, one of the most important jails for male inmates in the country, located in Medellín. One year, she was in constant contact with guerrillas, AUC members, and the so-called sociales14. She told me about the jail’s organization and functioning and emphasized the relationships between the armed groups and the jail’s employees. Prisoners had luxuries such as cellphones and TV; the armed groups and the ruling hierarchy controlled the internal dynamics of the jail.

Because Law 195 of 2005 reduces the sentences of demobilized individuals, and the priority of this law has always been AUC members, the transfer of membership from one group to another became increasingly common. Martha told me that the jail was completely under AUC members’ control when she was working there. During this period, many

14_{Sociales is the name that criminals not related with the armed groups get in jail. They include all}

(28)

guerrilla members switch to AUC affiliations to get benefits and feel better about their ongoing situation15. She said that, at some point, the hierarchy started to change inside of the institution, and one of the interns warned her:

“Señora Martha, this is going to get nasty really soon. We don’t want you to get dirty with what is going to happen, because we really like you. So if you want to avoid problems, it is better that you get out of here as soon as you can.”

Martha listened to him and presented her resignation letter to the Defense Ministry two months before her contract was officially over. One month after she left the position, the assassinations started. What she said is that this Law is just causing the armed groups to change focus but not really solving the violence and corruption situation. They still commit crimes and break the law; they do not know another way of living anymore, and this law is not really showing them a different path.

Experiencing violence

After being immersed in a violent national environment during almost 60 years, at least four generations can say that they do not know what it is like to live in peace or how it really would look (Lucero, interview # 16). Since the beginning of the 20th century, people have experienced violence and internal conflict and have learned how to live with it. Considering this history, it would be easy to assume that every Colombian recognizes that the country is still facing long-term conflict or even a civil war. In practice, this is not true; a sizable fraction of the Colombian population say that we are not facing a war and that what we are seeing is actually the end of the conflict and violence. Some politicians, such as Uribe Vélez, actually talk about post-conflict, explaining the violence away by saying that it is a consequence of a finished conflict. Many people who I talked with during fieldwork—people who were not necessarily included in my study population —say that the violence is not generalized or evident anymore, as it was before. However, a minority says that we are currently facing a war and that the conflict is a fact and its end lies in the distant future.

15_{Most of the guerrilla members had no visits at all in the jail, because the group used to abandon}

them when they got caught. That is why they killed themselves and became depressed more often than others.

(29)

The differences between these perceptions of the current circumstances are evidently a matter of personal experience. The case of Oscar exemplifies a person whose life was directly affected by la guerrilla. According to him, the best Colombian government was the one of Uribe Vélez. He said that, thanks to him, guerrillas were “exterminated” in different parts of the country. Uribe Vélez’s policies were mainly centered on the Democratic Defense and Security policy16. The main objectives of this policy would be achieved by following the president’s ideology: a firm hand with the violent. Oscar thinks that the conflict was close to being over when Uribe Velez presided. For him, the country is not at all facing a civil war right now.

Arturo’s point of view completely opposes Oscar’s. For him, violence is an element closely attached to Colombian identity. He talked about a conflict that is, in his words, “a brutality.” He told me about a competition in 2006 to choose a national song. He voted for “Violencia” (violence), a song by a Colombian composer that describes the pain and tragedy that violence brings to people’s lives. He tried to explain in greater depth the senselessness of the conflict, but he became emotional and was forced to stop on account of his tears. He is not even a desplazado or a victim of tragedy, but the conflict is a daily concern for him: it hurts him as it were his own suffering.

At the same time, Lucero said:

“Of course there has been war [in Colombia], this is a sui generis war. I mean, war has had a developmental and transformative effect as well. We can’t think about applying the traditional definitions of war to this current process. Why is it a war? Because it is an armed confrontation between parts that do not recognize each other…it is a war.”

The perception of Colombia’s current situation depends of people’s life histories because it includes sensitive content. The perception in rural areas is one of a people who, almost every day, have to deal directly with violence, paying armed groups to keep their

16_{The Democratic Defense and Security Policy is described by Uribe Velez’ government as being}

“proposed to recover territorial control by the state, protect the population, eliminate illegal drug business maintain a deterrent capability, act with efficiency, transparency and accountability for the management of the Impact of Democratic Security Policy. Six lines of action are identified: (i) coordinate state action, (ii) strengthening state institutions, (iii) consolidate control of the country, (iv) protect the population and infrastructure of the Nation, (v) cooperate for everyone’s safety and (vi) communicate the policies and actions of the state. (OPPDH, et al, 2008: 9-10)

(30)

lands and lives and living with the consequences of political corruption (e.g., not receiving public subsidies, having to pay enormous taxes without seeing the benefits). In urban areas, the perception is most likely diverse among people because contact with violence differs greatly. Urban citizens have contact with generalized crime, which is more a matter of luck, as some people told me. Avoiding or escaping from a robbery is just a matter of luck for some people. This is mostly why giving a name to the Colombian situation is so controversial; taking into account the socio-economic stratifications make such perceptions even more diverse. A person who has commodities and access to a wealthy life does not have to face the city in the same way that a low-income person must. The former has a private mode of transportation and can avoid public buses and walking, which reduces the risk of being a victim of robbery. The latter takes buses or walks to their daily destinations. Distances are normally long, and these people’s neighborhoods often are places with high crime rates.

3. Being Colombian

Constructing the Colombian nationality is a complex process. One of the objectives of this research is to identify the elements proposed by various individuals to comprise national identity and to analyze the different versions of identity that are proposed. What I am going to discuss in this chapter is in the predominant place held by national symbols and the way that people use them as a manner of self-identification within the nation. Likewise, I discuss the existence and relationship between the emic and the official discourses about national identity. This information will be complemented by an analysis of the role played by regional identity in the national identity construction process.

However, I would first like to introduce the concept of “nation” that I will consider in this research. National identity in Colombia becomes complex in the face of the diversity of human groups and socio-economic differences that describe the country—a diversity that reflects the idea of nation. The Colombian Constitution emphasizes the country’s human and cultural diversity, calling Colombia a “multiethnic and multicultural country” (Congreso de la República, 1991, Article 70). This means that one of the main characteristics of the Colombian nation is it cultural diversity. To better understand this, I

The thorns of Colombian violence : 60 years of constructing national identity