Lasting peace for Colombia requires social and economic justice

by Lisa Taylor, Colombia International Team

Chanting “The people united will never be divided!”, thousands of Colombians in major cities throughout the country mobilized for peace today, April 9. Declared a civic holiday and the National Day of Memory and Solidarity with Victims, the date commemorates the April 9, 1948 assassination of populist politician Jorge Eliécer Gaitán and the ensuing ten years of brutal political violence known as La Violencia that began the modern armed conflict. Taking to the streets, participants in the March for Peace demonstrated their support for the ongoing peace talks between the Colombian government and the largest guerrilla insurgency, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), while also seeking to vocalize victims’ demands for truth, justice, and reparations.

Since the official peace talks began in October 2012, the Colombian government and the FARC have met with unprecedented success, reaching partial accords on land reform, drug policy, and political participation.  Although the accords will not be finalized until agreements on the remaining points of victims’ reparations and implementation mechanisms have been reached, both sides have begun to take concrete steps toward peace and have received support from the international community. The U.S. government recently appointed Bernard Aronson as Special Envoy to the peace process, and last week Pope Francis announced a 2016 visit to Colombia. Peace is trending in Colombia, with hashtags of #MeMuevoporlaPaz (#IMoveforPeace) flooding Twitter and peace-themed graffiti filling public spaces.

Stopping during the march, one women’s activist said she supports the peace process “because women don’t want to birth more children for the war, because we believe it is necessary for our communities to be in peace, that our communities have the opportunity to work, to have opportunities necessary for our children’s futures.” Victims further demand an end to militarization, investigation into state crimes, reparations for victims, an end to impunity (currently above 90 percent for most crimes), and the right to know the truth about who ordered and carried out human rights violations. This last demand for a comprehensive truth commission would shed light on state, paramilitary, and multinational actors who together account for far more human rights violations than guerrilla groups.

Another issue not on the table in Havana is Colombia’s neoliberal economic model – a model adopted during the wave of Structural Adjustment Policies imposed on Latin American countries by the U.S. government, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) as a condition for debt relief – that has been enthusiastically defended by a series of Colombian presidents. Yet Colombian social movements are making connections between economic development policies, deepening inequality and insecurity, increasing labor rights violations, criminalization of citizen expression and political opposition, and mass displacement. In a statement declaring 2015 as the year for peace and social justice, over 60 Colombian organizations affirm that the current peace “negotiations are developing in the context of a worsening world crisis marked by the accumulation of capital that generates inequality, marginalization, and an increased rate of violence.”

To date, more than seven million victims have been registered with the Colombian government’s National Victims’ Unit. This includes more than five million internally displaced people (IDPs), a statistic that puts Colombia second only to Syria in number of IDPs and corresponds to roughly 12 percent of the entire Colombian population according to the NGO CODHES. Strikingly, CODHES also finds that mass displacements increased 83% in 2012, the year in which the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement (FTA) entered into effect and the year after the Colombia-founded Pacific Alliance regional Free Trade bloc and the Colombia-Canada FTA were approved. 

In such a grim context and with much national and international media narrowly focusing on the advancements of the talks in Havana, Colombian civil society seeks to develop a more profound analysis about peacebuilding.  What social, cultural, and economic guarantees must be in place for victims?  How can the March for Peace instigate deeper conversation about the role of multinational corporations and neoliberal economic policies? How can the international community, especially the U.S., support peace while also analyzing the impacts of foreign trade policies such as the FTA?

At the very least, all forms of violence including economic violence must be addressed for Colombia to build a real, lasting peace with social justice. As Marino Gruesso from the Popular Ethnic Movement of the Pacific declares, “We’re asking for social equality and political equality, because if we do not have that, there is no peace.”

“Enséñame a organizar”: Enfrentando las políticas neoliberales a nivel nacional e internacional

Por Celeste Larkin, Chicago Religious Leadership Network

Llevo tres años viviendo en Chicago y, en este tiempo, la ciudad ha vivido muchos cambios en su economía municipal. El gobierno local, a cargo del alcalde Rahm Emanuel, ha cerrado docenas de clínicas que prestaban servicios de salud mental a personas de bajos recursos necesitados de estos servicios; ha cerrado 54 colegios públicos, en donde un 90% de los estudiantes afectados son afrodescendientes, que se encuentran en barrios donde se ha visto un aumento de escuelas charter, las cuales son de gestión privada y la mayoría no cuentan con sindicatos; y ha consignado cerca de 55 millones de dólares para un estadio de baloncesto privado en el campus de la DePaul University (una universidad privada) como “parte de la visión más grande de Emanuel” para establecer un distrito de entretenimiento, que incluirá un nuevo hotel con 1.200 habitaciones en el centro de convenciones.

Estos son algunos de los eventos actuales que demuestran un cambio en la política pública hacia la austeridad a través de recortes en proyectos públicos y garantías de seguridad social. Nuestro gobierno municipal busca depender más de financiamiento privado favoreciendo las prioridades de la clase económica élite, afirmando que esta estrategia “levantará todos los barcos”, asegurará que la economía crezca y promoverá las formas de desarrollo que los especuladores económicos quieren ver. Pero los demás no lo creemos.

Las manifestaciones contra el cierre de los colegios desencadenaron la ira y las movilizaciones nacionales, y miles de personas tomaron las calles de Chicago en protesta. Activistas y líderes sindicales continúan trabajando contra las medidas de austeridad propuestas para los colegios públicos y las pensiones de los trabajadores. Los ciudadanos de Chicago montaron campamentos de 24 horas frente a las clínicas de salud mental que se esperaba cerrarían y permanecieron allí por meses hasta que los funcionarios municipales finalizaron los planes que iban a afectar a nuestros amigos y vecinos necesitados de estos servicios vitales. Después de bastantes protestas públicas la ciudad y la Universidad DePaul decidieron suspender el plan de invertir millones de dólares de fondos públicos en el estadio privado, aunque estos fondos se redistribuyeron a proyectos de construcción de hoteles de lujo en la misma zona.

Todos los días, voy a trabajar con la experiencia local del neoliberalismo, un término económico que describe las políticas económicas que promueven la desregulación, la privatización, el comercio libre y menos gastos públicos. Paso mi jornada laboral con la Red de Liderazgo Religioso de Chicago (Chicago Religious Leadership Network on Latin America, o CRLN) en solidaridad con las comunidades a lo largo de todo el hemisferio que enfrentan el mismo paradigma: Haya personas luchando contra tomas de territorio para fincas de cultivo de palma africana, para el derecho al agua potable frente a las concesiones mineras, o luchando para una buena educación pública para todos los niños, las comunidades se niegan a someterse a estas olas de privatización y siguen movilizándose, a veces en gran escala.

Hace poco asistí a la Conferencia Labor Notes de 2014 y escuché a trabajadores de todas partes del mundo mientras hablaban de su lucha para la dignidad y esfuerzos para construir movimientos. Uno de los talleres trató sobre estrategias creativas para aumentar y apoyar nuestro trabajo organizativo; el presentador, Ricardo Levins Morales, quien fuera un artista de la ciudad de Minneapolis, Minnesota; nos compartió una cita que él reinventó para hacerla menos condescendiente y más empoderadora. Esta idea de recuperar el dicho define el trabajo que va delante de nosotros: para redefinir nuestro concepto de lo posible, tenemos que rechazar las ideas jerárquicas de “libertad” y empezar a organizar de forma radical y crear nuestras propias soluciones:

"Si me das un pescado, me has alimentado por un día. Si me enseñas a pescar, entonces me has alimentado hasta que el río se contamine o se toma las orillas para proyectos de desarrollo. Pero si me enseñas a organizar, con cualquier reto puedo unirme con mis compañeros y nos creamos nuestra propia solución". – Ricardo Levins Morales

“Teach me to organize:” confronting neoliberal economics at home and abroad

Celeste Larkin, Chicago Religious Leadership Network

I’ve lived in Chicago for the past three years and, in that time, we’ve seen many changes to our local economy. The city, led by Mayor Rahm Emanuel has closed dozens of mental health clinics that served low-income people in need of services; closed 54 public schools, where 90% of students affected were black and in neighborhoods that happen to be seeing a spike in privately managed, mostly non-union charter schools; and promised about $55 million toward a private basketball arena on DePaul’s campus (a private university), as “part of Emanuel's bigger vision to establish an entertainment district, including a new, 1,200-room hotel at the convention center.”

These are just some of the current events that demonstrate a shift in public policy toward austerity cuts to public projects and social safety nets. Our local government seeks to further rely on private funds and the priorities of the economic elite, claiming this will “lift all boats,” grow the economy, and spur the kind of development the profiteers want to see. But the rest of us aren't buying it.

Protests against the school closings sparked rage and mobilizations nation-wide with thousands taking to the streets of Chicago in protest. Activists and union leaders are still working against the austerity measures being proposed for public schools and workers’ pensions. Chicagoans set up 24-hour camps outside of mental health clinics slated for closure and stayed there for months until city officials finalized their austerity plans for our friends and neighbors in need of these vital services. After much public outcry and protest, the city and DePaul decided to scratch the plan to pour millions of public dollars into the private sports stadium, though the money was redirected to the construction of high-end hotels in that area.

So I go into work every day with the background of local experience of neoliberalism, a term used to describe economic policies that promote deregulation, privatization, free trade and reduced government spending. I then spend my hours working at the Chicago Religious Leadership Network on Latin America (CRLN) in solidarity with communities across the hemisphere struggling at the hands of the same paradigm. But whether folks are struggling against land grabs for African Palm plantations, for the right to clean water in the face of mining concessions, or for decent public education for all children, communities are refusing to take these trends of privatization sitting down and are mobilizing on sometimes massive scales.

Recently, I was at the 2014 Labor Notes Conference hearing workers from all over the world talk about their struggles for dignity and movement building. One workshop dealt with creative strategies that can enhance and deepen our organizing work. The presenter, Ricardo Levins Morales, is an artist from Minneapolis, Minnesota. He shared with us a quote that he re-invented to make less patronizing and more empowering. His reclaiming of this truism defines our work ahead: to recreate our idea of what’s possible, refuse the top-down notions of “freedom” and to begin radically organizing and fashioning our own solutions: 

"If you give me a fish you have fed me for a day. If you teach me to fish then you have fed me until the river is contaminated or the shoreline seized for development. But if you teach me to organize then whatever the challenge I can join together with my peers and we will fashion our own solution."