Global Policy最新文献

The implementation of the 2016 Peace Agreement has produced one of the most comprehensive and exhaustive peacebuilding efforts to date. The ambitious peace agreement, centred around six core themes, has expanded the scope of peacebuilding into areas that traditionally have been largely ignored or overlooked by policymakers. While the implementation process is still maintaining an overall trajectory that can be considered as success, the same process is still poised with a range of engdogenous and exogenous challenges that may undermine both the pace and the quality of peacebuilding efforts. This article surveys the current trends in the implementation phase, highlighting the key dynamics that stand in the way of an effective and timely implementation of the Colombian peace plan. In addition to exploring the emerging challenges to the liberal peacebuilding approach, this article also highlights the significance of concurrent opportunities and liabilities that stem from developmental approaches to peacebuilding.

This article proposes a preliminary conceptual framework that integrates digitality, or the condition of being digital, with existing frameworks of peacebuilding and post-conflict reconstruction. It builds on existing literature about how the Internet impacts social capital, polarization, participation, and conflict as well as traditional conflict research that examines stability post-conflict. The framework is designed to evaluate the impact of digitality, which I treat as the independent variable, on six societal factors relevant to post-conflict civil society, which I treat as dependent variables. I hypothesize that these effects are meaningful for outcomes of social capital, reintegration, and justice in post-conflict civil society and find that digitality meaningfully changes post-conflict civil society. Finally, I recommend that policymakers tailor a peacebuilding approach to a digital world.

The multiple crises of Colombian-Venezuelan borderland geopolitics, which include a rise in Venezuelan refugees entering Colombia, mounting armed conflict from illegal armed groups throughout Colombia and the mixed efficacy of policy responses by the government, are converging to drive an evolution in Colombia's security concerns. This convergence of crises rivals the security conditions of the early 2000's. As before, the government faces prolific armed conflict, loss of legitimacy over sovereign territory to a host of illegal armed groups, unchecked coca cultivation-trafficking and illicit economies, and an overwhelming loss of confidence in the central government's abilities to govern and counter these threats. This paper argues that the cumulative effect of the nascent convergence of crises is the subsequent rise of mounting Colombian insecurity and threats to stability that now permeates throughout the country – spanning and linking rural, urban and borderland areas in unprecedented ways while driving Venezuelan xenophobia and social unrest.

The peace negotiation process between the Colombian Government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC-EP) is considered one of the most comprehensive peace agreements and is internationally acclaimed for being the first in history to have a gender perspective as a guiding principle. However, several institutions mandated to monitor the gender perspective have identified signs of stagnation in this perspective. As the peace agreement enters the second half of its 15-year implementation period, this article uses a conflict resolution framework to understand what might be preventing a successful and timely implementation of a gender perspective in Colombia. Findings emerging from recent research suggest that conceptual, technical, political, financial and security hurdles sustain a violent and discriminatory system for women, ultimately impacting the effectiveness of the peace agreement.

Great power competition between the United States and China marked the last decade and will continue to define geopolitics in the near future. Colombia is a key Latin American country with respect to this great power competition, and this article will explain why Colombia matters in the current great power competition. It will review the economic, military, and diplomatic resources of Colombia from each country, and the reception and effect that these decisions have on Colombia. In conclusion, the article proposes recommendations to support a liberal international order through engagement in Colombia.

In September of 2022, Gustavo Petro presented an alternative vision of the future of Colombia from that which Colombian administrations have pursued for the past two decades. In his speech to the United Nations, Petro called for an end to the irrational war on drugs and described the drug epidemic as a symptom of significant societal failures. Petro directed his criticism at Plan Colombia, a counternarcotics security strategy, speaking directly about vital elements such as the aerial eradication program. Although Plan Colombia has ended, the United States continues to provide significant financial support to the Colombian government to fund its counter narcotics mission. Is Petro serious about ending the counternarcotics mission in Colombia? Given the political climate, should the United States change its policy approach in Colombia? This article argues that despite an increased use of narratives about climate change and a declining relevance of security narratives, US funding for security has remained constant. Our findings suggest that the United States uses aid as a hard power tool to ensure that certain strategic interests are met irrespective of the political climate.

Women all over the world are using information and communications technology (ICT) to build peace in their communities. Women are natural pioneers of these technologies because the networks they use daily are the foundations that build long-term peace in their communities. This article discusses the relationship between gender and digital connectivity, investigates whether women have different needs when building peace versus when implementing peace, and uses ICT in peacebuilding in Colombia as a case study. The Colombian government has made significant strides in closing the digital gap, especially in rural areas, and women have taken advantage of ICT to facilitate the Peace Agreement of 2016. The implementation of the peace agreement and digital solutions, however, is posing new challenges to women, including vulnerabilities in physical safety and increasing social and political polarization. Colombia needs to strengthen its efforts to close the digital divide by providing communities with the type of infrastructure and training that will meet their needs. Further, gender-based technical policy needs to be readdressed to incorporate strategies to combat the current violence women face when using ICT. Colombia needs to prioritize providing a digital state presence to help protect women peacebuilders and hold perpetrators accountable.

While the 2016 Peace Accords with FARC do not contain a Chapter dedicated to the reform of the Armed Forces or to the methods for securing peace by the State, the False Positives scandal and the broader consequences of the armed conflict have driven the Truth Commission to consider the role of the Armed Forces in the conflict and to recommend institutional reforms. Throughout the peacebuilding phase, the Colombian Armed Forces have been slowly reforming their institution and have made progress on a number of the focus areas identified by the Truth Commission. The epitome of this progress is Colombia's ongoing participation in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Building Integrity (BI) Program, which has been the anchor point in the development and growth of the NATO-Colombia relationship and partnership since 2013. This article looks at the ongoing reforms and suggests that there is an opportunity for Colombia to leverage its established, mature relationship with NATO and the BI Program, to accomplish the desired reforms in the Armed Forces. This strategy allows the government of Colombia to co-opt existing efforts for his own domestic agenda without alienating or discounting the progress that the Armed Forces have already made on their own.

Colombia's constitution recognizes territorial autonomy as an inalienable right of its indigenous peoples, much like other countries across Latin America. Yet, for indigenous people exercising those rights, Colombia is the most dangerous country in the world. Why do states grant extensive rights to indigenous peoples and then fail to uphold them? This article approaches that question through an analysis of decentralization amid Colombia's armed conflict. It examines how crises that prompted a decentralization of governance during the conflict created political opportunities for indigenous rights in Colombia. Subsequent shifts in the conflict, however, including competition for control of extractive industries, put indigenous autonomy at odds with all the conflicting parties' interests. To resolve these challenges, the article suggests that the politics of climate change has created new political opportunities for indigenous autonomy throughout Latin America. It calls for investing in indigenous self-governance to both protect the environment and secure peace.

Over the past two decades, many Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) countries have deepened their economic relationship with China by accepting large amounts of Chinese investments and signing up for China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). However, Colombia has not followed such a path. Using cross-border data on trade, investment, and economic agreements, this article demonstrates that Colombia's under-engagement with China is driven by Colombia's lower competitiveness in the commodities sectors, where Chinese demand for LAC products is highest. Colombia's limited competitiveness has led to lower exports to China and lower amounts of Chinese investment. The low level of bilateral economic activities has resulted in a lack of incentives for Colombia to sign economic agreements with China, as well as general public skepticism toward China and more favorable attitudes toward the United States even though this trend has been on the decline since 2016. Colombia can benefit from strengthening ties with China, without distancing itself from the United States, on issues pertaining to energy transition and the development of rural infrastructure, which will help reduce inequality and broaden export diversification in the medium to long term.