It seems that the solution to this depends on a complex and integrated process, allowing for real changes to be generated. First, is to accept that one must think in terms of systematic processes (massive, punctual, very short duration campaigns have not shown significant changes); Second, the processes must be directed at people and not at the masses. Third, training must be experiential, continuous, directed, monitored and fed back in such a way that changes can be made in an explicit, adaptive and strengthening way.
In this sense, it can be said that the problem of the conflict in Colombia is not the conflict itself; both legal and illegal groups have apparently laudable interests and ends. However, these interests were not initially resolved by peaceful means and led to violent actions consolidated in history as an armed conflict. This situation has formed implicit cultural tendencies, transmitted from generation to generation, where the conflict itself leads to thoughts of violence and war.
When analyzing the issue of conflict in the department of Nariño, it is important to note that Nariño is located in the south of the country, featuring fertile lands, its characteristic patchwork tapestry of fields, land strategically located on the equator that guarantees a variety of climates with its mountains, coast and Amazonia. It is possible that due to its distance from the center of the country, it has remained one of the most neglected departments by the National Government. The additional factor, of Nariño lying on the border of the country, only serves to exacerbate socio-economic problems and facilitate others such as drug trafficking.
It is a very large territory and access to several of its regions, due to the absence of first-level roads, is complicated. Tertiary road transportation exists and there are schools, although children and teachers are often faced with precarious conditions when travelling to the facilities. There is a notable absence of health institutions, not to mention the lack of job opportunities in the rural sector, especially in a place where the main employers are the municipal Mayor’s office, the health center or the hospital. In these circumstances, the inhabitants of the rural areas of the department have mostly dedicated themselves to agricultural activities, although they lack the means to facilitate the marketing of their products; it is often more profitable for them to simply give away the products of the farm or let them go to waste than take them out to urban centers for commercialization. This absence of the State in many areas of the national territory, has been taken advantage of by illegal armed groups who, in exchange for the cultivation of illicit products, have imposed their own law, offering security to their inhabitants; provided that their mandates are followed of course.
In much of the national territory, the campesino population saw the benefits of illicit crops, which grew in these fertile and forgotten lands, with little investment, without much care, in a short time and, most attractive of all, with good profit margins and with the guarantee of purchase (everything that is produced is sold). That was one of the great errors made by the State; leaving the territory in the hands of illegal groups. After these businesses took force and drug trafficking became one of the country’s biggest problems, the Government then wished to curb the cultivation, processing and commercialization of illicit crops, and recover these territories. It is under these conditions that the conflict transformed into a war between legal and illegal groups, leaving death, poverty, desolation, forced displacement, attacks and massacres in its wake, marking territories as red zones, which then further distanced them from any possibility of progress. Thus, the greatest victims of this were and continue to be the campesinos, the population that has remained at the center of the conflict, a war that has been going on for more than fifty years.
Subsequently, a negotiation period was propitiated, however, before specifying this event, it is appropriate to cite Ogliastri (2001) in the document “How do Colombians negotiate?”, where the author makes a tour of the country analyzing the cultural roots of the negotiation techniques used from the beginning of the conflict. From this, he argues that Colombians are accustomed to resolving conflicts through unilateral actions or by the use of force, as part of the authoritarian culture. The author outlines how Colombians are haggling negotiators; initially asking for a lot to later lower the amount, finding the midpoint between the two. There is also a belief that if the other party wins, you yourself have lost, along with personality traits that lead to the desire to win just for the satisfaction of seeing the opponent lose; a selfishness that prevents seeing midpoints where there are no losers, only winners. Typical of the armed conflict in Colombia, is the use of unilateral action followed by the wait for retaliation, strengthening extreme positions and involving yet more people. This has introduced the same human complexity, loaded with feelings of pain, frustration and irreparable moral damage, to both belligerents of the conflict, as it has to the innocent, including minors, peasants and residents of rural and urban areas. The civilian population has been caught up between the extreme positions, where the problem is solved by the one with the most power. For them, the difference between negotiation and war is not defined; everything is flexible. There are intermediate areas, but ultimately, one believes in winning or losing. This has led to extreme and contradictory behavior during the negotiations, beginning with great kindness and courtesy, but passing on to posturing with personal threats and open conflict, attempting to intimidate the other and force him to accept a way of thinking. These are the “soft” and “hard” versions of traditional negotiation; two sides of the same coin. This form of negotiation clearly demonstrates the selfish nature of human beings when fighting for survival and threatened or intimidated. Often, that struggle to survive has led Colombians to leave material wealth behind and give relevance to simply living, becoming a statistic within the alarmingly large numbers of displaced people. As mentioned by Ogliastri (2001), there is a cultural lack of social responsibility. There is merely a sense of solidarity towards the family and close groups. Nor is individual responsibility assumed in the face of society. It is a world of personalized relationships, where it is better not to get involved, with a frank and cold indifference felt towards the news of the day. With the density of conflict related events, one news story easily overshadows another, but the negative emotions of pain and resentment remain in the victims. In those people most affected by the war, the feeling of “belonging”, of warm and close supporting relations, are part of the survival in this hard, uncertain world, full of urgencies and needs. Ogliastri rightly states that to negotiate, there is a need for conflicting interests, but also an area of mutual convenience where the difference can be resolved.
This area of convenience between the parties –National Government and Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, FARC– was indeed nurtured in Colombia, leading to a negotiation process that culminated in the signing of the peace treaty, which laid the foundations for peace.
Melo (2016), in the “Resumen del acuerdo de paz” or “Summary of the peace agreement”, in the “Revista de Economía Institucional” or “Journal of Institutional Economics”, summarizes that the document signed on September 26th is primarily an agreement whereby the FARC renounces its project, outlined since 1962 , to come to power through weapons, and agrees to follow the rules of Colombian democracy to pursue its political objectives.
The Government, for its part, renounces the imposition of penalties, on the rebels, defined by criminal law for their political, politically related or other crimes, and will stand by a set of approvals that allow FARC members to act legally in politics: brief approvals that do not imply, as a general rule, the loss of political rights for guerrilla leaders.
In this sense, the success of the agreement reflects the end of the FARC as an armed organization and its transformation into a party that is subject to legal norms and that benefits from some special support to act […].
Finally, although the agreement is based on the idea that the aim of the negotiation is to achieve the abandonment of weapons and the end of the armed conflict, and that the transformation that the country requires must be the result of peaceful political confrontation following democratic rules, it also addresses two other special issues due to the very close relationship they have had with the armed conflict in recent decades: the problem of land and that of drug trafficking.
In this sense the agreement considers:
The renunciation of armed struggle and the participation in democratic