International Perspectives on Democratization and Peace by Narayanan Ganesan

Author:Narayanan Ganesan [Ganesan, Narayanan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Political Science, International Relations, General, Law, International, Peace, Business & Economics
ISBN: 9781800430686
Google: le2CzQEACAAJ
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Emerald Publishing Limited
Published: 2020-10-26T00:00:00+00:00

Democracy Expansion and Political Reincorporation: Progress, Difficulties in Implementation, and Resistance to Change

The points dealing with “Political participation: A democratic opportunity to build peace” and the “Reincorporation of the FARC-EP into civilian life” are the two aspects of the agreement most explicitly related to the expansion of democracy (OACP, 2016). The document contemplates three main approaches in this sense: the need for the political system to be more inclusive; the importance of guaranteeing the safety of those who will be politically active; and encouraging the participation of social organizations in democracy.

During the negotiation, government delegates insisted that the agreement would signal a roadmap toward sustainable peace but that it would be up to the Congress to discuss and approve the specific reforms to achieve it (Bermúdez, 2018). This underscores the negotiators’ confidence in the democratic institutions, but the legislative process also distorted some of the aspects linked to political participation, which so far is one of the points with the lowest implementation level.

Indeed, the same Congress that unanimously approved the final agreement in December, 2016, then distorted and finally torpedoed key reforms to improve the political system and expand democracy during the following months (Misión de Observación Electoral (MOE), 2018a). This apparent contradiction is not only due to the fact that the political support for the Santos government diluted at the end of his administration, parallel to increasing objections from political groups critical of the agreement (Rettberg & Quiroga, 2014). It also shows a strong resistance to change by political elites against achieving fairer rules and greater representation for excluded citizens and regions.

A clear example of this is the reform bill to increase transparency within the political system. After going through the legislative process, the project suffered a distortion that even reversed issues that had already seen improvements in the previous years. Given this scenario, the government decided to shelve the reform project, considering that it was not coherent with the spirit of expanding democracy and transparency initially intended (MOE, 2018a, p. 20).

Something similar happened with the mechanism called “Transitory Peace Circumscriptions” which sought to further promote the ideal of decentralization of the 1991 Constitution (Bermúdez, 2018). Recognizing that there are populations particularly and historically affected by violence, excluded from national politics despite their wealth in resources and territory, the agreement provided for a mechanism so that these regions would have guaranteed seats in Congress during the following eight years. This was intended to compensate for the low representation and the impact violence had had on these populations, spread over one third of Colombia, with a wealth of natural resources and indigenous reservations as well as community councils for African descendants, but representing only 7 per cent of the electoral census (MOE, 2018a, p. 21). However, the bill did not achieve the necessary votes and ended up sinking for lack of parliamentary support.

One aspect in which progress has been made concerns the statute for guaranteeing the exercise of political opposition – something also contemplated in the 1991 Constitution but which had not been materialized.

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