Comparative Peace Processes In Latin America

This book is about ending guerrilla conflicts in Latin America through political means. It is about peace processes, aimed at securing an end to military hostilities in the context of agreements that touch on some of the principal political, economic, social, and ethnic imbalances that led to conflict in the first place. The book presents a carefully structured comparative analysis of six Latin American countries--Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Colombia, and Peru--which experienced guerrilla warfare that outlasted the end of the Cold War. The book explores in detail the unique constellation of national and international events that allowed some wars to end in negotiated settlement, one to end in virtual defeat of the insurgents, and the others to rage on. The aim of the book is to identify the variables that contribute to the success or failure of a peace dialogue. Though the individual case studies deal with dynamics that have allowed for or impeded successful negotiations, the contributors also examine comparatively such recurrent dilemmas as securing justice for victims of human rights abuses, reforming the military and police forces, and reconstructing the domestic economy. Serving as a bridge between the distinct literatures on democratization in Latin America and on conflict resolution, the book underscores the reciprocal influences that peace processes and democratic transition have on each other, and the ways democratic "space” is created and political participation enhanced by means of a peace dialogue with insurgent forces. The case studies--by country and issue specialists from Latin America, the United States, and Europe--are augmented by commentaries of senior practitioners most directly involved in peace negotiations, including United Nations officials, former peace advisers, and activists from civil society.

In the Wake of War assesses the consequences of civil war for democratization in Latin America, focusing on questions of state capacity. Contributors focus on seven countries--Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Peru--where state weakness fostered conflict and the task of state reconstruction presents multiple challenges. In addition to case studies, the book explores cross-cutting themes including the role of the international community in supporting peace, the explosion of post-war criminal and social violence, and the value of truth and historical clarification. This book completes a fifteen-year project, "Program on Comparative Peace Processes in Latin America," which also led to the 1999 publication of the book Comparative Peace Processes in Latin America.

This book analyses the war against drugs, violence in streets, schools and families, and mining conflicts in Latin America. It examines the nonviolent negotiations, human rights, peacebuilding and education, explores security in cyberspace and proposes to overcome xenophobia, white supremacy, sexism, and homophobia, where social inequality increases injustice and violence. During the past 40 years of the Latin American Council for Peace Research (CLAIP) regional conditions have worsened. Environmental justice was crucial in the recent peace process in Colombia, but also in other countries, where indigenous people are losing their livelihood and identity. Since the end of the cold war, capitalism aggravated the life conditions of poor people. The neoliberal dismantling of the State reduced their rights and wellbeing in favour of enterprises. Youth are not only the most exposed to violence, but represent also the future for a different management of human relations and nature.

Of the workshop and the discussions / Jack Child -- Development and democracy: their relationship to peace and security / Oscar Camilión -- Development and democracy: their relationship to peace and security / Howard J. Wiarda -- Social reconciliation in Colombia / Jesús Antonio Bejarano -- The superpowers and Latin American conflict / S. Neil MacFarlane -- Interstate conflicts in Latin America and the search for solutions: five illustrative cases / Jack Child -- Confidence-building measures and the arms limitations process / Alejandro San Martín -- The future role of third-party neutrals in peacekeeping operations and observance of agreements in the Americas / Gastón Ibáñez O'Brien.

Colombia and El Salvador, two Latin American countries, have developed similar counterinsurgency processes and started similar processes of peace negotiations between the insurgent armies and the forces of order. One peace process was concluded in 1992, when El Salvador ended the war through a political solution (Peace Accords). Salvadoran insurgent forces agreed to demobilize its army and to become a legal political party, while the government agreed to make changes in the social and political structure. Colombia, after forty years of guerilla warfare and after failed peace talks during the last decade, is still trying to set conditions to gain peace through negotiations. The thesis, while contrasting both general contexts, emphasizes their differences to explain the success of the peace process in El Salvador and the failure in Colombia. After comparing the political actors involved - the military and the guerrillas, studying the intensity of the conflict, and analyzing the outcomes of the different peace processes, we arrived to the conclusion that the Salvadoran model of negotiation cannot be applied entirely to the Colombian case. Similarly, no government should try to copy the Salvadoran recipe as the remedy for their own social and political problems. Any simplistic interpretation should be avoided because it could lead to fallacies that could generate dangerous interpretations by the key actors in the process.

The political, economic, and social problems of Central America during the past four years have at times threatened to escalate into a generalized conflict. Intense diplomatic efforts to find peaceful solutions to the crisis, however, have met with only limited success. Negotiations have collapsed amid bitter accusations of intransigence or bad faith, and some have taken place outside of public scrutiny, resulting in widespread confusion that has surrounded the entire peace process. This book is an effort by the Central American and Caribbean Program at the School of Advanced International Studies to shed light on the crucial roles of the Contadora Group (Colombia, Mexico, Panama, and Venezuela) in forging peace in the region. Containing a collection of nearly one hundred statements, declarations, proposals, resolutions, draft treaties, and official documents, it easily constitutes the most comprehensive reference work on the search for peace in Central America. In order to improve readability, slight adjustments have been made to some of the documents.