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Reparation Beyond Statehood: Assembling Rights Restitution in Post-Conflict Colombia

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Reparation Beyond Statehood: Assembling Rights Restitution in Post-Conflict Colombia REPARATION BEYOND STATEHOOD: ASSEMBLING RIGHTS RESTITUTION IN POST-CONFLICT COLOMBIA Thesis submitted as partial fulfilment for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Leicester by Fredy A. Mora-Gámez School of Management University of Leicester 2016 i Abstract This thesis is an ethnographic study of rights restitution as an arrangement that establishes boundaries, and how those boundaries are translated, challenged, and exceeded. Following the guidelines of International Humanitarian Law and its version contained in the Law of Victims and Land Restitution (1448/2011), the Colombian government established a wide network of professionals in charge of registration and reparation for claimants registered as victims of the armed conflict (7,999,963 people in April 2016). In these procedures of recognition and reparation, technologies like forms and protocols become crucial for the mediation of rights restitution. As a starting point, I trace the trajectories of technologies of recognition and reparation across assistance centres, governmental offices and sessions of psychosocial assistance. I am interested in functionaries and applicants’ experiences of forms and protocols, the procedures of recognition and reparation, and the circulation of official numbers as narratives of rights restitution. Drawing on Science and Technology Studies, a central concern of this thesis is to ask what technologies of recognition and reparation assemble. I interrogate the translation of experiences of pain and mobility into numbers and the circulation of those numbers by state representatives. I also explore some of the material forms of organisation developed by registered and unregistered interlocutors, as arrangements beyond the boundaries of state interventions. I describe how some of those alternative orders translate state interventions and enact spaces of material justice. Instead of reproducing the notion of reparation as a cornerstone of rights restitution in transitional justice societies, I suggest that a different sort of Reparation might occur beyond the boundaries of post-conflict statehood and within its intersections with alternative arrangements. Keywords: Rights restitution, human rights, science and technology studies, bureaucracy, psychosocial assistance, social technologies, infrastructures, Colombia, post-conflict, Law of Victims and Land Restitution ii Acknowledgments Although my name is the first to appear in this document, the reflections and insights presented here are far from being individual achievements. Words are not enough to thank all my interlocutors and friends in the queues all over Colombia who generously shared their stories and daily lives with me. I cannot use their names here but without their contributions, none of these pages could have been written. My reflexive and affective acknowledgement of their experiences of pain and mobility has been transformative itself in a variety of ways. My friends, you will always have my admiration, solidarity and gratitude. I also value the support and access given by the outgoing director of the psychosocial team working at the UARIV. To those psychosocial professionals in charge of ERE and Entrelazando, you have my admiration for your attempt of assembling a different society. Moments of uncertainty were inherently part of this thesis. However, the continuous support and guidance generously offered by Steve Brown and Dimitris Papadopoulos were invaluable tools transforming uncertainty into clarity, questions into answers, and feelings into arguments. Steve and Dimitris, I cannot thank you enough for teaching me how to think from the margins and the inbetweenness of disciplinary fields. Please accept my most sincere gratitude for your confidence, wise inputs, and provoking questions now embedded into this document. It has been a privilege to think with you. Thanks for navigating so effectively in the messiness of my ideas to invigorate their potentiality. I thank María Puig de la Bellacasa for her friendship, unconditional support, invaluable comments, genuine interest, and for continuously encouraging me to “dejarme ver en el texto”. ¡Gracias de corazón! My life in Leicester as a migrant and student has been enriched by very dear friends: Marton Racz, Maria Vlachou, Irina Cheresheva, Kevin Pijpers, Blandine Emilien, Fabian Frenzel, Marta Gasparin, Marco Checchi, and Juan Espinosa. Thanks guys for being there and making Leicester my home. I especially thank Marton for his fresh and critical eyes over my words and his visits while getting this document done. Before living in Leicester, my introduction to the world of STS was accompanied by friends whose comments also shaped this document. Thanks to the members of the Grupo de Estudios Sociales de la Ciencia, la Tecnología y la Medicina (GESCTM) at Universidad Nacional de Colombia. Dear Olga Restrepo, Malcolm Ashmore and Yuri iii Gómez, my heartfelt thanks for your support and for encouraging me to pursue this PhD. Malcolm, thanks for your thorough reading and stimulating comments. Some of the arguments presented in this thesis were developed during my visit to the Department of Anthropology at UC Davis in 2015. Thanks to my friends Marisol de la Cadena, Julia Morales, and Santiago Martinez who read my preliminary drafts and pushed my arguments towards unexpected and fruitful directions. ¡Gracias amigos queridos! As part of this visit, I deeply appreciate the comments offered by Cristiana Giordano and Adrien Yen about psychosocial assistance, Patrick Carroll regarding STS and the state, and Luis Guarnizo on migration. For her comments on several drafts, I thank Jenny Reardon at the Science and Justice Research Centre at UC Santa Cruz. My parents’ decision of migrating into Bogotá in the 1960s has played its part in this document. Their lives as peasants and migrants inherently inform my understanding of Colombia and the mobility of millions of people in the country. Although Luis and Celia departed a long time ago, I want to believe they would be proud in this moment. Mom and dad, this is also your achievement, thanks for making our education your priority. To my family Emilsen and Ariel, you have been with me in every single reflection and written word despite the physical distance. You both have been examples and my reasons to miss home. ¡Gracias por su apoyo y cariño! My everydayness underlying the written reflections in this document was full of ambivalences, ups and downs, moments of happiness and sadness, feelings of optimism and despair. Fortunately, I have been constantly and unconditionally supported by my partner. Marisol, you really made the difference in every single step. Your contributions to this thesis are uncountable. Thanks for every conversation, your careful reading, your patience, and your loving, constant, and caring presence. I am lucky for walking with you during this journey. Let us walk in yours now… I finally thank the School of Management for the studentship granted in 2012 that made possible my presence in Leicester. This thesis has also been sponsored by Colombian public funds through the Beca Francisco José de Caldas 568/2012 granted by COLCIENCIAS. I sincerely hope that the following reflections about rights restitution in Colombia resonate with those who pursue a form of Reparation exceeding the boundaries of post-conflict statehood. iv Table of contents Abstract ii Acknowledgements iii Table of contents v List of tables vi List of figures vii List of abbreviations ix Prelude Depicting rights 1 Chapter 1 Tracing: the Law of Victims 5 Chapter 2 Reframing: recognition and reparation as 34 sociotechnical arrangement Chapter 3 Registering: on forms, official recognition, and 66 sociotechnical borders Chapter 4 Organising: on compensations, psychosocial 104 assistance, and repairing betrayals Chapter 5 Staging: the mise-en-scène of post-conflict statehood 141 Chapter 6 Exceeding: Reparation beyond statehood as interstitial 171 mobility Afterword Signing Peace Colombia 204 References 207 v List of tables Table 1 Table used in the discussion paper of the Congress sessions. 22 Sources Hernández and Martínez (2010: 176) and Gaceta 11/05/2011 Table 2 Summarized chronologies of events mobilizing the LV 27 Table 3 Victimizing Facts during the armed conflict used to fill the FUD 72 (DPS 2012) Table 4 Estimations per Victimizing Fact UARIV 105 Table 5 Priorities of investment of administrative reparation manifested 110 by Victims during the PAARI modified from the original in the order of the columns. Table 6 Summary of titles, objectives and activities contained in the ERE 129 protocol (UARIV, 2015) vi List of figures Figure 1 Conceptual sculpture “A los Derechos Humanos” by León Ferrari, 2 2011. Parque de la Memoria, Buenos Aires, Argentina (author’s photograph) Figure 2 Luis and his son in Bogotá (author’s photograph) 6 Figure 3 Map of forced displacements in Colombia (1996-2012). Source 10 GMH (2013) Figure 4 Queue of people waiting to access a CDR in Bogotá. Author´s 67 photograph Figure 5 Example of ticking in the boxes of the FUD during the initial 75 interview (Guidelines by the DPS DPS 2012) Figure 6 Heading of the response letter granted by the UARIV to applicants 92 Figure 7 Official number of people recognized in the RUV displayed at the 94 UARIV website (January, 2016) Figure 8 Print Screen of the App RNI-Cifras developed by the UARIV and 100 the National Information Network (RNI) Figure 9 Session of the PAARI in Samaná, Caldas. July 2014. Samaná 110 Council website Figure 10 President Santos and the director of the UARIV inaugurating a 115 minimarket 2x3 in Bello, Antioquia. Caracol Noticias Figure 11 Session of the ERE (author’s photograph) 120 Figure 12 First session of the ERE album (UARIV, 2015) 121 Figure 13 Psychosocial professional filling the attendance record (author’s 123 photograph) Figure 14 José approaching one of the participants during the session of 127 the ERE (author’s photograph) Figure 15 National March for the Victims at Plaza de Bolívar in Bogotá 141 Diario El Universal (08-04-2013) Figure 16 Map of FUDs filled per region during a day of massive 146 declarations. IOM Colombia news website.
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