Issue 6 | Spring/Summer 2017 Inside Out, Building sustainable From the territorial peace Bottom Up in Colombia RutgersA MagazineHumanist of Transnational Connections Special Edition: The Voices of Peace in Colombia Contributors TABLE OF CONTENTS This magazine is published by the Center for the Study of research and community engagement interests include new Genocide and Human Rights. literacies studies, critical pedagogy, historical textbook analysis, educational reform, global education, the role of technology The Humanist Special Edition Editor: in educational access, genocide, human rights and peace education. Her interest in the role of technology, education and Special Edition Editor: Daniel Fernández Fuentes language/culture in promoting human rights and social reform Rotary Peace Fellow Class XIII has led her to work on training, advocacy and development International Christian University Tokyo, Japan projects with organizations in countries around the world, including the Ministries of Education in Mexico and Colombia, Faculty Editor and Advisor: Nela Navarro the Documentation Center of Cambodia, and the Open Society Center for the Study of Genocide and Human Rights and Institute, Thailand. English Department- Rutgers University, USA Nilson Antonio Liz Marín Daniel Fernández: President of the Cauca region section of the Committee of the has directed National Association of Farmers of Colombia ANUC. and coordinated multidisciplinary Nelson Lemus teams that have Leader of the Association of Indigenous Councils of Northern developed social Cauca, Colombia (ACIN). media projects exploring the nature Luis Angulo of social conflicts Representative of the afro-colombian Association of Community since 2003, www. Councils of Northern Cauca (ACONC). lagartofernandez. info. He has Todd Howland sensed the realities Representative in Colombia of the United Nations High of international Commissioner for Human Rights. protracted conflicts, and has delved Diego Bautista into the importance Advisor for Post-Conflict Peace Planning and Institutional of Memory and Architecture for the Colombian Republic. Intercultural Dialogue, being Tania Rodriguez and Carlos Duarte interested in Assistant directors of the Institute for Intercultural Studies learning from (Instituto de Estudios Interculturales IEI) at the Javeriana non-westerner University in Cali, Colombia. perspectives to dealing with Marta Elena Montaño, Leonardo Salcedo and Esnéider Rojas the past and Researchers and facilitators in processes of dialogue and envisioning present and future global coexistence. He has peacebuilding of the Institute for Intercultural Studies (Instituto de collaborated as a senior communications and education Estudios Interculturales IEI) at the Javeriana University in Cali, consultant, having worked for educational and advocacy Colombia. peace programs with local and international institutions. Some of his projects have become tools for mediation in Claudia Petrilli (Designer): Claudia graduated with a BA in Art racial conflicts among high school students, and three of his & Design from Rutgers-Newark. View her portfolio at www. documentaries are now part of the syllabus in secondary designbyclaudia.com. education and university instruction in Catalonia. His interest lies in analyzing local realities without forgetting their validity ***The editor would like to extend special thanks to Dr. Manuel in a global context, giving special importance to personal Ramiro Muñoz and the entire team of the Instituto de Estudios testimonies, as their voice a much-valued experience in the Interculturales (The Intercultural Studies Institute) at Javieriana search for innovative approaches for Peace Education and University-Cali, Colombia and to The Center for the Study of Conflict Transformation learning processes. Genocide and Human Rights, Rutgers University*** Nela Navarro (Faculty Advisor): Nela serves as Associate Cover Photo Credit: Daniel Fernández Fuentes. Pachita, Director/Director of Education and Member of the UNESCO community leader of the afro-colombian Choco’s region Chair for Genocide Prevention Executive Committee at displaced people in Cali, and member Institute for Intercultural CGHR. She received her graduate education at Columbia Studies (Instituto de Estudios Interculturales IEI) at the Javeriana University Teachers College. She is a lecturer in the University in Cali, Colombia. Department of Spanish and Portuguese (Newark) and English Department Writing Program (New Brunswick). Her All photos (cover and interior) are courtesy of Daniel Fernández Fuentes. 2 TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE Contributors TABLE OF CONTENTS █ INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................4 █ FROM THE BOTTOM UP Introduction ................................................................................................................................6 Community Leaders ...................................................................................................................6 █ TOP DOWN Introduction ..............................................................................................................................12 Tom Howland Interview ............................................................................................................13 Diego Bautista Interview ..........................................................................................................16 █ INSIDE OUT Introduction .................................................................................................................................20 Mediators ....................................................................................................................................22 █ 13[25] IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE WORD Introduction .................................................................................................................................28 Photo Essay ................................................................................................................................30 3 Introduction Social communication and advocacy for Human Rights in Colombia. He believes that projects in 2004 and 2009 enabled me to travel it is vital for combatants to meet and to listen to to Colombia, where I met with many survivors of their victims, who have already developed survival Colombia’s endless civil war. In interviews and strategies that could mean major contributions to conversations with grassroots activists, community a new, all-embracing democratic model. Finally, leaders and former guerilla fighters, I learned that a meeting with the Advisor for Peace Planning many Colombians saw a lack of social justice and Institutional Architecture for a Post-Conflict as fueling conflict and believed the country’s Society, from the Office of the High Commissioner white elite had traditionally retained its privileges for Peace of the Presidency of the Colombian through enforcing a culture of violence. I began to Republic, helped me to understand that the understand why, sixty years ago, some of these state currently needs help to reach out to those people had reached a desperate conclusion: who it treated with contempt since the time of only by taking up arms would their grievances Independence. be heard. Most of what I already knew about At this crucial time in Colombian history, the Colombia, before returning to the country in the country needs people and institutions that can summer of 2015, I had learned in the field, through bring all parties together. These third party actors listening to personal stories and walking some of may be able to facilitate epistemological and the landscapes wounded by the war and its painful cultural translations, which in turn will enable the consequences. different parties to listen, recognize and respect In this edition of The Humanist, I have each other’s needs and worldviews. This is vital so assembled different voices from my field research they may find common ground to plant the seeds in 2015 to describe the necessary conditions for a shared and peaceful future. for building sustainable peace in Colombia. I This edition also focuses on the role of local interviewed the representatives of those who have non-state actors who may play a critical role in suffered the most from armed conflict without transforming the culture of violence into a culture having taken up arms themselves. Scholars in of peace. It is for this reason that The Humanist the field of Peace Studies like Galtung, Lederach wishes to present the vision, mission, and or Richmond, have academically argued what methodology of a local third party committed to the peasant, indigenous and Afro-Colombian rural development of a sustainable, intercultural peace community leaders know to be true from their own in Colombia. A Colombian University Institute, everyday experience. However they all seem to the Instituto de Estudios Interculturales IEI of agree that a positive, sustainable peace will only Javeriana University of Cali, offers a blueprint for be possible if it reflects the interests, identities, transforming intercultural conflict in Colombia. and needs of all actors involved, state and non- state, and if it creates a new reality in which mutual The IEI has widely been acknowledged as compromise and social justice accommodate a third party mediator, devoted to the creation difference. This edition also includes an interview of an intercultural dialogue between opposing I held