Abstract
There is a considerable body of research covering diverse aspects of the persistent violence afflicting Colombia; however, the connections between the construction of a Colombian national identity and violence in the second half of the twentieth century has been less studied. Considering the political dimensions of national identity and some of the strategies pursued by the nation state to construct it, such as the use of myths and symbols, it will be argued that the historical weak legitimacy of the Colombian nation state has prevented the creation of a hegemonic national identity. This has led to a self-perpetuating system of violence that has precluded a resolution to the increasing violence and to the crisis of national identity. Outbreaks of political violence have been intermittent over the past two centuries of Colombian history, but since the outbreak of La Violencia (1948–1954), a period of undeclared civil war and communal violence, political violence has reached unprecedented levels.1 It has also given violence the features of a myth, as if it were part of the country’s natural landscape or an unavoidable natural disaster,2 a legacy that continues to inform contemporary Colombia. With reference to this period, this chapter sets out to investigate the paradoxical and unresolved relationship between high levels of political violence and the construction of a Colombian national identity.
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Notes
Estimates suggest some two hundred thousand dead and over two million rural citizens displaced between 1946 and 1966. Mary Roldan, Blood and Fire: La Violencia in Antioquia, Colombia, 1946–1953 (Durham: Duke University Press, 2002), p. 5.
Daniel Pécaut, “From the Banality of Violence to Real Terror: The Case of Colombia,” in Kees Kooning and Dirk Kruijt (eds.), Societies of Fear: The Legacy of Civil War, Violence and Terror In Latin America (London: Zed Books, 1999), p. 162.
Numerically there were more civil wars in nineteenth-century Colombia than in Venezuela, Bolivia, Argentina, Uruguay, Mexico, and most of Central America. Malcom Deas, Intercambios Violentos: Reflexiones sobre la Violencia Política en Colombia (Bogotá: Aguilar, 1999), p. 26.
Alexander Wilde also highlights the fact that the army, in contrast to Brazil or Venezuela, was ineffectual militarily and marginal politically. Alexander W. Wilde, “Conversations among Gentlemen: Oligarchical Democracy in Colombia,” in Juan J. Linz and Alfred Stepan (eds.), The Breakdown of Democratic Regimes. Latin America (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1978), pp. 28–81.
Socorro, a victim of violence and displacement in Colombia, in Constanza Ardila Galvis, The Heart of the War in Colombia (London: Latin American Bureau, 2000), p. 219.
Barry Buzan, People, States and Fear: An Agenda for International Security Studies in the Post–Cold War Era (London: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1991), p. 72.
Anthony D. Smith, “History and National Identity: Responses and Clarifications,” Nations and Nationalism 10: 1 /2 (2004), pp. 195–209.
Anthony D. Smith, Myths and Memories of the Nation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 57.
Anthony D. Smith, Nationalism: Theory, Ideology, History (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1991), p. 84.
Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 1991), p. 150.
A Frank Safford argument mentioned in Marco Palacios, “Colombian Experience with Liberalism: On the Historical Weakness of the State,” in PosadaCarbo, E. (ed.), Colombia: The Politics of Reforming the State (London: Macmillan Press, 1998), p. 32.
Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1983), p. 55.
Jenny Pearce, Colombia: Inside the Labyrinth (London: Latin American Bureau, 1990), p. 24.
David Bushnell, The Making of Modern Colombia: A Nation In Spite of Itself (Oxford: University of California Press, 1993), p. 143.
Marco Palacios, El Café en Colombia 1850–1970 (México: El Colegio de México y El Ancora Editores, 1983), p. 484.
Marco Palacios, Entre la Legitimidad y la Violencia Colombia 1875–1994 (Bogotá: Editoria Norma, 1995), p. 75.
Gonzalo Sánchez, “The Violence: An Interpretative Synthesis,” in Charles Bergquist (ed.), Violencia in Colombia Contemporary Crisis in Historical Perspective (Wilmington: Scholarly Resources Inc., 1992), p. 79.
Jack Snyder, cited in Stuart Kaufman, “An International Theory of Inter-Ethnic War,” Review of International Studies 22: 2 (1996), pp. 149–171.
Sam Keen 1986, cited in Kathleen Braden and Fred Shelley (eds.), Engaging Geopolitics (London: Pearson Education, 2000), p. 63.
John Green provides many examples of statements in liberal and the conservative newspapers reflecting their usefulness in fostering partisan sectarianism. John W. Green, Gaitanismo, Left Liberalism and Popular Mobilization in Colombia (Gainsville: University Press of Florida, 2003).
Francisco Gutierrez Sanín, “The Courtroom and the Bivouac—Reflections on Law and Violence in Colombia,” Latin American Perspectives 116: 28,1 (2001), pp. 59–60.
Cristina Escobar, “Clientelism and Citizenship—The Limits of Democratic Reform in Sucre, Colombia,” Latin American Perspectives 126: 29,5 (2002), pp. 20–47.
See the implementation of these reforms in Donna Lee Van Cott, The Friendly Liquidation of the Past. The Politics of Diversity in Latin America (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2000), pp. 90–122.
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© 2006 Will Fowler and Peter Lambert
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Dennis, M. (2006). National Identity and Violence: The Case of Colombia. In: Fowler, W., Lambert, P. (eds) Political Violence and the Construction of National Identity in Latin America. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230601727_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230601727_6
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