Analysis of the Colombian Program for Economic Reintegration of Members of Illegal Armed Groups (2008 – 2016)

Abstract

The signing and approval of the peace agreement with the FARC guerrilla in Colombia has placed the peacebuilding initiatives as a first priority for the Government. On the most relevant angles of this process is the economic reintegration of ex combatants as one of the factor that will have a direct influence in the long-term sustainability of the recently achieved peace.

The economic reintegration strategy of Colombia is a program created as part of the reintegration policy in 2008 and requires a close work with the private sector to promote the hiring of ex combatants and the joint work with the micro businesses they create with the help of the Colombian Government, however the companies are not always willing to engage in mainly political issues like the guerrilla conflict.

After almost 10 years of implementation, the economic reintegration program will be tested again with the collective reintegration of the FARC members setting the perfect moment to make a revision of the results and propose improvements to achieve a more sustainable reintegration process and long term peace.

According to this, the present paper analyses through different tools the level of success of the Colombian economic reintegration program based on the hypothesis that the set of market solutions established for facilitating the economic reintegration of ex combatants havent been sufficient to achieve a successful inclusion in the labor market and to promote the massive participation of the private sector.

The main findings suggest that even if the reintegration policy and the economic reintegration program have been well structured, following the international standards, theres still room for improvement in its implementation strategy as well as in the monitoring and evaluation systems.

Keywords: Colombia armed conflict, peacebuilding, FARC guerilla, private sector and peacebuilding, economic reintegration of ex combatants, DDR.

Student Number: 2016 - 27861