This working paper analyzes recent peacemaking efforts between the Colombian government and two of the remaining armed guerrilla groups—the Colombian Revolutionary Armed Forces-Popular Army (FARC-EP) and the National Liberation Army (ELN). It evaluates the demobilization process with the paramilitary umbrella organization known as the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), and current efforts to implement the Justice and Peace law that regulates the paramilitary process. The paper analyzes the roles of third-party actors—primarily the church, civil society more broadly, and the international community—in peace initiatives. In Colombia, these roles include pressuring for peace, setting the stage for peace accords, establishing spaces for dialogue and democratic discussion, creating the mechanisms for conflict resolution necessary for a sustainable peace, facilitating or mediating peace processes themselves, and implementing and monitoring peace agreements.
While in Colombia and elsewhere peace is usually negotiated between the government and one armed group at a time, this paper underscores that where there are multiple armed actors involved, it makes sense to approach peacemaking in a more comprehensive way. The paper underscores the need to be attentive to the ways that the dynamics within and between each set of armed actors impact the prospects for peace with other armed groups. The USIP conferences on which this paper is based for the first time brought together in Washington, D.C. participants in and analysts of current peace efforts with the AUC, FARC-EP, and ELN. This paper underscores the need to continue to put the experiences of each armed group into dialogue with each other and the need to anticipate the impact (and potential impact) that negotiations and agreements with one sector will have on the other groups and on the prospects for a sustainable and comprehensive peace....
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