Paramilitarism in a Post-Demobilization Context? Insights from the Department of Antioquia in Colombia

Abstract

Despite efforts employed by the Colombian state to demobilize paramilitary groups and to tackle organized crime structures since 2003, Colombia today remains characterized by a repressive apparatus of social control by paramilitary successor groups in certain sectors of the population. Drawing on information from Colombia's second-largest city -Medellín -and various rural areas of the Department of Antioquia, this work offers a characterization of the legacies of the paramilitary phenomenon, and its continuities and transformations in relation to one particular paramilitary confederation, the Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia (AUC). In many regions, the AUC gained territorial, economic, and social control by managing the illegal drug economy and perpetrating political violence against leftist parties and social organizations. Paramilitaries have thus exerted what we refer to as status quo-oriented violence. As we illustrate for the case of Medellín, mechanisms of territorial, economic, and social control, as well as the particular manifestations of violence related to these mechanisms, have been transferred to paramilitary successor groups. The findings are mainly based on the outcomes of qualitative field research carried out in Medellín in mid-2015. Keywords: Medellín, Department of Antioquia, social, economic, and territorial control, paramilitary successor groups, organized crime, Colombia.Resumen: Paramilitarismo en un contexto post-desmovilización? Perspectivas desde el Departamento de Antioquia en Colombia A pesar de los esfuerzos desplegados desde el año 2003 por el Estado colombiano para desmovilizar a los grupos paramilitares y hacer frente a las estructuras de crimen organizado, la Colombia de hoy sigue estando caracterizada por la existencia de un aparato represivo de control social ejercido por los grupos sucesores del paramilitarismo sobre ciertos sectores de la población. Partiendo de fuentes informativas procedentes de la segunda ciudad más grande de Colombia -Medellín -y de algunas zonas rurales del Departamento de Antioquia, este trabajo ofrece una caracterización de los legados del fenómeno paramilitar, sus continuidades y transformaciones en relación a una confederación paramilitar en particular, las Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia (AUC). En muchas regiones del país, las AUC lograron

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Militarized peace: understanding post-conflict violence in the wake of the peace deal in Colombia

“…(US Office on Colombia, 2013) In addition, amongst the most common victims of the new paramilitaries' violence are those considered by the armed groups to exhibit 'undesirable' characteristics inconsistent with their regressive social attitudes. Deploying 'social cleaning squads'known locally as La Limpieza Social paramilitaries have targeted transgendered people, prostituted women, and the homeless with lethal violence as part of a broader strategy of social control (Garzon, 2017;Wienand & Tremaria, 2017). Sexual violence is employed by groups against such undesirables and against women transgressing gendered social roles as 'corrective violence' or to 'cleanse the population' of these undesirable influences (Sachseder, 2019).…”

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