The credible commitment problem and multiple armed groups: FARC perceptions of insecurity during disarmament in the Colombian peace process

ABSTRACT

Insecurities associated with the credible commitment problem during disarmament, demobilisation, and reintegration (DDR) processes are usually examined within a dyadic relationship between the government and a rebel group, ignoring how these insecurities play themselves out in the context of multiple warring parties. In addition, most studies on these dynamics take an overview macro-perspective, leaving out micro-dynamics such as how insecurity is experienced by those undertaking the disarmament process. This paper examines FARC members’ perception of insecurity and threat during the disarmament process in Colombia in the context of multiple armed groups. Drawing on semi-structured interviews with FARC combatants in three different demobilisation camps during the process of disarmament, this paper sheds light on how credible commitment problems between the FARC and the Colombian government were influenced by the presence of additional armed actors and how associated insecurities are perceived by combatants who are disarming vis-à-vis various armed actors.

KEYWORDS:

• FARC
• multi-party conflict
• disarmament
• Colombia
• peace process

Acknowledgements

Thank you to Dr. Laura Taylor for valuable advice designing the surveys and all your input in this project. The research for this publication was made possible by the Global Challenges Research Fund internal Queen’s University Belfast (R3861HAP) award for project Paramilitary-Insurgent Rivalries and the Peace Process in Colombia. Awarded January-July 2017.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Walter, ‘Designing Transitions from Civil War’; Walter, Committing to Peace; Fearon, ‘Why do Some Civil Wars’.

2. Kirschner, ‘Knowing Your Enemy’.

3. Stedman, ‘Spoiler Problems’; Reiter, ‘Does Spoiling Work?’; Reiter, Fighting Over Peace.

4. Walter, ‘Designing Transitions from Civil War’; Walter, Committing to Peace.

5. Nilsson, ‘Partial Peace’; Quinn, ‘One Dyadic Peace’; Cunningham, Barriers to Peace; Ghais, ‘Consequences of Excluding Armed Groups’.

6. Nussio, ‘How Ex-combatants Talk About Personal Security’; Nussio, ‘Emotional Legacies’; Jennings, ‘The Struggle to Satisfy’; Annan et al., ‘From “Rebel” to “Returnee”’.

7. Walter, ‘Designing transitions from civil war’; Walter, Committing to Peace; Fearon, ‘Why do Some Civil Wars’.

8. Walter, ‘Designing Transitions from Civil War’, 134.

9. Berdal, Disarmament and Demobilisation; Bøås and Hatløy, ‘Getting In, Getting Out’.

10. O’Kane, ‘Decommissioning and the Peace Process’; Brown, ‘Arms Decommissioning in Northern Ireland’.

11. Cusack, ‘Official IRA “Doomsday” Bunkers’.

12. Walter, ‘Designing Transitions from Civil War’; Walter, Committing to Peace; Mattes and Savun, ‘Fostering Peace After Civil War’; Hartzell and Hoddie, ‘Institutionalizing Peace’; Hartzell and Hoddie, ‘Crafting Peace’; Hartzell et al., ‘Stabilizing the Peace After Civil War’; Burgess, ‘Fashioning Integrated Security Forces’; Fearon, ‘Commitment Problems’.

13. Ghais, ‘Consequences of Excluding Armed Groups’.

14. Kirschner, ‘Knowing Your Enemy’.

15. Quinn et al., ‘One Dyadic Peace Leads to Another’; Kreutz and Nussio, ‘Destroying Trust in Government’; Nilsson, ‘Partial Peace’.

16. Driscoll, ‘Commitment Problems or Bidding Wars?’; Nygård and Weintraub, ‘Bargaining Between Rebel Groups’; Steinert, ‘Spoilers of Peace: Pro-Government Militias’.

17. Nilsson, ‘Partial Peace’.

18. Reiter, ‘Does Spoiling Work?’; Reiter, Fighting Over Peace.

19. Steinert et al., ‘Spoilers of Peace: Pro-Government Militias’; Aliyev, ‘Pro-Regime Militias and Civil War Duration’; Aliyev, ‘No Peace, No War’.

20. Phillips, ‘Enemies with Benefits?’.

21. Berdal, Disarmament and Demobilisation; Kingma, ‘Demobilization, Reintegration and Peacebuilding’; Nussio, ‘How Ex-Combatants Talk About Personal Security’.

22. Humphreys and Weinstein, ‘Demobilization and Reintegration’; Reiter, Fighting over Peace; Bøås and Hatløy, ‘Getting In, Getting Out’; Kingma, ‘Demobilization, Reintegration and Peacebuilding’.

23. Nussio, ‘How Ex-Combatants Talk About Personal Security’.

24. Jennings, ‘The Struggle to Satisfy’; Phayal et al., ‘What Makes an Ex-Combatant Happy?’; Pugel, ‘What the Fighters Say’.

25. Phillips, ‘Enemies with Benefits?’; Velázquez, ‘Historia del Paramilitarismo en Colombia’; Hristov, Blood and Capital.

26. Maher and Thomson, ‘A Precarious Peace?’.

27. Gomez-Suarez, ‘US-Colombian Relations in the 1980s’; Nasi, ‘Spoilers in Colombia’.

28. Nasi, ‘Spoilers in Colombia’, 225–227.

29. Bouvier, Colombia: Building Peace in a Time of War.

30. Nasi, ‘Spoilers in Colombia’, 234.

31. United States Congress, U.S. Colombia Relations.

32. Gonzalez and Espitia, XIII Informe Sobre Presencia de Grupos Narcoparamilitares; Gill, ‘Colombia’s Post-AUC Paramilitaries’; Ávila, ‘Bacrim, Neoparamilitares’.; Human Rights Watch, Paramilitaries’ Heirs.

33. Alto Comisionado Para La Paz, ‘Zonas Veredales Para la Dejación de Armas’.

34. Presidencia de la República de Colombia, ‘Dejación de Armas’; El Tiempo, ‘El Paso a Paso’.

35. Presidencia de la República de Colombia, ‘Dejación de Armas’; Al Jazeera, ‘UN: Colombia FARC Rebels Complete Disarmament’.

36. Alto Comisionado Para La Paz, Acuerdo Final.

37. Such as the Pacto Político Nacional; la Comisión Nacional de Garantías de Seguridad; la Unidad Especial de Investigación; el Cuerpo Élite en la Policía Nacional; el Sistema Integral de Seguridad para el Ejercicio de la Política; el Programa Integral de Seguridad y Protección para las Comunidades y Organizaciones en los Territorios.

38. Policía Nacional de Colombia, ‘Agamenón’; Brodzinsky, ‘Colombia’s Road to Peace’.

39. United Nations Human Rights Council, Visit to Colombia; United Nations Security Council, United Nations Verification Mission in Colombia.

40. Maher and Thomson, ‘A Precarious Peace?’; Holmes et al., ‘Paramilitary Violence in Colombia’.

41. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondents 13–16, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 24 July 2017; and Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 17, ZVTN camp ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, 23 April 2017.

42. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 13, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 24 July 2017.

43. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 17, ZVTN camp ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, 23 April 2017.

44. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 13, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 24 July 2017.

45. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 17, ZVTN camp ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, 23 April 2017.

46. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 3, ZVTN camp in San José del Guaviare, 7 July 2017.

47. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 16, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 24 July 2017.

48. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 16, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 24 July 2017.

49. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondents 1, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 18 April 2017; 12 and 16, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 24 July 2017; 17 and 18, ZVTN camp ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, 23 April 2017.

50. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 17, ZVTN camp ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, 23 April 2017; Anonymous FARC respondent 18 had a very similar answer, ZVTN camp ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, 23 April 2017.

51. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 13, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 24 July 2017.

52. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 4 and 5, ZVTN camp in San José del Guaviare, 7 July 2017.

53. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 1, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 18 April 2017.

54. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 3, ZVTN camp in San José del Guaviare, 7 July 2017.

55. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 1, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 18 April 2017.

56. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 1, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 18 April 2017.

57. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondents 17 and 18, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 24 July 2017.

58. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondents 1, 2, 3, 4, 15, 16, 17, ZVTN camps ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, San José del Guaviare, ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 18 April, 7 July, and 24 July 2017.

59. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 5, 6, ZVTN camp in San José del Guaviare, 7 July 2017, and anonymous FARC respondent 7, ZVTN camp ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, 16 July 2017.

60. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 21, ZVTN camp in San José del Guaviare, 7 July 2017, anonymous FARC respondent 22, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 24 July 2017.

61. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 18, ZVTN camp ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, 23 April 2017.

62. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 6, ZVTN camp in San José del Guaviare, 7 July 2017.

63. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10, 12, 14, 16, ZVTN camps ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, San José del Guaviare, ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 18 April, 7 July, and 24 July 2017.

64. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 15, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 24 July 2017.

65. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 11, ZVTN camp ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, 16 July 2017.

66. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 16, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 24 July 2017.

67. One respondent from Chocó (where the ELN have a presence) but who was stationed in the camp in Córdoba rated the ELN as a ‘10ʹ to his personal safety. He stated that the ELN might pose a threat should he return to the areas where he was operational as a FARC member in Chocó. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 7, ZVTN camp ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, 16 July 2017.

68. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 3, 4, 5, 7, 8,9, ZVTN camps San José del Guaviare and ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, 7 July and 16 July 2017.

69. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 5, 6, 9, ZVTN camps San José del Guaviare and ‘Gallo’ in Córdoba, 7 July and 16 July 2017.

70. Author interview with anonymous FARC respondent 12, ZVTN camp ‘La Elvira’ in Cauca, 24 July 2017.

71. Filippidou and O’Brien, ‘Trust and Distrust’.

72. Kreutz and Nussio, ‘Destroying Trust in Government’.

73. As of January 2020, the Colombian National Reincorporation Agency was unable to locate 821 ex-guerrillas out of 13,330 that had signed up to the agreement. This does not include numbers of FARC members that did not join the peace process from the beginning, which was an even smaller percentage of the total FARC members pre-2016 agreement. Colombian National Reincorporation Agency, ‘ARN en Cifras’.

74. Daniels, ‘Former Farc Commanders Say They Are Returning to War’.

75. Casey and Rios Escobar, ‘Colombia Struck a Peace Deal With Guerrillas But Many Return to Arms’.

76. United Nations Human Rights Council, Visit to Colombia; United Nations Security Council, United Nations Verification Mission in Colombia; El Tiempo ‘Durante la Cuarentena, Cada Tres Días Asesinan a un Líder: MOE’.

77. The literature explores credible commitment problems as dyadic, occurring between a government and an insurgent group. Walter, ‘Designing Transitions from Civil War’; Walter, Committing to Peace; Fearon, ‘Why do Some Civil Wars’; Longo and Lust, ‘The Case for Peace Before Disarmament’; Spear, ‘The Disarmament and Demobilisation of Warring Factions’.

78. Phillips, ‘Enemies with Benefits?’; Nilsson, ‘Partial Peace’.

79. Stedman, ‘Spoiler Problems’; Reiter, ‘Does Spoiling Work?’; Reiter, Fighting over peace.

80. Steinert, ‘Spoilers of Peace: Pro-Government Militias’; Aliyev, ‘Pro-Regime Militias and Civil War Duration’; Aliyev, ‘No Peace, No War’.

81. Ghais, ‘Consequences of Excluding Armed Groups’.

82. Barltrop, ‘The Negotiation of Security Issues in Sudan’s Comprehensive Peace Agreement’; Arnold, ‘The South Sudan Defence Force’; Arnold and Alden, ‘This Gun is Our Food’.

83. Joshi and Melander, ‘Explaining Demobilization’; Derouen et al., ‘The Duration of Civil War Peace Agreements’.

84. Humphreys and Weinstein, ‘Demobilization and Reintegration’; Walter, ‘Designing Transitions from Civil War’; Hartzell, ‘Explaining the Stability of Negotiated Settlements to Intrastate Wars’.

85. Gomez-Suarez and Newman, ‘Safeguarding Political Guarantees’.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Andrew Thomson

Andrew Thomson is a Senior Lecturer at Queen’s University Belfast and Fellow at the Institute for Global Peace, Security and Justice in Belfast, Northern Ireland.