The micro-dynamics of conflict and peace: Evidence from Colombia

Abstract

This article introduces the special issue “The Micro-dynamics of Conflict and Peace: Evidence from Colombia.” It contributes to the burgeoning literature on the study of micro-dynamics in peace and conflict studies, with a special empirical focus on the Colombian case. The contributors to the special issue use a variety of methods and interdisciplinary approaches to study questions regarding land tenure and forced displacement during conflict, the assassination of social leaders in post-conflict scenarios, as well as dataset comparability and accuracy in micro-level analyses. They tackle the challenges of micro-level studies of conflict, namely the disconnect between the macro- and the micro-levels, data quality, and generalization. Indeed, although all articles use Colombia in their empirical analyses, the theoretical contributions are broad and general: land tenure structures cause and are caused by conflict dynamics; national policies will be met with violence to preserve local orders; and relatively rich data environments are not as reliable as they might seem. Este artículo presenta el número especial “Las microdinámicas de conflicto y paz: evidencia de Colombia”. Contribuye a la creciente literatura sobre las microdinámicas en los estudios de paz y conflicto, con un enfoque empírico especial en el caso colombiano. Los autores en este número especial usan una variedad de métodos y aproximaciones interdisciplinares para estudiar preguntas acerca de la tenencia de la tierra y el desplazamiento forzado durante el conflicto, el asesinato de líderes sociales en escenarios de posconflicto, así como la comparabilidad y certeza de bases de datos en los análisis a un nivel micro. Los autores enfrentan los retos del estudio a nivel micro del conflicto, a saber: la desconexión entre los niveles macro y micro, la calidad de los datos, y la generalización. En efecto, aunque todos los artículos usan a Colombia en sus análisis empíricos, las contribuciones teóricas son amplias y generales: las estructuras de la tenencia de la tierra causan y son causadas por las dinámicas del conflicto; las políticas nacionales serán enfrentadas con violencia para preservar órdenes locales; y ambientes relativamente ricos en datos no necesariamente son tan fiables como aparentan. Cet article présente le numéro spécial “Les microdynamiques des conflits et de la paix : évidence de la Colombie”. Il contribue à la littérature croissante sur les microdynamiques dans les études sur la paix et les conflits, avec un focus empirique particulier sur le cas colombien. Les auteurs de ce numéro spécial utilisent une variété de méthodes et d'approches interdisciplinaires pour étudier des questions sur le régime foncier et les déplacements forcés pendant les conflits, le meurtre de leaders sociaux dans les situations post-conflit, ainsi que la comparabilité et la certitude des bases de données dans l'analyse à un niveau micro. Les auteurs sont confrontés aux défis de l'étude du conflit au niveau micro, à savoir : la déconnexion entre les niveaux macro et micro, la qualité des données et la généralisation. En effet, bien que tous les articles utilisent la Colombie dans leurs analyses empiriques, les contributions théoriques sont amples et générales : les structures fonciéres causent et sont causées par la dynamique des conflits; les politiques nationales se heurteront à la violence pour préserver l'ordre local; et les environnements relativement riches en données ne sont pas nécessairement aussi fiables qu'ils le paraissent.

Keywords:

• Colombia
• conflict
• micro-dynamics
• post-conflict

Introduction

This special issue contributes to the burgeoning literature on the study of micro-dynamics in peace and conflict studies, with a special empirical focus on the Colombian case. The study of micro-dynamics in conflict and post-conflict scenarios is a fertile and promising avenue of research. Traditional studies of conflict, which are done at a highly aggregated level, fall short of fully understanding the causal mechanisms and micro-level foundations of conflict, as well as the disconnect between the macro- and micro-levels (Haer, Vüllers, and Weidman 2019). Indeed, it can be argued that “at a fundamental level, conflict originates from individuals’ behavior and their interactions with their immediate surroundings, in other words, from its micro-foundations” (Verwimp, Justino, and Brück 2009, 307–308).

Many scholars have taken up the challenge and have furthered our understanding of conflict at the local level. Recent research has focused on the impact of battle diffusion on conflict termination (Ito and Hinkkainen Elliot 2020), the interplay between poverty and conflict vulnerability on civilian participation (Justino 2009), the use of violence as a function of territorial control (Kalyvas 2006; Kalyvas and Kocher 2009), the unintended consequences of UN peacekeeping troop deployment (Peitz and Reisch 2019), reciprocity in the use of violence in protests (Bramsen 2017), the interweaving of gendered institutions and practices of violence (Rigual, Prügl, and Kunz 2022), and the impact of jihadist group involvement in conflict (Bencherif, Campana, and Stockemer 2020), among many others. These studies feature novel data gathering and analysis techniques, as well as original theorizing usually stemming from interdisciplinary approaches.

This type of research has both scholarly and policy implications, as it contributes to knowledge production which could better inform policies aimed at ending conflicts and foster peace. A focus on the micro level “implies enabling those on the margins to represent and defend their interests and recognizes local institutions as significant actors in building peace” (Schierenbeck 2015, 1031). The local turn in peacebuilding, for example, demonstrates how peace is achieved from the bottom-up (Autesserre 2014, 2021). Moreover, business scholars have also begun studying the local turn, striving to show how businesses might create prosperity (Christensen, Ojomo, and Dillon 2019) and how corporations could facilitate peacebuilding (Miklian and Shouten 2019).

Yet, this approach is not without its challenges. Haer, Vüllers, and Weidman (2019) argue that the disaggregation required for micro-level analyses has three potential issues. First, just as with traditional macro-level studies, focusing on micro-dynamics might miss the interplay between the local and the national. Second, collecting data is challenging since micro-level analyses require high-quality, fine-grained data. Typically, data are collected after a conflict has ended and compiled from secondary sources, which, as Weidmann (2015, 2016) explains, might give rise to issues of completeness, bias, and accuracy. Finally, and stemming from the second, the focus on the micro-level usually involves delving deeply and exclusively into a single case, which may impede generalization. Indeed, different datasets may not be comparable.

The articles in this issue tackle these challenges head-on.

Overview of the Special Issue

The four articles in this special issue analyze the micro-dynamics of peace and conflict in recent Colombian history. This collaboration emerged from the first Latin American Peace Science Society (LAPSS) annual conference at Universidad EAFIT (Medellín, Colombia), to which most of the authors and the guest editor attended. As Albarracin et al. (this issue) argue, Colombia is an interesting case for the analysis of conflict micro-dynamics because it bears resemblance to many other cases at the local level: although it is a relatively consolidated democracy at the national level, many of its municipalities are poor, disconnected from the main cities by lack of roads and rugged terrain, and suffer local authoritarian politics and armed-group dominance. Moreover, the Colombian case distinctly shows how national and subnational processes can be at odds with each other: although the 2016 peace agreement between the Colombian government and FARC acknowledges the importance of the local level (e.g., the development program with a territorial focus, or PDET), the local ramifications of the national-level agreement have not been sufficiently examined.

The articles focus on a plethora of actors and issues in the subnational study of conflict to offer a better understanding of how both conflict and post-conflict scenarios develop. The authors advance several fronts in this literature through a variety of methods: formal theory, mixed methods, and interdisciplinary approaches. Although the theoretical contributions are broad and general, the empirical focus is on Colombia. The articles are divided into three broad themes: land and conflict, post-conflict violence, and data issues in micro-level studies.

First, Germán Lambardi and Paola Palacios analyze how land productivity and land use affect forced displacement. Using a game-theoretic model, the authors show how economic considerations may be behind the decision of armed actors to forcibly displace farmers. The state, having limited resources, will only devote forces to sufficiently protect those rural areas that represent a high-enough revenue in terms of taxation. When land plots are very productive but are mostly devoted to subsistence agriculture, they are economically unimportant in the state’s cost-benefit calculus. Forced displacement is thus more likely since a turn to commercial agriculture would provide armed groups with economic benefits, for example through extortion of the businesses that set up operations after farmers flee.

The authors also warn readers about the unintended local-level consequences of well-intentioned national programs. The 1991 constitution recognized the individual and communal rights of ethnic minorities, including collective land ownership of ancestral territories in order to preserve the culture and traditional modes of production of indigenous groups and Afro-Colombians. However, the legislation on collective land titles for ethnic minorities discouraged modern agriculture from being developed in their lands, which then made them more vulnerable to forced displacement, and the authors show evidence of precisely this.

Relatedly, Jose Antonio Fortou, Sandra Johansson, and Juan Carlos Muñoz employ a mixed-methods approach to analyze how patterns of territorial control by armed groups (paramilitaries and rebels) affects land concentration and distribution. Their qualitative analysis of the region of Urabá identified the mechanisms that armed groups use to transfer land, and how their use has evolved over time. The qualitative analysis also informs the quantitative analysis. Regression results show that areas under dispute between different armed actors (paramilitaries and rebels) and those controlled by the paramilitaries have greater land inequality but more land formality. Areas controlled by FARC show the opposite: improved land equality (akin to a small landholder scheme), but more land informality.

Usually, land ownership inequality is studied as a cause for conflict, but the authors show that conflict dynamics also affect land ownership, which provides insights into armed-group governance dynamics. While the paramilitaries used the mechanisms and institutions developed by the Colombian state to transfer land formally (but not necessarily legally), FARC developed their own institutions to effect land reform, a key objective of their armed struggle. However, to do so meant to manage titling informally. We therefore see how both territorial control and ideological differences affect the governance efforts of armed groups.

The third paper focuses on political violence after the 2016 peace agreement between the Colombian government and FARC. Juan Albarracín, Juan Pablo Milanese, Inge Valencia, and Jonas Wolff show how the assassination of social leaders in Colombia is not only due to a weak state presence and the power vacuum left by FARC, but also due to local authoritarian politics. They find that social leaders are more likely to be killed in areas in which the local political elites see an electoral threat to their political dominance emerging from the bottom up. In other words, we see more violence in municipalities where, through new political parties and movements jumping into the fray, electoral competitiveness increased enough to endanger the landslide victory of the local elites. The implication is that war-to-peace transition dynamics are more complex than previously understood. This is because distinguishing between conflict and post-conflict violence is difficult, since the two can co-exist, as they do in the Colombian case.

This paper tackles the challenge of studying micro-dynamics without losing sight of the national level. Notably, the paper concludes that a local consequence of the peace agreement was to embolden grassroots challengers to local authoritarian rulers. Yet, the low provision of security by the state made the path towards a stronger democracy very dangerous for social leaders.

Finally, Javier Osorio studies the quality and comparability of datasets about the Colombian conflict. Procuring fine-grained, high-quality data is difficult, especially in conflict contexts, which is why scholars must make the most out of a poor data environment (Verwimp, Justino, and Brück 2009; Ibáñez and Velásquez 2009). However, recent data gathering efforts have made Colombia a data-rich environment, as there are now multiple datasets with the municipality-year as their unit of analysis. But how reliable are these datasets? And how comparable are they to one another? Using Geographic Information Systems and ecology techniques, the author shows discrepancies between multiple datasets trying to capture the same phenomena (armed actor presence and activity).

The author finds that there are very low levels of similarity between the datasets analyzed, which stems from both measurement differences and missing data. What this implies is that scholars and policymakers must be very careful when selecting datasets for their analysis, as they may arrive at different conclusions simply based on the choice of data. This is critical in the realm of policy-making, as national regulations and programs intended to aid municipalities may have dire unintended consequences, as some of the other special issue papers highlight. In terms of performance, the best dataset in this paper’s comparison is the Violent Presence of Armed Actors (ViPAA), as the models that use it have the least amount of missing data and are favored by the AIC and BIC selection criteria. This dataset was produced by Osorio et al. (2019) through computerized event coding to process human-rights violations narratives geo-locate armed actors. The narratives come from the collection Noche y Niebla by prominent Colombian think thank Centro de Investigación y Educación Popular (CINEP), which has meticulously documented the Colombian conflict for several decades.

Conclusion

Although they address diverse issues, the articles in this special issue share some important aspects. First, two of the articles show how national policies have unintended consequences for local violence. Second, all of them reconsider conventional takes on local conflict dynamics and sheds light on the complexity of the phenomenon: Lambardi and Palacios point our attention to how market mechanisms (or lack thereof) play a role in forced displacement; Fortou, Johansson, and Muñoz argue that land tenure is not only a cause but also a consequence of conflict; Albarracín et al. warn of how local competitive authoritarian orders are kept in place by political assassinations in post-conflict scenarios; and Osorio shows the issues and perils of dataset choice for studying the micro-dynamics of conflict. Finally, all articles use the Colombian case for their empirical analyses, which allows for easy connections to be drawn between them.

Indeed, thanks to the findings from the special issue articles, we can paint a more complete and accurate picture of the violence in Colombia. First, a central assumption in the study of civil violence in Colombia is that land is at its heart. The insight from this issue is that land tenure structure determines and is determined by conflict, which implies the need for both a reconsideration of the history of the Colombian conflict and which should guide peacebuilding and development efforts so as to avoid setting off conflict spirals at the local level. Second, when national policies are instituted to establish a new order at the local level, violence will be used by armed groups, whether on their own or complicitly with local elites, to resist change. That is, unless the locality is sufficiently important to the state to warrant providing a high level of security. This implies that, in ensuring a durable and stable peace, the government should be careful regarding which criteria to use for prioritizing security provision. This is urgent because of the heightened risk that social leaders and grassroots movements currently face. Finally, we must be careful in ensuring that the data environment for Colombia not only becomes richer, but also more reliable. Nevertheless, as the contributors to this issue show, it is possible to use novel sources creatively to collect sufficient data for accurate and meaningful analyses.

Taken together, the articles illustrate the advantages of using diverse methods and interdisciplinary approaches in furthering our understanding of the micro-dynamics of peace and conflict. Although the empirical focus was exclusively on Colombia, and despite the peculiarities of this case, it is easy to see how the insights derived from these works may also hold true for many other cases. Indeed, what this special issue might show is that land tenure structure and local competitive authoritarianisms remain understudied in the civil war literature.