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ABSTRACT
In Colombia, the engagement of Afrodescendants in the political field opened up by multiculturalism has generated sociopolitical realities that require a careful examination of the relations among ethnoracial ‘minority’ groups and between them and state institutions. Guamal, a town in the Colombian Andes, has been seen as mainly populated by descendants of enslaved Africans who have had history of sociocultural and economic interactions with indigenous communities, including disputes over land ownership. This paper examines the use of various ‘multicultural’ legal instruments and institutional mechanisms in disputes provoked by multicultural recognition. It focuses on a series of litigations between the town’s Afrodescendant community council and the indigenous authorities of cabildo Cañamomo-Lomaprieta. In 2013, the indigenous authorities filed a legal action claiming that the state should have consulted their communities prior to recognition of the Afrodescendant council because such administrative measure directly affected their well-being. Through analysis of the formalization of the Afrodescendant community council and the tutelage claim filed by an indigenous governor in the case, this article shows how, after 28 years of multiculturalism, ethnoracial minorities have developed a wide range of skills and politico-legal strategies that allow them to claim rights and legitimize their forms of authority and organization.
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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1. ‘Multiculturalism’ is understood here as a state modus operandi more so than as a utopian project for the distant future; see this special issue’s introduction.
2. Cabildos were introduced during the colonial era in Hispanic America and the Philippines as a local neighborhood system of representation. They were later incorporated as a representational structure by indigenous communities to administer territory and organize social life. Currently, cabildos are considered the highest authority of local government, as a form of exercising indigenous autonomy from the Colombian State.
3. My usage of ‘ethnoracial’ in this article is in line with the usage of that term made by the Observatory of Justice for Afrodescendants in Latin America (OJALA), which focuses on the application of ‘ethnoracial legal instruments’ in the context of Latin American justice systems’ practices and specific legal cases. The ‘ethnoracial legal instruments’ they focus on are of two kinds: 1) those that recognize collective rights to Afrodescendants, usually over territory and; 2) those that protect Afrodescendants against racial discrimination. When considering Afrodescendants in the region, it is difficult to separate what is considered more cultural (lo étnico) from the consequences of racialization (lo racial).The work of Eduardo Restrepo (Citation2013) on the ethnicization of blackness in Colombia that the multicultural turn brought about would further justify such usage. This combination of lo étnico and lo racial is also emphasized in the work of the PCN (Proceso de Comunidades Negras), which is very much focused on Afro-Colombian local realities – particularly in the Pacific region – while also proclaiming solidarity with Afrodescendants everywhere.
4. This article emerges out of my doctoral dissertation entitled: ‘Imbricaciones identitarias. The ethnic uses of territory in Guamal, Caldas, Colombia’ (Lara Largo Citation2019). My research is based on documentary research and ethnographic work conducted between 2013 and 2017 with Guamal’s ethnic organizations: the indigenous cabildo of Cañamomo-Lomaprieta and the Afrodescendant community council of Guamal. I especially thank the leaders of these organizations for their accompaniment and the inhabitants of Guamal for accepting me within their community life. Without their generous support, I could not have defended a dissertation or written this article.
5. Veredas are a unit of territorial subdivision that depends administratively and politically on municipal entities. In most cases the veredas have served to group and organize geographically the rural areas surrounding the urban centers. Some are also located on the roads that connect the most densely populated centers.
6. The authorities of Cañamomo-Lomaprieta trace the foundation of their defense to the royal cedula issued by Carlos I of Spain on 10 March 1540, while other sources locate in 1627 the creation of the resguardos of the area, during the visit of the Spanish hearer Lesmes de Espinoza y Saravia (Lopera-Mesa Citation2010, 68).
7. This Afro-Indigenous ‘double consciousness’ (Du Bois (Citation(1903) 2007)) is not lived as a contradiction with the Afrodescendant identity that they also emulate.
8. According to article 86 of the Constitution and more precisely decree 2591 of 1991: ‘Every person will have a tutelage right to claim before the judges, at any time and place, through a preferential and summary procedure, by itself or by anyone acting in his/her name, for the immediate protection of his/her fundamental constitutional rights, whenever these are violated by the action or omission of any public authority or of the individuals in the cases indicated in this Decree. All days and hours are good for filing for tutelage’. It is a subsidiary, residual, and autonomous action that aims to guarantee equality and legal security. Tutelage claims are known in other countries as a remedy of amparo or ‘amparo lawsuit,’ even though its characteristics are specific and vary depending on each national context.
9. The prior consultation was regulated by Convention 169 of the International Labor Organization and adopted by the government of Colombia through Law 21 of 1991. Colombia was the first country in the region to address the implementation of prior consultation of indigenous and Afrodescendant communities through Decree 1320 of 1998, within the framework of projects for the exploitation of natural resources within their territories. This decree established the concept of direct involvement in relation to the effects produced on the indigenous territories as well as in the situations in which the consultation should take place. The Ministry of the Interior is responsible for the protocols for prior consultation in Colombia. Prior consultation processes are a right of indigenous and Afrodescendant communities that allow them to know, determine, and agree on actions against projects or activities that take place in their territories and that threaten to affect their ethnic and cultural integrity.
10. All the authorities of country are subject to review before the Constitutional Court; however, that court can decide whether they should be reviewed or not.
11. Regarding this issue, the Constitutional Court stated that: ‘the possible award by the state to the community of Guamal of a portion of land legally belonging to the indigenous resguardo, leads to a clear conflict involving fundamental rights such as collective property, due process and the ethnic and cultural diversity, among others, of both groups. Under this understanding, the consultation process should have been carried out since, as noted, the problem was not limited to the lands that were inhabited but to issues such as education and even works that benefit both communities, among many others. This, coupled with the fact that the adjudication process is translated into an administrative measure that directly affects the two ethnic groups. This would be a prior consultation in which issues that involve the rights and interests of both communities should be discussed. Otherwise, it would constitute a violation of the right to due process of the community of Guamal to allow the resguardo and other entities sued, to decide without having consulted the Afrodescendant group (Constitutional Court Citation2014, 2).
12. The Negroide Carnival of Guamal is a popular festival that takes place every two years and is celebrated during the last week of December. It is considered by Guamaleños as the maximum expression of their Afrodescendant culture. To hold this celebration, they receive financial support from different authorities, such as those from the municipality of Supía and the Ministry of Culture. However, the most important sponsor of the festival is currently the indigenous cabildo of Cañamomo-Lomaprieta who, through their support, explicitly recognize the cultural diversity that characterizes their territory. Most of the members of the Afrodescendant community council of Guamal consider that this support should not take place, given that it is contradictory with the ethnic character of the Guamal population, which they consider to be exclusively Afrodescendent. However, a great majority of Guamaleños, as well as the external visitors and the inhabitants of the different indigenous and peasant communities of the region, actively participate in the celebration and find that the support of the indigenous cabildo for the celebration is natural. Likewise, the majority of Guamaleños affirm that this support does not seek in any way to obscure the Afrodescendant cultural manifestations through any imposition of indigenous culture.
13. William Moreno is about 60 years old. He is a member of Guamal’s community and was one of the principal proponents of the creation and formalization of the Afrodescendant community council of Guamal. In 2015, he was a candidate for the mayor of the municipality of Supía for the Cambio Radical party.
14. There were representatives from the Governor of Caldas, the offices of the Mayor of Supía and INCODER – Caldas, and different arms of the Ministry of Interior.
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Sofía Lara-Largo
Sofía Lara-Largo, PhD. Anthropology and Sociology, University of Paris. Master in Anthropology at the School of Higher Studies in Social Sciences of Paris -EHESS. Professor at Anthropology and Sociology department of the University of Caldas, Manizales, Colombia.