Building Local Peace in the Middle of a National War. Community-Based Noncooperation Strategies in Colombia's Civil War

Despite of the high risks involved and the high levels of uncertainty, unarmed civilians organize themselves to collectively defy armed groups in order to avoid displacement, seek protection from violence, reclaim autonomy over daily affairs, and/or build local zones of peace in the middle of war. This paper presents findings from a theory-driven empirical analysis of two communities that, in the midst of Colombia’s civil war, chose noncooperation as a strategy to cope with war and live a life free from armed groups’ violence and rule: the Peace Community of San Jose de Apartadó (PCSJA) and the Peasant Worker Association of the Cararé River (ATCC). Although both are instances of community-based noncooperation strategies, they differ in the form this strategy took: while the PCSJA unilaterally declared itself neutral without any bargaining with armed groups, the ATCC negotiated its noncooperation strategy with armed groups. The aim of the paper is, therefore, twofold: explain what drove these communities to chose noncooperation over other possible responses (e.g. flee, obey, actively collaborate) and explain the determinants of variation in the form of noncooperation. The paper explores rational, moral and emotional considerations behind the choice; attention is paid to both the capacity and the desire to defy armed groups, and both pre-war conditions and processes that are endogenous to war are analyzed. The study draws on both quantitative and qualitative data. A dataset on violent events at the village level and two rounds of fieldwork, including individual and group interviews and memory workshops, inform the analysis of both the emergence of noncooperation and its variation. These findings are the basis of a larger research project that aims to theorize the emergence and sustenance of community-based forms on non-cooperation in irregular civil war as grassroots efforts to build and sustain peace in the middle of war.