Los nadies y las nadies: The Effect of Peacebuilding on Political Behavior in Colombia

Abstract

How do peacebuilding institutions affect political behavior? This article studies the historic victory of the Colombian left in the 2022 presidential elections in light of the implementation of local peacebuilding programs through the 2016 Peace Accords. Using a quasi-experimental design, we show that the Development Plans with a Territorial Focus (PDET), a central component of the 2016 Peace Accords between the government and the FARC, increased the vote share for the leftist coalition, Pacto Histórico, in the 2022 elections by increasing voter turnout in PDET regions. In a departure from existing literature, we find that the explanatory effect of violence on vote share is significantly reduced when we include an indicator for PDET implementation and additional covariates. While there is a substantial body of work examining the effects of conflict violence and the presence of armed actors on elections, there has been relatively little focus on how the peacebuilding has affected vote choice and political behavior. We see our project as a bridge to fill this gap in the literature.

Incentives War: The Consequences of Announcing a Substitution Policy on Coca Cultivation in Colombia

“…Although FARC's participation and commitments were not explicit in the Peace Agreements, government documents show that the former guerrilla played an active role in promoting the PNIS in municipalities where it had a former presence (Consejería Presidencial para la Estabilización y la Consolidación 2017). The FARC's interest in participating in the program may have been motivated by its political interests through more influence in the rural population who lived off coca to join the program, which capitalize on their political aspirations in the peace-building zones (Balcázar, Varela & Barbosa 2018;Gélvez & Johnson 2023). However, the non-involvement of the guerrilla group as a promoter of the program could affect the legitimacy of the PNIS (Bernal, Gélvez & Garzón 2022), so this was a risk that had to be assumed.…”