Walking together: Healing and hope for Colombian refugees

History and Context of Forced
Displacement in Colombia
Colombians come to Canada for a variety of reasons - some come for economic reasons, as workers
or professionals, others come as members of Canadian families, and others come seeking safety, as
refugees. Colombians that flee Colombia as refugees do so because they can no longer live safely in their
country. For a Colombian to receive refuge in Canada through the Canadian Government’s Humanitarian
Protection Program, he or she must prove that they were living under serious threat of death and could
no longer live in any part of Colombia.
The journey to Canada for most Colombian refugees begins with forced displacement from their original
homes, farms, towns or cities. Forced displacement usually involves loss of land, home, jobs, belongings,
educational pursuits, dreams, friends, community, social ties, and all sense of security. In order to better
understand the variety of factors that cause forced displacement in Colombia, it is helpful to understand
the history and context of the armed conflict in Colombia.
HISTORY
In the 200 years since Colombia became a Republic, the population has only enjoyed five years of
relative peace. 1 It is a society of victims and perpetrators, with a blurred distinction between one and the
other. The diverse forms of violence affect Colombian people as individuals, but also as a whole society;
millions of people are affected simultaneously by the same realities. In a society that suffers collective
traumatization, where everyone seems to carry too much fear and pain to live truly healthy lives, healing
will also need to unfold collectively.
Although the root causes of the Colombian conflict lie in the structures of exploitation and exclusion
generated after the Spanish invasion in the early 1500s, the current internal armed conflict started with
the unsatisfactory resolution of the civil war, called “La Violencia,” between Conservatives and Liberals
that tore the country apart between 1948 and the late 1950s. Insurgent or guerrilla groups formed
during the mid 1960s in response to the economic exclusion and political intolerance perpetrated
by the peace agreements signed by the Conservative and Liberal elites in 1957. Two main insurgent
groups, FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) and the ELN (National Liberation Army) gained
1. The History section has been adapted by Bonnie Klassen from her previous publication, Klassen, B., (2006) Opening Space for
Healing in Colombia, in Peacebuilding in Traumatized Societies, and the MCC Colombia Field Guide.