1. Public - Private Partnerships for peacebuilding.
An analysis towards the reparation of the victims in Colombia
Ana Maria Salinas Bojacá
Master Thesis supervised by
Dr. Mariana Delgado Barón
August 2016

2. 2
Abstract
Colombia has been the scenario of one of the longest wars in the world that has left almost 8
million victims and has impacted negatively the social, political and economic structures of
the country. Due to the different efforts of peacebuilding of the last decades, Colombia is
going through a costly process of reconstruction and reconciliation that demands the
implementation of innovative strategies. One of these mechanisms is the involvement of the
private sector in peacebuilding through the Public Private Partnerships – PPPs, in which
Colombia is a pioneer country. Precisely, because of its resources, knowhow and networking,
these partnerships have become into a fundamental element of the Colombian Infrastructure
for Peace.
In this context, one of the main challenges of peacebuilding is the ambitious governmental
plan for the reparation of the victims, which due to its magnitude and complexity has required
the inclusion of the PPPs strategy. The present paper analyses the dynamics of the PPPs as a
mechanism of peacebuilding in Colombia, emphasizing the experiences in the victim´s
reparation, the principal characteristics of this process and the challenges and opportunities
to the future.
Resúmen
Colombia ha sido el escenario de una de las guerras más largas del mundo que ha dejado casi
ocho millones de víctimas y ha impactado negativamente las estructuras sociales, políticas y
económicas del país. Debido a los diferentes esfuerzos de construcción de paz de las últimas
décadas, Colombia está atravesando un costoso proceso de reconstrucción y reconciliación
que exige la aplicación de estrategias innovadoras. Uno de estos mecanismos es la
participación del sector privado en los procesos de construcción de paz a través de las
Alianzas Público-Privadas - APP, en las que Colombia es un país pionero. Precisamente,
debido a sus recursos, knowhow y networking, las APPs se han convertido en un elemento
fundamental de la Infraestructura para la paz de Colombia.
En este contexto, uno de los principales desafíos de la construcción de paz es el ambicioso
plan gubernamental para la reparación de las víctimas, que, por su magnitud y complejidad,
ha requerido la inclusión de la estrategia de las APPs. El presente trabajo analiza la dinámica
de las APP como mecanismos de construcción de paz en Colombia, haciendo hincapié en las
experiencias de reparación a las víctimas, las principales características de este proceso y los
desafíos y oportunidades para el futuro.

3. 3
Contents
Abstract............................................................................................................................................... 2
Introduction ........................................................................................................................................ 6
Chapter 1. Peace and peacebuilding: a broad concept beyond the absence of war.......................... 8
1. Colombia: a brief mapping of manifestations of “structural and invisible violence” ................... 10
Violence expressed in poverty and inequality ..................................................................... 10
Violence in the access to the Basic Human needs ............................................................... 11
2. Ouroboro: the vicious circle between the structural and the direct violence.............................. 12
3. The numbers of the direct violence in the “longest war of Latino America” ............................... 13
4. Peacebuilding: Changing the violent structures............................................................................ 15
5. Infrastructures for peace I4P: A multidimensional and collective construction........................... 17
Colombian Infrastructure for Peace: reparation of the victims........................................... 18
Victim´s reparation as part of the peacebuilding process ................................................... 19
6. The need of new stakeholders in the I4P focused on the reparation of the victims.................... 21
Chapter 2. Public Private Partnerships: an innovative element of the Infrastructure for Peace ..... 23
1. A conceptualization of the PPPs for peacebuilding ...................................................................... 25
2. Methodology: Conditions of the PPPs for peacebuilding and the reparation of victims in
Colombia ........................................................................................................................................... 26
3. PPPs for peacebuilding: An overview of Social Map..................................................................... 28
4. The statistics of social investment in Colombia ............................................................................ 29
Chapter 3. General assessment of the Colombia strategy of PPPs for peacebuilding and the
reparation of the victims................................................................................................................... 34
1. Assessment under the protocol to have effective partnerships................................................... 34
Needs assessment, ascertain mandate, manage expectations............................................ 34
Creation of the structure to enable participation and impart ownership ........................... 37

4. 4
Building capacity................................................................................................................... 38
Sustainability ........................................................................................................................ 38
2. The PPPs in action: experiences in peacebuilding and reparation of the victims......................... 38
Peace shops.......................................................................................................................... 38
Economic and Social Reconstruction of El Salado................................................................ 40
Social Partnership for the Alto San Jorge............................................................................. 42
3. Analysis of the engagement of business from an econometric evaluation.................................. 43
PPP’s and the origins of the conflict..................................................................................... 45
PPPs and the presence and intensity of conflict .................................................................. 47
PPPs and the location of conflict.......................................................................................... 49
PPPs and the other stakeholders ......................................................................................... 50
PPPs and the characteristics of the companies.................................................................... 51
Conclusions ....................................................................................................................................... 53
Bibliography ...................................................................................................................................... 56
Appendix 1. ....................................................................................................................................... 63

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List of abbreviations
Agencia Colombiana para la Reintegración -ACR
Corporate Social Responsability -CSR
Department for Social Prosperity - DPS
Development Bank of Latin America - CAF
Infrastructures for peace - I4P
Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender -LGBT
Millennium Development Goals -MDG
Multidimensional Poverty Index -MPI
National Administrative Department of Statistics -DANE
Non-governmental organization - NGOs
Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development -OECD
Public Private Partnerships – PPPs
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia - FARC
The National Service of Learning -SENA
Unit for Attention and Reparation of Victims - UATV
United Nations -UN
United Nations Development Program -UNDP

6. 6
Introduction
During the last six decades Colombia has been at the center of an armed conflict that has
produced one of “the worst humanitarian and human rights crises in the world” (Christian
Aid , 2016). The statistics of the called “Latin-America’s longest war” are astonishing
(Vargas & Symmes Cobb, 2016). According to the Unit for Attention and Reparation of
Victims, in the frame of the armed conflict almost eight million Colombians have been
victims of “murders, kidnappings, displacements, forced disappearances, threats, tortures,
forced recruitment and different kinds of sexual violence” (Unidad de Víctimas, 2016)
However, since November 2012, the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed
Forces of Colombia –FARC “have progressed positively in the peace negotiations which are
predicted will end in 2016 with the sign of a final agreement” (BBC, 2015). With this
projection it seems that the end of the armed conflict finally could be close, but this is just
the beginning of a challenging process of peacebuilding.
In this context, the reparation of the victims is one of the main challenges that the government
faces. As was announced in a study done by Harvard University, “the dimensions and the
complexity of the reparation process exceed the economic and administrative capacities of
the government, subsequently is it likely to emerge possible future problems in terms of the
size of the expectations and the difficulty of complying with them" (Segura, 2014).
Regarding this situation, the private sector has had a fundamental role. The Colombian
government “has implemented several mechanisms of Public Private Partnerships -PPPs to
promote schemes in which is possible to articulate the resources, knowhow, strengths and
the capabilities of public and private actors to perform efficient actions oriented towards the
improvement of the quality of life of the vulnerable populations, among others, the victims
of the violence” (Departamento para la Prosperidad Social, 2015, p. 12).
Therefore, the present paper aims to generate a better comprehension of the dynamics of the
Public-Private Partnerships -PPPs in the reparation of the victims as one of the main
challenges of the peacebuilding process in Colombia.
In order to achieve this objective, the document is organized in three main sections: Chapter
1. Peace and peacebuilding: a broad concept beyond the absence of war, Chapter 2. Public
Private Partnerships: an innovative element of Infrastructure for Peace, and finally, Chapter
3. General assessment of the Colombia strategy of PPPs for peacebuilding and the reparation
of the victims.
The first chapter of the document incorporates a theoretical framework related with the
concepts of peace, peacebuilding and Infrastructures of Peace. Firstly, it is elaborated the
distinction between the narrow and the broad concepts of peace and violence in order to
understand the complex dynamics of peacebuilding in Colombia.
In the following segments it is included a brief mapping of manifestations of the structural
and the direct violence and a review of the statistics of the conflict. This information is

7. 7
fundamental to recognize the vicious circle established between the structural and the direct
violence as the origin of the Colombian armed conflict.
Finally, after considering the concepts of peacebuilding and the Infrastructures for Peace -
I4P, these terms are applied in the analysis of the structures, measures and mechanisms that
are part of the reparation process in Colombia. There is an emphasis in the innovative
strategies to overcome the challenges through the involvement of the private sector.
In the second chapter it is studied the role that the private sector is playing in supporting
peacebuilding efforts in conflict and post-conflict areas. Afterwards, in the section of the
methodology are explained the quantitative and qualitative approaches that were
implemented to understand the role of the PPPs in the peacebuilding process, specifically in
the reparation of the victims. Since the analysis is based on the platform “Mapa Social” or
“Social Map”, this chapter also includes an overview of this strategy and of the statistics of
the social investment in Colombia.
Lastly, in the third chapter it is developed an assessment of the Colombian PPPs under the
protocol to have effective partnerships. This diagnostic allows the identification of the main
challenges, obstacles and the advances in the topic. Moreover, the assessment includes the
analysis of three experiences in the reparation of the victims: “Tiendas de Paz” or “Peace
Shops”, “The Economic and Social Reconstruction of El Salado” and the “Social Partnership
for the Alto San Jorge”.
The document finalizes with an analysis of the engagement of business from an econometric
evaluation in order to understand the conditions under which the PPP’s have been operating
in the case of Colombia. This segment takes into account the relation of the PPP with the
origins of the conflict, the presence and intensity of conflict, the location of conflict, the other
stakeholders and the characteristics of the companies. In this last section are identified the
trends in the implementation of PPPs in the Colombian context.
Even though there are several studies on the role of the private sector in peacebuilding, there
are not many academic researches that focused on the experiences of PPPs. In the other hand,
Colombia is a pioneer country in the implementation of this type of mechanisms in the
context of the construction of peace and the reparation of the victims, reason why the case
offers an unexplored opportunity of investigation.
The conclusions of this paper that reflect the findings related to the principal advances, the
challenges and the opportunities to the future, have the aim to serve as base for further
researches and as an academic antecedent for the formulation of public policies related with
the topic of analysis.

8. 8
Chapter 1. Peace and peacebuilding: a broad concept beyond the absence of war
In principle, peace is a broad and ambiguous concept that apparently has an implicit positive
value, independently of the assigned meaning. Nevertheless, a narrow comprehension of
peace can paradoxically generate negative social, political and economic conditions. For this
reason and for the purposes of the present paper, it is necessary to make a distinction between
the narrow and the broad concepts of peace and violence in order to understand the complex
dynamics of peacebuilding in Colombia.
Generally, “peace is understood as the opposite of war” (Galtung, 1990, p. 293). However,
this simplistic and “narrow concept recognizes peace as the negation of physic and direct
violence, while ignores that there are important interconnections among different types of
invisible violence” (Galtung, 1990, p. 293). If peace is just the absence of war, and peace is
the main objective, even dictatorships or unequal societies can be peaceful. In this context,
peace degenerates in an equivoque comprehension of reality. To overcome this issue, it is
necessary to establish a positive extension of the concept of peace that goes beyond a “merely
list of undesirables” (Galtung, 1990, p. 293).
According to Johan Galtung, “violence are avoidable insults to Basic Human Needs, and
more generally to life, lowering the real level of needs satisfaction below what is potentially
possible” (Galtung, 1969, p. 168). These human essentials refer to “survival needs where the
negation represents death or mortality; well-being needs where violence represent misery or
morbidity; identity needs where negation is alienation; and freedom needs in which the
affectation is expressed in repression” (Galtung, 1990, p. 292).
In this order of ideas, peace denotes an “ecological balance”, term that applies to the “system
maintenance” of the social, political and economic structures (Galtung, 1990, p. 292).
Consequently, the “ecological balance” corresponds to the satisfactory and positive sum of
“survival + well-being + freedom + identity human needs” (Galtung, 1990, p. 292). At
applying this theory, if this principle is not satisfied, “the result is ecological degradation,
breakdown, imbalance”, in other words, conflict and war. In the opposite case, if the principle
of the balance is accomplished, the resulted state will be peace.
In consequence, first of all, violence should not be understood just from a physic dimension
where “an actor intends to generate a somatic incapacitation or deprivation of health”, but
also from the “psychological aspect where the actors aim to constrain human action” through
an affectation of the mind (Galtung, 1969, p. 170). This physiological violence also decreases
the individual or collective potentials, generating violations to the basic needs.
Moreover, Galtung also affirms that “the difference between the potential and the actual”, is
not just result of a direct type of violence where there is a “subject who perpetrates a violent
action to affect an individual or group of individuals (object of the act) (Galtung, 1969).
According to the author, there are cases of violence “where either subject or object or both
are apparently absent” or at least their identification is not evident. In these cases, this
invisible violence, which Galtung denominates as structural, generates the same results:
death, misery and alienation, among others (Galtung, 1969).

9. 9
Finally, this dynamic of direct and structural manifestations “is usually legitimized by a
violence installed in the deepest roots of the society and its different cultural expressions: art,
ideology, language”, among others (Galtung, 1990, p. 291). This violence denominated as
cultural, usually justifies the direct and structural affectations to the “Basic Human Needs”.
The different expressions of violence can be represented in a “vicious triangle” in which the
direct acts interact with the structural and the cultural levels of violence. (Galtung, 1990, p.
291). This mutual interaction between the different kind of violence broke the “ecological
balance” creating war.
The adoption of this broad concept of violence brings a vision of a positive peace, not just as
the absence of war but also as the absence of structural and cultural violence (Dilts, & others,
2012, p7). In the Graph 1., it is explained this cyclic relationship established between the
different types of violence in the case of Colombia. For instance, poverty and exclusion
(Structural violence) are directly related with the origins of the conflict (direct violence). In
the other way around, the different crimes committed during the armed conflict (direct
violence) intensify the poverty and the inequality (Structural violence). All this process is
supported by a culture of confrontations and the inexistence of social channels of dialogue
and reconciliation.
Graph 1. Galtung’s Model of Conflict, violence and peace. Case: Colombia (a).
Note (s): (a)This model is a graphic representation of the Triangle of Violence stablished by Johan Galtung in
his work Cultural Violence adapted to the Colombian case. (Galtung, 1990, p. 291)
In the next sections, it will be analyzed the dynamics of the direct, the structural and the
cultural violence in the case of Colombia in order to understand the challenges of
peacebuilding.

10. 10
1. Colombia: a brief mapping of manifestations of “structural and invisible violence”
In the case of Colombia, as in other countries in conflict, violence has been “built into the
structure and shows up as unequal power and consequently as unequal life chances”
(Galtung, 1969, p. 171). Therefore, the distribution of resources is the best indicator of the
structural violence which express itself in high levels of poverty and inequality, low levels of
education and health, among others. (Galtung) Moreover, one of the most relevant and
determinant indicators of this kind of violence is the “unevenly distribution of power to
decide over the distribution of the other resources” (Galtung, 1969, p. 171).
Violence expressed in poverty and inequality
The manifestations of the structural violence in the case of Colombia are evident. Even
though the levels of poverty and inequality have decreased radically during the last decades,
there is still a large number of people which are not able to satisfy their Basic Human Needs,
especially, the ones related with the survival and wellbeing dimensions.
Between 2002 and 2015, there was a reduction of almost 22 percentage points in the
incidence of the monetary poverty, decreasing from 49,7% to 27,8% (DANE, 2015).
Similarly, the incidence of the extreme poverty decreased from 17,7% in 2002 to 7,9% in
2015 (DANE). However, even if “Colombia achieved with a year in advance the goal
established in the Millennium Development Goals -MDG”, the numbers show a worrying
reality. From the 48 million of Colombians, 13 million are still poor and 3,8 million are still
living in extreme poverty (UNDP, 2015, p. 15).
Besides, poverty in Colombia is concentrated in the rural zones where the incidence of
monetary poverty is 40,3% and of the extreme poverty is 18%, numbers considerable high
with respect to the national average (DANE, 2015). This gap between the urban and the rural
zones is also evident in the Multidimensional Poverty Index - MPI, which takes into account
“five dimensions: education, health, employment, conditions of children and teenagers and
access to public services” (DANE, 2012). While the national average is 20,2%, the incidence
of the MPI is 40% in the rural zones and 14,4 urban areas (DANE, 2015).
Regarding the levels of inequality, according to the World Bank, Colombia ranks seventh in
the global level and second in Latin America with a Gini Index of 53,5 (World Bank, 2016).
In consequence, even though Colombia has reduced the levels of poverty in the last decades,
it is still one of most unequal countries in the world. “In Colombia the richest 10% of the
population earns four times more than the poorest 40%” (BBC Mundo, 2016).
Finally, it is necessary to analyze the concentration of the land, one of the principal issues in
the country. According to UNDP, “in 2009 the Gini Index of the property of the land was
0,86, which represents one of the highest levels of inequality not just in Latino America but
worldwide” (Centro de Estudios Estratégicos Latinoamericanos – CEELAT , 2016). Some
studies affirm that the “the 52% of the land is owned by the 1,5% of the population”
(Portafolio , 2011), others that “the 77% is in hands of the 13% the population” (Revista
Semana, 2016). Nevertheless, all the statistics point out the severity of the inequality in this
dimension which is also related with the low level of quality of life and the high levels of
poverty in the rural zones.

11. 11
Violence in the access to the Basic Human needs
Other structural expressions of violence in the terms of Galtung could be analyzed through
the performance of the country in international indexes. For instance, the MGDs point out
the challenges in different dimensions. In relation with the levels of unemployment, the
statistics show a decrease from 11,5% in May of 2007 to 8,8% in May of 2016 (DANE,
2016). In this case, the dynamics of unemployment affects the most to women, young and
poor. According to the Report 2015 of the United Nations Development Program -UNDP, in
2014, the national unemployment rate was 9,1% (UNDP, 2015, p. 17). However, there is a
considerable difference between different groups, while the rate for males was 7%, for
women was 11,9 % (UNDP, 2015, p. 17).
The rate of analphabet has also decreased considerably. While in 1985 was 13,5%
(MinEducación , 2016) in 2015 was 5,8% (El Tiempo, 2015). At considering the levels of
education, Colombia has universal basic education service but still has a partial coverage of
the medium level (UNDP, 2015, p. 20). As could be expected, the coverage of medium
education is lower in the rural zones due to “the insecurity, the risks, the absence of
transportation and infrastructures” (UNDP, 2015, p. 21) Finally, talking about the superior
education, the coverage raised from 30,0% in 2006 to 49,4% in 2015 (MinEducación, 2016).
Regarding the performance in health, according to the Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development, OECD, “the coverage of the health insurance increased from
23,5% in 1993 to 96,6% in 2014, which means that almost all the Colombians have access
to the services” (OECD, 2016). This improvement was focus on poor population and rural
zones (OECD, 2016). Despite the advances, the principal challenge is the improvement of
the quality of services, which is still lower for segregated communities (OECD, 2016).
Finally, regarding the infrastructure and the access to the public services, the challenges are
also palpable. “The provision of the basic public services, potable water and sewage system,
hides huge differences between the regions and the rural and the urban zones” (UNDP, 2015,
p. 40) While almost the 100% of the urban zones has access to the services, 28% of the rural
population does not have potable water, which means than more than 3 million Colombians
are exposed to diseases and contaminated sources (El Tiempo, 2015).
It is important to mention also, that this type of vertical (between individuals) and horizontal
(between groups) inequality, as expression of structural violence, tends to reproduce itself
“creating a vicious circle related with the poverty traps” (Stewart, 2009, p. 323). “Adults with
low level of satisfaction of the Basic Human Needs in health, education and nutrition, for
instance, tend to have low earnings. Their children then are likely to have also a low access
to the needs since the low incomes make it difficult to provide for the health and nutrition of
children” (Stewart, 2009, p. 323). This situation generates a reproduction of violence within
the structures and increases the difference between the potential and the actual state of the
Colombian society.

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2. Ouroboro: the vicious circle between the structural and the direct violence
The structural dynamics of violence mentioned in the last sections are part of the complex
explanations of the origins of the conflict in Colombia. Even if there is not a unique consensus
about the causes of the conflict, the structural violence is a fundamental element of analysis.
In the case of Colombia, all the structural symptoms interacted and still interact between each
other creating the “root causes of violent conflict” (Galtung, 1990). In this sense, the
structural violence was the base of the manifestations of direct violence, which paradoxically,
has been also the cause of the reproduction and persistence of the structural issues. At the
end, war results in a “particular form of orchestrated violence” based on this cyclical
relationship (Galtung, 1990, p. 293).
This interaction could be represented through the image of the ouroboros, “a serpent or
dragon eating its own tail which symbolizes cyclicality or infinity” (Oxford Dictionaries,
2016). Precisely, the structural and the direct violence could be symbolized as the head and
the tail of the serpent. In this image it is difficult to identify which are the causes and which
are the consequences, since the structural and the direct violence, could be both at the same
time.
Theoretically, inequality “between regions, zones and ethnic and cultural groups is an
important source of conflict, especially where they are consistent across the economic, social
and political dimensions” (Stewart, 2010, pág. 33) At the same time, inequalities generate
“instability and social mobilizations to political protest, which in some cases like in
Colombia, Côte d’Ivoire, Rwanda, Northern Ireland, Nepal, Chiapas, and Sudan, evolved
into an armed conflict” (Stewart, 2009, p. 317). In summary, how is expected, “political or
economic exclusion, horizontal inequalities and discrimination, break the “ecological
balance” and undermine sustainable peace” (United Nations, 2012, p. 12)
Precisely, regarding the historical explanation of the apparition of the FARC in Colombia, it
is possible to find clear references to the symptoms of the structural violence. The follow
extract is part of the statements of the FARC about their origin and objectives. “For various
historical reasons, Colombia has a past of State political violence and armed rebellions, which
were also the expression of power monopolization by the bourgeois and landlord classes and
the exercise of a land dispossession policy in favor of big landowners. Our first political
declaration, known as the Agrarian Program of the Guerrilla Fighters, states that we have
risen up in arms because the doors to a legal, peaceful and democratic political struggle were
closed in our country” (FARC-EP, 2016) .
In the same way, in the framework of the peace process, in 2014 was created the Historical
Commission of the Conflict and its Victims. “The Commission composed by twelve experts
and two rapporteurs, had the mission of producing a report on the origins and the multiple
causes of conflict, the main factors and conditions that have contributed to their persistence,
and the impacts most notorious on the population” (Equipo de Paz Gobierno , 2016).
Almost all the experts focused their reports on inequality, social injustice and the severe
agricultural issues, others included the absence of political pluralism and the concentration

13. 13
of the political power as objective causes. Others analyzed the institutional weakness and the
collapse of the State in its mission of guaranteeing the population rights (VerdadAbierta,
2015). These arguments point out the different structural manifestations of the violence as
the origin of the “ecological imbalance” or the conflict in Colombia.
3. The numbers of the direct violence in the “longest war of Latino America”
7.809.143 victims of the conflict are the result of the dynamic of violence in Colombia. This
means that almost the 16% of the Colombians has been affected at least by one or more
manifestations of direct violence during the internal armed conflict (Unidad de Víctimas,
2016). These victims have denounced around 9.310.303 crimes, which are disaggregated in
the table 1. below.
Table 1. Victims of the violence by gender
Crime Victims N of events Women Men LGBT/NR
Forced abandonment or Land Dispossession 10.467 11.464 3.433 3.300 3.734
Terrorist act/ Combats/ Harassment 90.568 96.937 37.681 49.590 3.297
Threat 309.147 324331 158.537 147.509 3.101
Crimes against sexual freedom and integrity 15.236 15748 13.692 1.167 377
Enforced disappearances Direct:46.041
Indirect:
116.735
172234 74.929 85.439 2.408
Displacement 6.849.277 7.458.666
Murder Direct:265.829,
Indirect:
707.172
1051308 448.352 510.417 14.232
Landmines, Cluster Munitions, and
Unexploded Ordnances
11.002 11674 1.043 9.845 114
Loss personal property 106.238 115296 44.801 46.941 14.496
Kidnapping Direct:28.520,
Indirect: 3.780
33496 7.479 24.219 602
No Information 43 43 13 30
Torture 9.879 9982 3.771 5.909 199
Conscription of children in armed conflict 7.984 9.124 2.523 5.273 188
Total 7.809.143 9.310.303 3.876.481 3.872.27
3
60.389
Note (s): Table made by the autor using the information of the Registro Único de Víctimas (RUV) | RNI - Red Nacional de
Información. August 2016.
The direct violence “has forcibly displaced more than 6.8 million Colombians, generating
the world’s second largest population of internally displaced persons (IDPs) after Syria”
(Human Rights Watch, 2016). This situation that affected almost the 14% of the total of the
Colombian population, has incremented the manifestations of structural violence while
increasing poverty, misery and decreasing the access to the different Basic Human Needs.
According to a survey made by the National Administrative Department of Statistics -DANE
“at least six out of ten displaced live in poverty and three out of ten are in extreme poverty”
(El Tiempo, 2015).
Of the total victims of direct violence 49,64% are women, 49,58% men and 0.78% are part

14. 14
of the LGBT Community or not registered the gender (Unidad de Víctimas, 2016). In this
frame, women are more affected that men by forced abandonment or land dispossession,
crimes against sexual freedom and integrity, threats and displacement as is showed in the
Table 1.
Regarding the ethnic pertinence of the victims of direct violence, afro Colombian and
indigenous communities are the most affected. The 9.11% of the total of victims are afro
Colombians and 2,5% are part of indigenous communities (Unidad de Víctimas, 2016). This
situation confirms also the interaction of the structural and the direct violence, that in the case
of Colombia, affects the most to these communities.
Table 2. Victims of the violence ethnic group
Crime Indigenous ROM Raizal San
Andrés y
Providencia
Afrocolombiano(a) Palenquero None
Forced abandonment or
Land Dispossession
79 5 3 360 1 10.019
Not information 2 41
Murder 7.612 1.458 2.758 28.197 87 932.889
Loss personal property 3.495 119 534 10.608 43 91.439
Enforced disappearances 1.792 315 232 6.349 17 154.071
Kidnapping 308 40 97 1.342 31 30.482
Torture 144 18 18 496 2 9.201
Crimes against sexual
freedom and integrity
260 48 20 1.784 4 13.120
Conscription of children
in armed conflict
133 14 6 204 7.627
Terrorist act/ Combats/
Harassment
3.693 122 312 12.893 39 73.509
Threat 4.905 382 229 30.727 112 272.792
Landmines, Cluster
Munitions, and
Unexploded Ordnances
323 5 32 349 3 10.290
Displacement 170.974 29.115 6.994 694.342 880 5.946.972
Total 175.453 29.390 9.605 711.867 1.024 6.881.804
Note (s): Table made by the autor using the information of the Registro Único de Víctimas (RUV) | RNI - Red Nacional de
Información. August 2016.
All these expressions of direct violence clearly affect the survival, wellbeing, freedom and
identity needs. However, in relation with the last two types of needs, it is relevant to mention
also that currently Colombian leaders and rights defenders are in an extreme state of
vulnerability and risk due to their political activities and their expressions of resilience, which
have become them in an objective of particular ways of direct violence. “Human rights
defenders, trade unionists, journalists, indigenous and Afro-Colombian leaders, and other
community activists face death threats and violence, but perpetrators are rarely held
accountable” (Human Rights Watch, 2016).
According to the Colombian organization “Somos Defensores”, “in 2015 there were 682
aggressions against leaders and defenders among murders (9%), kidnappings (4%), forced
disappearances (1%), threats (79%), attacks (5%) information robed (1%) and arbitrary use
of penal system (1%)” (Somos Defensores, 2015, p. 23).

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In the case of Colombia as in most of the war cases, all these actions of direct and physical
violence of the different illegal and legal actors have generated “massive traumas which have
incapacitated individuals and communities to develop their potential” (Monsalve Vargas &
Isaza Pelaez, 2011, p. 28).
4. Peacebuilding: Changing the violent structures
The statistics of the structural and the direct violence in Colombia show the magnitude of the
“rupture of the ecological balance” and put in evidence the challenges for peacebuilding. The
questions that arise in this instance are, how to reestablish the balance to achieve a sustainable
peace? And in this framework, what could be the role of the Public Private Partnerships PPPs
in this process, specifically in the preparation of the victims? In order to answer these
questions, it is necessary to establish a framework of peacebuilding.
The concept of peacebuilding derives from the positive idea of peace developed by Galtung.
In 1976, the author “called for the creation of peacebuilding structures to promote sustainable
peace by addressing the “root causes” of violent conflict and supporting indigenous
capacities for peace management and conflict resolution” (United Nations, 2010).
Nevertheless, it was 16 years later that the concept of “post conflict peacebuilding” was
introduced for the first time in the international scenario by the former UN Secretary-General
Boutros Boutros-Ghali “in the report “An Agenda for Peace” (UN Peacebuilding Support
Office (PBSO), 2016). In this document, peacebuilding was understood from the scope of
the post conflict as “the action to identify and support structures, which will tend to
strengthen and solidify peace in order to avoid a relapse into conflict. This structures should
consolidate peace and advance a sense of confidence and well-being among people”
(Secretary-General UN, 1992).
Later on, regarding “the failure of the United Nations Peace Operations to prevent genocide
in Rwanda in 1994 and to protect the inhabitants of Srebrenica (Bosnia and Herzegovina) in
1995, was published the Brahimi Report of 2000, which aimed to propose realistic
recommendations for change” (United Nations, 2000). The legacy of Galtung was confirmed
in this Report where peacebuilding was defined as “activities undertaken on the far side of
conflict to reassemble the foundations of peace and provide the tools for building on those
foundations something that is more than just the absence of war” (United Nations
Peacebuilding Fund , 2016).
The concept of peacebuilding was developed in three reports of Peacebuilding in the
aftermath of conflict published in 2009, 2010 and 2012 by the Secretary-General (United
Nations Peacebuilding Fund , 2016). The report of 2009 recognized that the “end of a conflict
offered a window of opportunity to provide basic security, deliver peace dividends, shore up
and build confidence in the political process, and strengthen core national capacity to lead
peacebuilding efforts” (United Nations, 2012, p. 1).
Secondly, the report of 2010 focused on the need of pointing out the “national capacity
development as the cornerstone of all peacebuilding efforts”. According to this report, the

16. 16
“national leadership is crucial because it enables national actors to set priorities and engage
international partners in support of a common vision. Developing capacity at subnational and
local levels is also essential” (United Nations, 2010).
Finally, the report of 2012 sustains “that successful peacebuilding processes must be
transformative, creating space for a wider set of actors – including women, youth,
marginalized groups, civil society, and the private sector – to participate in national post-
conflict decision-making” (United Nations, 2012, p. 12). This report focuses on the need of
inclusivity and engagement of a broad cross section of society, actors who will be key
“peacebuilding stakeholders” (United Nations, p. 12).
In this report the UN emphasizes on the need of including the private sector actors, who
should “be engaged in order to maximize their contribution to peacebuilding through
employment and skills development, and to ensure that any adverse impacts of their activities
are mitigated” (United Nations, 2012, p. 12). In the same way, the UN mentions the
appropriateness of “multi-stakeholder initiatives to address the peacebuilding needs through
the activities of companies in peacebuilding contexts, including coordination, training,
funding and integration into local programs” (United Nations, p. 12).
It is important to mention that peacebuilding assumes a positive concept of peace which is
for nature “multidimensional (including political, security, social and economic dimensions
among others), cuts across sectors (education, Health, nutrition, child protection, gender,
distribution of land among others) and occurs at all levels in a society (national to community
levels)” (UNICEF, 2016).
In this line, John Paul Lederach, sustains that peacebuilding "is more than post-accord
reconstruction" and "is understood as a comprehensive concept that encompasses, generates,
and sustains the full array of processes, approaches, and stages needed to transform conflict
toward more sustainable, peaceful relationships” (Peacebuilding Initiative, 2016). In this
sense, according to the author, it is impossible to localize the peacebuilding process in time
before or after the peace agreements, “metaphorically, peace is seen not merely as a stage in
time or a condition. It is a dynamic social construct" (Peacebuilding Initiative).
The main objective is to reestablish the “ecological balance” and achieve the structural
stability which “embraces the interdependent and mutually reinforcing objectives of social
peace, respect for the rule of law and human rights, social and economic development,
supported by dynamic and representative political institutions capable of managing change
and resolving disputes without resorting to violent conflict” (Grävingholt, Gänzle, & Ziaja,
2009).
Peacebuilding, thus, attacks both, the head and the tail of the ourubus of violence.
Nevertheless, this response to the direct and the indirect violence requires an Infrastructure
for Peace – I4P “focuses on the building of relationships that in their totality form new
patterns, processes, and structures" (Peacebuilding Initiative, 2016). This framework
becomes into a general guideline of the thematic and temporal scope of the participation of
the private sector.

17. 17
5. Infrastructures for peace I4P: A multidimensional and collective construction
“The nature and characteristics of contemporary conflict, as the Colombian one, suggest the
need for a set of concepts and approaches that go beyond traditional statistic diplomacy.
Because of this, building peace in today's conflicts calls for long-term commitment to
establishing an infrastructure across the levels of society, an infrastructure that empowers the
resources of reconciliation from within that society and maximizes the contribution from
outside" (Lederach, 1997, p. 14).
In this line, in February 2010, “representatives of governments, political parties, civil society
and UN Country Teams from 14 African countries came together in Naivasha” – Kenia for
constructing a broad and comprehensive conceptualization of the Infrastructures for Peace -
I4P. As a result of this meeting was created the concept of I4P as a "dynamic network of
interdependent structures, mechanisms, resources, values and skills which, through dialogue
and consultation, contribute to conflict prevention and peacebuilding in a society" (Tongeren,
2012, p. 93)
The I4Ps refer thus to the platforms which allows the “transformation of the flows of the post
conflict, while modifying in the long term the patterns and structural causes of wars”.
According to the theories of Lederach, the generation of “this platform is essential to support
a real social change” (Lederach, 1997). “The term that takes into account the multi-
dimensional nature of the human experience and rely on broad social participation; the
psychological, spiritual, social, economic, political and military levels" (Peacebuilding
Initiative, 2016)
The different components of the infrastructure can participate in different functions, among
which are “1. capacity building, 2. advising the parties and internal consultation; 3.
facilitating communication or mediation between the parties and other stakeholders; 4.
contribution to the implementation, monitoring or management agreed by the parties to the
conflict and other stakeholder’s activities; 5. articulation and advocacy of social sectors
towards peace” (Peacebuilding Initiative, 2016, p. 6).
According to Tongeren (2011, p. 49), the “I4Ps help fragile and divided societies to build
and sustain peace” through three fundamental axes. First, the structures for peace allow the
control of the “continuous conflicts related to land ownership, natural resources and political
tensions” (2011, p. 49). Second, these structures “facilitate the design of internal solutions
to conflicts through consensus or dialogue between the various stakeholders” (2011, p. 49).
Finally, these constructions generate “the negotiation and the implementation of new
governance arrangements based on inclusion and consensus” (2011, p. 49).
However, the realization of these theoretical precepts can become into a complex and
ambiguous process due to the amplitude of the terms. “This explains not only the long periods
of time it takes the establishment of I4Ps, but also the various strategies through which it is
possible to transform these ideas into reality” (Tongeren P. v., 2012, p. 94).
One of these strategies are the PPPs which have become into fundamental agents of the I4P,
due to its potential of contributing to the long term changes, to the elimination of the multiple
roots causes of the conflict and to generate a dynamic of reconciliation within the society.

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Colombian Infrastructure for Peace: reparation of the victims
The “victim’s right to reparation, compensation and affirmative actions is a fundamental part
of the peacebuilding process” and in consequence of the I4P (Baldo & Magarrell, 2007). A
simple reparation of the victims of the direct violence without a change of the violent
structures can generate not only a relapse into conflict but also a possible re victimization.
Because of this, the reestablishment of the rights of the victims should be developed in a
framework that tends to eliminate the structural causes, is fundamental for the achievement
of a suitable peace.
“As the UN Basic Principles and Guidelines on the Right to a Remedy and Reparation for
Gross Violations of International Human Rights Law and Serious Violations of International
Humanitarian Law confirmed, victims of such abuses have a right under international law to
prompt, adequate and effective reparation. It is the state’s obligation to make that right
accessible. Recent decades have seen a growing recognition among states that future political
stability cannot be assured if the victims of past grave human rights abuses and violations of
international humanitarian law are ignored and left without remedy or redress for the harms
done to them” (Baldo & Magarrell, 2007).
Precisely, in 2014 the Fundation Berghof made “a mapping of the Colombian peace structures
in the multiple levels, actors and sectors and the role they play in the current peacebuilding
process” (Pfeiffer, 2014, p. 7) In this evaluation were included the I4P that orients its actions
towards the reparation of the victims.
According to Pfeiffer “after nearly half a century of internal armed conflict and three decades
of peacebuilding efforts, Colombia has enough experience in the development of an I4P”
(Pfeiffer, 2014, p. 3). During the last three decades, have been stablished different strategies
and institutions that could be considered as a part of an I4P from which “some are engage
with the violence prevention, the protection of civilians and the humanitarian assistance, and
others push structural reforms to overcome the causes of conflict” (Pfeiffer, p. 3).
It is important to mention also that some actors or components of this structure participate
according to their interest and needs in different stages of “counseling, capacity building,
mediation, management, monitoring, financing and coordination” (Pfeiffer, p. 3).
In the context of the complexity of the Colombian conflict, different actors have created
“spaces that were built over time and that could be viewed as elements of an I4P, that are
related to different phases of the conflict and served a variety of purposes as peace negotiation
processes, prevention and protection or post conflict, especially in the topics of victim´s
reparation and reintegration of ex combatants” (Pfeiffer, 2014, p. 8). In the framework of the
Law of Justice and Peace (Law 975, 2005) and the Law of Victims and Land Restitution
(Law 1448, 2011), were created some of the most fundamental elements.
A new structure was established in the Department of Social Prosperity (DPS) attached to
the presidency. This entity has the objective “of designing, coordinating, and implementing
public policies for social inclusion and reconciliation”, including the strategies for
overcoming extreme poverty, attending vulnerable groups and repairing the victims of the
conflict (Departamento para la Prosperidad Social, 2016). In this department are included the

19. 19
National Center of Historical Memory, the Unit for Attention and Reparation for Victims and
the Colombian Family Welfare Institute (Departamento para la Prosperidad Social, 2016).
One of the components is the “National Center of Historical Memory” that is in charge of
building the museum of national memory and “the management, development and
dissemination of a narrative on the armed conflict in Colombia based on various truths and
memories of violence, with a differentiated approach and a preferential option for the voices
of the victims” (Pfeiffer, 2014, p. 20). This reconstruction of the history has been
fundamental to understand the causes and the evolution of the conflict and the different actors
who participate in it. This component also pretends to tackle the cultural violence through
different narratives and the reconstruction of the memories of the conflict.
However, one of the most important components of the actual infrastructure for
peacebuilding is the Unit for Attention and Integral Reparation for Victims. This institution
“created in January 2012 is responsible for implementing the Victims Law and to ensure the
integral participation, assistance and reparation of the almost eight million victims of the
Colombian conflict” (Unidad de Víctimas, 2016). “The Unit also has the aim to coordinate
the different actions and efforts that promote the effective participation of victims in the
process of reparation” (Unidad de Víctimas, 2016). In order to achieve this goal, it was
created the National System for Attention and Reparation for Victims which reunites around
“50 state entities from which the Executive Committee is formed by the President and
representatives of the Ministries of the Interior, Justice and Law, Finance and Public Credit
the National Planning Department, the DPS and the Victims Unit which acts as Technical
Secretariat of the Committee and the System” (Pfeiffer, 2014, p. 17).
It is important to mention that the Unit articulates not just the institutions of the government
and the organizations of victims, but also “the local governments, private sector, unions,
international cooperation and other important players in the national economy” (Unidad de
Víctimas, 2016).
Finally, many “organizations from civil society” (Pfeiffer, 2014, p. 12) haven been created
during the last decades which have been and will be protagonist in the current negotiation
process and in the peacebuilding process.
Victim´s reparation as part of the peacebuilding process
The process of reparation in Colombia consists in an integral route that takes into account
the “individual, collective, material, moral and symbolic dimension and includes five
principal measures: rehabilitation, compensation, satisfaction, restitution (land, housing,
sources of income, employment, access to credit) and guarantees of non-repetition” (Unidad
de Víctimas , 2016).
Nevertheless, following the idea of the peacebuilding from a positive and structural point of
view, “the reparation to victims involves not only monetary compensation or restitution of
some goods, but an accompaniment of the State to guarantee the effective enjoyment of rights
or human basic needs in education, health, housing, employment programs and income

20. 20
generation, among others” (Unidad de Víctimas , 2016). The objective of the actions of
reparation is also to “restore their dignity, memory, retrieve the truth and create conditions
for events such as those who suffered will not be repeated” (Unidad de Víctimas , 2016).
In the Table 3. below it is explained briefly the five different mechanisms that are part of the
integral plan of reparation of the victims. This information in fundamental to understand the
role of the privates and specifically of the PPPs in the process.
Table 3. Measures of reparation included in the Law of Victims and Land restitution
Measure Explanation
Monetary
compensation
“Is given for the suffering experienced and aim to rebuilding the life projects of the
victims”. Is provided to victims of murder, forced disappearance, kidnapping, personal
injury that led to permanent disability or disability, illegal recruitment of children and
adolescents, crimes against sexual freedom and integrity, torture, cruel, inhuman or
degrading treatment, forced displacement. The amounts of compensation depend on the
crime and the quantity of victims (direct and indirect). (Unidad de Víctimas , 2016)
Rehabilitation “Consists of a set of strategies, plans, programs and actions of legal, medical, psychological
and social nature that aim at restoring the physical and psychosocial conditions of the
victims and the social networks in the collective cases”. This plans include the Psychosocial
Care, the creation of the Regional Centers for Victims psychosocial support and the
strategies for emotional recuperation in the group level. (Unidad de Víctimas, 2016)
Satisfaction
measures
“This measures aim at the reliving of the pain through the reconstruction of the truth, the
promulgation of historical memory and the dignity of the victims. The measures currently
implemented are: messages or letters to dignify the victims from the government, the
exemption from the military service, the recognition processes of responsibilities and
requests for public forgiveness and the accompaniment during the delivery of bodies of
victims of forced disappearance”. (Unidad de Víctimas, 2016)
Restitution The objective of these measures is “to restore the state of the victim before the victimizing
act was done. It includes the material dimension such as financial measures; restitution of
housing; land restitution and the restitution of employment skills. Finally, the restitution
contains the process of returns and relocation of the victims of forced displacement under
conditions of safety, dignity and sustainability”. This process has three stages of support:
1. Return (process by which the person or household victim decides to return to the site
from which they were displaced in order to settle indefinitely), 2. relocation (the person or
household victim decides to settle in a different place than that they were forced to leave)
and 3. local Integration (process of reconstruction of the community networks) (Unidad de
Víctimas, 2016)
Guarantees of
non-repetition
“Are considered both, as one of the forms of reparation to victims and as one of the general
principles of international responsibility of States to prevent violations of human rights and
breaches of international humanitarian law. The principal objective is to eliminate and
overcome the structural causes in order that the violation of rights. Guarantees of non-
repetition include two dimensions: preventive and restorative”.
“Preventive, when the risk persists and is not enough to repair the damage already done but
prevent futures, for example, mine clearance and prevention of recruitment, and restorative
when is necessary to mitigate the damage to the victims in violation of their human rights
and breaches of international humanitarian law, for example, the socialization of judicial
truth, social pedagogy in human rights and the elimination of cultural patterns, among
others to facilitate the reconciliation and the peacebuilding process”. (Unidad de Víctimas,
2016)
Note (s): Table made by the author using the information of the Unit of Victims

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Finally, the collective chapter of the reparation process, is understood as “a fundamental right
of groups that have been affected by the violation of collective rights, the violation of
individual rights of the members of the collective and the collective impact of the violation
of individual rights” (Unidad de Víctimas, 2016). “The groups and social and political
organizations, the communities created from a political, social, cultural, legal, or common
purpose recognition, and the indigenous, ROM, Afro-Colombian, Raizal and palenqueras
communities, are the groups that have access to the collective reparation process” (Unidad
de Víctimas , 2016).
For instance, the journalists, unions, Human Rights Defenders, NGOs, the LGBT community
among others, are groups persecuted and victimized systematically in the middle of the
conflict, reason why they have the right to “reparation including all the measures of
reparation in the political, material and symbolic components” (Unidad de Víctimas, 2016).
The different mechanism and methodologies of reparation contribute to the reestablishment
of the “ecological balance” or peace, generating real social changes through a modification
in the long term of the structural causes of war. On the efficiency of this process depends the
possibility of achieving a sustainable peace.
6. The need of new stakeholders in the I4P focused on the reparation of the victims
Given the magnitude of the quantity of the victims from the direct violence and the
complexity of the Colombian reparation process, the economic, administrative and technical
challenges of the reparation process are evident.
After doing a comparison with 45 experiences of reparation worldwide, the report
“Evaluation for the Unidad para las Víctimas: global and comparative benchmarking” made
by the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, stated that “the
number of victims that aims to repair the Colombian strategy is much broader than any
reparation program in the world, both in absolute terms, the amount of persons recognized
as victims, and the percentage of the total population covered. The number of people in the
register of Colombian victims represents more than 14% of the population. None of the other
experiences have tried to compensate more than 1%” (Segura, 2014).
This considerable difference in the percentage of the population attended “is due to the
political decision of including the Internally Displaced Persons (6 million people), otherwise
the number of population included would be only the 2% of the population” (Segura, 2014).
Precisely, “Colombia is the country with most types of damages recognized, which has a
selection process victims more open and that establishes a clearer distinction between
victims” (Segura, 2014).
According to this study “focused on completeness (the ability of public policy to cover the
spectrum of potential beneficiaries) and complexity (the range of benefits offered by a law
to compensate the damages which include generation of productive projects, psychosocial
care and ethnic and gender approaches, among many others), Colombia is one of the six
countries with better standards in this type of process” (Segura, 2014).

22. 22
Nevertheless, the study affirms that this situation could be problematic since “the countries
that have made more explicit differentiations of the victims and the types of compensation
have economic difficulties to meet the expectations, thus, they have been forced to implement
solutions less differentiated” (Segura, 2014).
The Carr Center warns that “the ambitious nature of the reparation process can lead to
compliance difficulties” related to the financial, institutional, administrative capacities of the
government, “as has happened in cases with which Colombia was compared” due to the
increase of the demands and in consequence, of the constrains (Segura, 2014).
However, despite all the evident challenges and difficulties, “with an investment of over three
billion pesos, the government has repaired more than half a million victims” (El Espectador,
2015). But, even though it could be difficult to project an exact amount of money needed to
accomplish the reparation plan for the almost eight millions of victims, the limitations of the
actual I4P are clear.
According to the Committee for monitoring and evaluating the compliance of the Victims
Law, “it is estimated that there is a shortage of 33.6 billion pesos to guarantee to all victims
the rights of compensation and housing included in law” (El Tiempo, 2015). This amount
does not incorporate the other measures of reparation and the resources needed to achieve
the governmental goals as the administrative and technical dimensions of the operation,
among other costs that are implied in the reparation process.
Regarding this situation, the DPS and the Unit for Attention and Integral Reparation for
Victims have created different and innovative strategies to overcome the challenges. For
instance, inside of each institution there is an office in charge of promoting “the involvement
private sector, unions, international cooperation, civil society and other important
stakeholders, in order to increase the resources available for the reparation” (Unidad de
Víctimas, 2016).
The challenges for the effective operationalization of a project of reparation of this magnitude
call for a broader and more inclusive and articulated I4P. This infrastructure should allow a
real transformation of the structures, avoiding not just the relapse into conflict, but also the
construction of a positive and sustainable peace. Given that one of the protagonist of this
peacebuilding process is the private sector, the next chapters of the present dissertation will
analyze its actual and potential role, the conditions that determine its participation and the
opportunities towards the future.

23. 23
Chapter 2. Public Private Partnerships: an innovative element of Infrastructure
for Peace for the reparation of the victims
In recent years, the responsibility of business and the private sector in the peacebuilding
process has been at the center of several debates and research worldwide. Numerous
publications from international organizations, journals, universities and academic centers
have provided concepts and theories about the role of the private sector in this process.
“Since the publication of Jane Nelson’s The Business of Peace: the private sector as a partner
in conflict prevention and the first UN resolution on cooperation between the UN and the
private sector in 2001, the private sector has become in one of the most important strategic
partners for the international and domestic organizations in building sustainable peace”
(Rettberg, 2010, p. 5).
Following this line, the concept of “Business for Peace” (United Nations Global Compact,
2016) was included as one of the focus areas of the United Nations Global Compact, which
is an “initiative to encourage businesses worldwide to adopt sustainable and socially
responsible policies” (UN News Center, 2015). “The primary responsibility for peace and
security rests with governments. However, the private sector can make important
contributions through business practices” (United Nations Global Compact, 2016).
In this context, companies can adopt different strategies in order to generate a positive impact
on the society. “At a very minimum level, for example, a company should aim to be compliant
with national regulations and whit the applicable international laws and standards. In the
second level, business can orient their strategies towards the minimization of risks and harms
from its operations. And, finally and ideally, companies should aim to proactively create
societal value-added and new business opportunities by optimizing its positive multipliers
and impacts on society” (Nelson, 2000, p. 7).
Precisely, referring especially the second and the third level, “the private sector is playing a
greater role in supporting peacebuilding efforts in conflict and post-conflict areas by
providing critical expertise, know-how, capital and investment capabilities”, which are
essential to stabilization, recovery, and reconstruction of the “ecologic balance” (Abramov,
2010, p. 481).
It is important to mention that there are two types of intervention on peacebuilding. The first
one is called indirect intervention because temps to get favorable results to post conflict
societies from “the growth and progress generated by the private sector”. These positive
results are achieved “promoting economic recovery by stimulating domestic and
international private sector actors to produce and invest in order to reinvigorate economies”
(Rettberg, 2010, p. 9).
In this sense, “the private sector can lift some burden from government and help lend
legitimacy to the state” (Peschka, 2010, p. 8). These broader effects are created “through
investments that not only create jobs but also provide basic and new services, introduce
innovative approaches to development, and generate tax revenues for reconstruction efforts”

24. 24
(Peschka, 2010, p. 8). In this sense, an “early engagement of the private sector is essential
in order to address the full range of economic conflict factors and positively contribute to the
peacebuilding process” (Specker, 2009, p. 1).
In second place, there is a kind of indirect intervention where “the private sector creates
employment for demobilized combatants or victims of armed conflicts, generates preferential
investment in post-conflict development in affected communities, subscribes codes of good
corporate behavior, or creates alliances between private sector foundations and other civil
society organizations” (Rettberg, 2010, p. 9).
At the same time, “by supporting the state´s peace-building efforts, the private sector helps
strengthen the State´s legitimacy and increase the credibility of the population” (Peschka,
2010, p. 10). For instance, “by generating jobs and income opportunities and filling gaps in
delivering basic services, the private sector can help the state shift expectations in the country,
because concrete dividends instill hope and optimism in people, and give them a reason to
buy into peace”. Without this component of economic security, fragile peace arrangements
can rarely be sustained. (Peschka, 2010, p. 10).
This is the Colombian case, where “the involvement of the owners of capital and company
managers holds significant symbolic value, representing a commitment and willingness to
accept change”. Thus, “business participation should also be considered a source of political
legitimacy for tasks related to diverse peacebuilding goals” (Rettberg, 2013, p. 5).
In the last years, this topic has won relevance in public policy analysis in Colombia. However,
“business involvement in negotiations and peacebuilding is not a recent phenomenon in the
country. More importantly, in light of increasing budget limitations it is likely that the
Colombian state and society (mainly wealthy taxpayers and the business community) will
bear the brunt of Colombia’s peacebuilding costs. The relevance of the business sector’s
backing of peace negotiations and peacebuilding can therefore not be over‐ stated; via taxes,
employment, and other contributions it supports processes including institutional reform,
demobilization, and victim reparations” (Rettberg, 2013, p5).
Nevertheless, “boosting economic recovery via private sector engagement and engaging the
private sector in specific peacebuilding tasks is easier said than done (Rettberg, 2013, p5).
Even though, there is an agreement around what are the benefits of involving the private
sector in the peacebuilding process, there is not a complete clarity about how the private
sector can influence the process. “How to bring business aboard the peacebuilding agenda is
less clear” even if there are already different experiences (Rettberg, 2010, p. 10).
One of the strategies to engage the private sector are the Public Private Partnerships - PPPs,
a mechanism to build sustainable peace that has not been completely explored and in which
Colombia is a pioneer country.

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1. A conceptualization of the PPPs for peacebuilding
Typically, PPPs have been implemented by governments as “a way to boost economic growth
and to involve the private sector in the construction of infrastructure and the provision of
goods and services such as water, energy, among others” (Shediac , Abouchakra , Hintze ,
Hammami, & Ramsay Najjar, 2008, p. 16). In this context, “PPPs are mutually beneficial
relationships formed between the public and private sectors where the private-sector partner
makes a substantial equity investment, and in return the public sector gains access to new or
improved services” (Shediac , Abouchakra , Hintze , Hammami, & Ramsay Najjar, p. 1)
In the PPPs “the private organization participates in the decision-making and production of
a public good or service that has traditionally been provided by the public sector and in which
the private sector shares the risk of that production” (Forrer, Kee, Newcomer, & Boyer, 2010,
p476). “These cooperative efforts include a sharing of responsibilities as well as expertise,
resources and other benefits” (International Labour Office, 2008, p. 1).
In this provision of services, “public-sector policymakers increasingly find themselves
struggling to balance the rising demands on infrastructure with a lack of capital, manpower,
and expertise” (Shediac , Abouchakra , Hintze , Hammami, & Ramsay Najjar, 2008, p. 3).
This is the reason why “the PPPs have become the default solution to government problems
and needs, trend that may accelerate as governments experience fiscal deficits and look for
alternative ways to finance and deliver government services” (Forrer, Kee, Newcomer, &
Boyer, 2010, pág. 475).
The ability to share risk with the private sector, tap external financial resources, and profit
from private-sector investments and intellectual capital gives public-sector policymakers
greater flexibility in allocating both human and financial resources. (Shediac , Abouchakra ,
Hintze , Hammami, & Ramsay Najjar, 2008, p. 16). This means, for example, in the case of
Colombia, new sources to accomplish the reparation process in a context of financial,
administrative and operative limitations.
Precisely, in the text The business for peace: The private sector as a partner in conflict
prevention and resolution, Jane Nelson presents “the five principles for corporate
engagement: 1. Strategic commitment of the CEO and board level leadership on corporate
responsibility issues, 2. Risk and impact analysis of the company's core business and social
investment activities on a systematic and comprehensive basis, 3. Dialogue and consultation
with key stakeholder groups, 4. Partnership and collective action with other peacebuilding
stakeholders and 5. Evaluation and accountability” (Nelson, 2000, p. 27).
Regarding the 4th
point, the author refers to “mutually beneficial and transparent partnerships
with other companies, civil society organizations and government bodies to address sensitive
political and public policy issues and to invest in practical projects” (Nelson, 2000, p. 27).
Therefore, the PPPs are seeing as “collective action” with which it could be easier to “address
activities such as: advocacy for good governance and anti-corruption measures; negotiating
peace; developing voluntary codes of corporate conduct; supporting an open and free media;
and creating innovative public-private financing mechanisms for health, education, civic

26. 26
institution building and infrastructure development” (Nelson, 2000, p. 33).
As is expected in context of conflict, this mechanisms of PPPs are in some cases “a realistic
option for a company operating in a politically sensitive environment than risking the
exposure of unilateral approaches” (Nelson, 2000, p. 33). In this framework, after
establishing the risk and impact analyses and the multi-stakeholder dialogues, it is possible
“to identify potential partners and the tasks to be tackled and to build the mutual
understanding, trust and common purpose that are crucial for the emergence of effective
partnerships and collective action” (Nelson, 2000, p. 33).
How is expected, the difficulties and the complexity of the establishment of PPPs in the case
of peacebuilding are considerably higher than in the traditional cases of the provision of good
and services. “The process of creating and sustaining mutually beneficial partnerships is not
easy, especially on a cross sector basis between business, government and civil society and
especially in situations of existing or potential conflict” (Nelson, 2000, p. 33).
“Despite their challenges and limitations, cross sector partnerships and collective corporate
action can be valuable mechanisms for addressing some of the complex, resource intensive
and integrated issues associated with conflict prevention and resolution” (Nelson, 2000, p.
33). The potential of this mechanism has been explored during the last decades in Colombia,
generating successful experiences and practices that with the time have become into relevant
components of the I4P. These mechanisms are thus innovative ways to repair the victims of
the direct violence, but also to build positive peace while tackling the roots of the armed
conflict.
2. Methodology: Conditions of the PPPs for peacebuilding and the reparation of
victims in Colombia
The present research was developed through a quantitative and qualitative approach with
which was possible to understand the role of the PPPs in peacebuilding, specifically in the
reparation of the victims, and the conditions under which these partnerships have operated in
the case of Colombia.
In first place, regarding the quantitative component, a sequence of econometric analysis was
developed using the data base of “Mapa Social” or “Social Map”. This is an innovative
platform where is possible to find the Geo-referenced information of the supply and demand
of the projects of social investments in the country (Centro de Innovación -Gobierno en
Linea, 2016).
Social Map includes the general information of 14.538 social projects such as the type of
project, the location, quantity and type of beneficiaries, the line of intervention, the amount
invested and the type of institutions and private actors that participate. The social projects
included are developed by 3.334 public and private actors. It is important to point out that
the data base is not exhaustive since the register of the projects depends on the willingness
of the actors who implement it, nevertheless, Social Map is a representative approximation
to the behavior of the social projects developed in the country.

27. 27
Using this information was possible to identify the quantity of PPPs per municipality and the
principle topics in which the PPPs are developed. These factors are relevant to understand
the general framework of the PPPs for peacebuilding regarding the interest of the partnerships
on certain regions and topics (lines of intervention).
One of the main issues found during the analysis was the fact that each project of PPPs has
presence in different municipalities at the same time, has multiple lines of intervention (in
each municipality) and sometimes, has different private or public actors that participate in
the partnership (in each municipality). For this reason, in the original data base the projects
appear multiplied several times by location, line of intervention and actors. This means that
the number observations (projects) instead of being 14.538, are 112.575.
However, since the units of analysis are the municipalities and not the PPPs themselves, the
collapsed information allowed an analysis of 1. The existence and quantity of private, public
and PPPs interventions per municipality, 2. The existence and quantity of the interventions
by topic, and 3. The type of the organizations present in the municipality.
Other issue of the data set analyzed was the fact that variables such as the quantity, the type
of beneficiaries and the amount invested, had too many missing values, therefore these
variables were excluded from the analysis. It is important to mention that the research was
developed based on the data set of Social Map, because, even though it is still in process of
construction, it is the most complete source of information of PPPs in peacebuilding in
Colombia.
After structuring the information of the Social Map per the 1.123 municipalities included in
the Administrative and Politic Division of the country, this information was merged with 10
additional data sets, which contain the corresponding economic, political and social
indicators. The objective of the creation of the combined data set is to identify under what
conditions the PPPs have been operated in Colombia and what are the circumstances under
which, this kind of interventions are more likely to be created.
Variables such as the presence of armed groups, the duration and the intensity of the conflict,
the level of risk of corruption and level of transparency, the number of victims and the number
of Internal Displaced People, the number of demobilized people, the Multidimensional
Poverty Index, the rates of monetary poverty, the Index of Unsatisfied Needs and the
Indicators of Humanitarian Needs were included.
The analysis takes these variables into account in order to develop a series of “regressions
functions" which allow the analysis of the predict probability of the establishment of PPPs in
certain territories that have certain characteristics (H. Stock & Watson, 2003). The Appendix
1. explains each one of the variables included in the analysis same than the sources of the
different data sets.
Regarding the qualitative component of the research, three interviews were conducted to
different representatives of the public and the private sector that participate in PPPs for
peacebuilding in Colombia, specifically in the reparation of the victims. Maria Lucía Vallejo

28. 28
Salazar, part of the Sub Direction of the National System of Attention and Reparation for
Victims (Unit of victims), Gretel Jordan Marquez, part of the team of the Foundation Bavaria
(Sabmiller Colombia) and Maria Alejandra Cabal Londoño, General Manager of the
Foundation Semana, were the actors included in the interviews. These actors were selected
due to their importance in the process of conformation of the PPPs for the reparation, and
due to their leadership as pioneers and representatives of some of the successful experiences
included in Social Map.
The information collected in these interviews was useful to construct the theoretical
framework related to this topic. At the same time the information gathered was used in the
process of selection of the variables and in the development of the different econometric
analysis.
In terms of methodology the quality of design researches has been measured by taking into
account the characteristics of reliability, validity, credibility and ethical practices (Ross &
Matthews, 2010). Precisely, the crossbreed between the quantitative and the qualitative
approach allows the development of an integral research that accomplishes these principles.
Finally, it is important to point out that the present paper aims to contribute to the theoretical
and the empirical understanding of the PPPs as mechanisms of peacebuilding in complex
conditions. As was mentioned above, despite if there is a considerable literature in the role
of the private sector in peacebuilding, there are not many researches that address the specific
topic of the PPPs in real cases and applying the quantitative approach.
3. PPPs for peacebuilding: An overview of Social Map
Colombia is living undoubtedly a transition era. In the framework of the peace process; both
public and private sector are getting more involved in innovative social investment projects
to face the post-conflict and peacebuilding challenges. Although during the lasts decades a
lots of initiatives have born to sort out these issues, these attempts were not articulated and
coordinated, reason why there was a decrease in the impact and the efficiency of the social
investments (Portafolio , 2016). This is the main reason for Social Map creation.
Social Map was born in 2013 as a result of a strategic partnership between the DPS, the
Development Bank of Latin America (CAF) and Microsoft. The main idea behind Social
Map creation was “that an organized and coordinated investment would generate a greater
impact and a more efficient use of the resources for social projects. This was not possible
before because there was not an information system for the organizations” (Portafolio ,
2016).
Precisely, Social Map is an innovative platform, which allows users “to share and consult
updated and reliable information about social projects” executed in Colombia (Portafolio ,
2016). It organizes current supply and demand related with community’s and territory’s
needs. In other words, it informs public and private actors about where and when an
investment would be useful for a specific vulnerable population (Portafolio , 2016). This is

29. 29
especially important because the organizations developing social projects could improve
their strategies, generating sustainable and relevant impacts (Portafolio , 2016).
Social Map has two main components. The first one is an online Colombian map, which
contains the location and information of every single social project executed in the country.
The idea is that with this geo-referenced presentation of the social projects would not be more
an overflow of resources over a few projects or an effort duplication regarding the territory
and the population beneficiaries (Portafolio , 2016).
In addition, “the platform gives the possibility to do business intelligence with projects data.
It contains, for every municipality, more than 100 development indicators, with which it is
possible to make better investments based on the needs of the territories” (the manifestations
of structural, direct or cultural violence) (Portafolio , 2016).
The second component is a free support service that guide companies or public organizations
during the whole process of social investment. “This group of people is basically a
specialized team of consultants with a large knowledge about poverty and Public-Private
Partnerships” (Centro de Información de Gobierno Electrónico , 2016).
“Through this platform it is possible to have access to the mapping of social projects
implemented by the private sector, by the public sector, the list of Public-Private Partnerships
in social issues and the list of good practices” (Centro de Información de Gobierno
Electrónico , 2016)
4. The statistics of social investment in Colombia
Till August 2016, in the Data Base of Social Map were registered 14.538 projects, which are
implement by 3.334 public and private actors, independently or in partnerships. From these,
7.837 are projects developed by the public sector, 4.080 are developed by the private actors
and finally, 2.621 are PPPs (Mapa Social , 2016).
The projects included in the platform are classified according to different components: the
type of the project, the line of intervention, the target group and the amount of the investment
among others.
In first place, regarding the different topics of interest, even though if there is a line
denominated “Peace and Development”, all the categories of investment contribute to
peacebuilding in the positive and broad sense because they are oriented towards the
elimination of the structural violence and the reestablishment of the “ecological balance”.

30. 30
Table 4. Social Investment by type o project
This means that the social
investment in the different
lines of intervention aims to
eradicate the “root causes of
the conflict” in order to
build a sustainable peace. It
is important to mention that
each program can have
more than one intervention;
this is why the number of
interventions is higher than
the number of projects.
According to the
information of Social Map,
the topics where is localized
most of the social
investment, in general and
in the case of the PPPs, are
Culture, Education,
Generation of Income and
Capabilities, Childhood and
young and Peace and
Development (Mapa
Social , 2016).
In relation with the target
group of the PPPs projects,
Women, Early Childhood,
Ethnic groups and Victims
of the violence, are prioritized as is showed in the Table 2. below.
Line of intervention PPP Public Private Total
Water and Sanitation 36 20 30 86
Humanitarian Assistance 8 2 87 97
Intensity Science and Technology 59 11 94 164
Culture 308 1912 608 2828
Sports 7 0 18 25
Human Rights 190 9 304 503
Donations 1 1 13 15
Education 749 19 1214 1982
Entrepreneurship DPS 1 0 9 10
Businessman for Education 0 0 2 2
Inclusive economy 0 0 5 5
Institucional Strengthening 116 34 204 354
Generation of Income and
capabilities
619 44 699 1362
Ethnic Groups 45 3 47 95
Intensity Socio-emotive
Capabilities
1 0 9 10
Financial Inclusion 39 7 173 219
Infrastructure and Habitat 191 3664 374 4229
Integral Interventions 4 23 7 34
Others 125 22 323 470
Peace and Development 338 9 512 859
Childhood and young 379 10 341 730
Health 170 36 377 583
Food Security and nutrition 141 11 202 354
Conditional Transfers 6 8 5 19
Voluntary Work 13 0 81 94
Total 3546 5845 5738 15129

31. 31
Graph 2. Public – Private Partnerships PPPs by target group
Note (s): The graph includes the results of the econometric analysis explained in the methodological section
To finish the general overview of the information provided in Social Map, in the case of the
PPPs that benefit victims of violence, most of the investments are made in the lines of Peace
and Development, Generation of Income and Capabilities, Human Rights and Education.
This trend demonstrates that the PPPs could be useful mechanisms in situations beyond the
infrastructure and the provision of services, especially in peacebuilding processes like the
Colombian, where a multi stakeholder intervention is certainly required.
In this frame, “among the topics that are more sustainable in the long term and are easily
manageable are the projects of labor linking, inclusive business and productive projects
because they contribute to the generation of value of the business. However, at the same time
there is an increasing interest in projects for the reconciliation, institutional strengthening and
empowerment of the community, with which, the PPPs want to generate new ways of
creating relationships in the territory” (Salazar, 2016).
145
15
0
330
8
514
12
904
137
8
226
458
0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700 800 900
Elderly
Communities
Disarmament , demobilization and reintegration - DDR
Ethnic groups
Youth (18 to 25)
Women
Children and adolescents ( 6-17 years old)
Others
People on disability status
Population in poverty
Population victim of violence
Early Childhood

32. 32
Graph 3. Public – Private Partnerships PPPs that targeted victim population by line of intervention
Note (s): The graph includes the results of the econometric analysis explained in the methodological section
The maps below show in different tonalities the concentration of projects of social investment
in contrast with the location of the victims in Colombia. This is a good indicator of the
different initiatives of peacebuilding from an integral and positive sense.
Nevertheless, it is necessary to analyze the characteristics of the territory to understand in a
deeper way the complex context of the social investment for peacebuilding in Colombia and
the dynamics of the different actors who participate in the process.
2
1
2
37
2
58
0
50
0
0
0
6
52
3
0
12
42
1
37
104
15
32
25
3
7
0 20 40 60 80 100 120
Water and Sanitation
Humanitarian Assistance
Intensity Science and Technology
Culture
Sports
Human Rights
Donations
Education
Entrepreneurship DPS
Businessman for Education
Inclusive economy
Institutional Strengthening
Generation Income and capabilities
Ethnic Groups
Intensity Socio-emotive Capabilities
Financial Inclusion
Infrastructure and Habitat
Integral Interventions
Others
Peace and Development
Childhood and young
Health
Food Security and nutrition
Conditional Transfers
Volunteering

33. 33
Graph 4. Concentration of the projects of social investment Vs Location of the victims1
Number of victims Public Private Partnerships
Public Projects Private Projects
1
Note (s): The darker the tonalities of the colors, the higher concentration or major quantity of the projects.
Maps made by the author with the results of the econometric analysis explained in the methodological section.

34. 34
Chapter 3. General assessment of the Colombia strategy of PPPs for peacebuilding
and the reparation of the victims
1. Assessment under the protocol to have effective partnerships
In his text Building Peace in Fragile States – Building Trust is Essential for Effective Public–
Private Partnerships, Igor Avramov presents the strategy “for forming and maintaining
effective Partnerships which includes a four-phase protocol: 1. assess needs, ascertain
mandate, manage expectations; 2. create structure to enable participation and impart
ownership; 3. build capacity; and 4. ensure sustainability” (Abramov, 2010, p. 484).
This protocol is reflected in the mechanisms of PPPs proposed by the DPS, the Unit of
Victims and other public entities. However, since in Colombia it does not exist a general legal
framework for the social PPPs, the analysis will be developed using the guidelines applied
for the “Social Partnerships” and the “Integral Interventions”, strategies of the DPS registered
in the Social Map and the experiences of the Unit of Victims.
It is important to mention that these strategies aim to incentive a deeper participation of the
private sector in the public sphere. The idea is transcending the basic dimensions of
compliance with national and international regulations and standards and the mitigation of
the negative impacts, “to new strategies of creation of social value”. (Departamento para la
Prosperidad Social, 2015, p. 12).
The creation of value is in this case the base of the effectiveness of the partnerships. This
concept refers to situations when “companies can proactively create positive societal value
by optimizing the external multipliers of their own business operations and by engaging in
innovative social investment, stakeholder consultation, policy dialogue, advocacy and civic
institution building, including collective action with other companies” (Nelson, 2000, p. 28).
However, as was explained in the theoretical framework, the social value and the
reestablishment of the “ecologic balance” redounds in the generation of economic value for
the business. This is why, “it is necessary to work on the strategy of the shared value and not
just from the Corporate Social Responsibility- CSR point of view because in this way are
emphasized the benefits that business can obtain if they participate in this type of partnerships
for peacebuilding. This is a way to strength the idea of the solidarity and the complementarity
between actors” (Salazar, 2016).
In this sense, the efficiency the PPPs in generating social value as the driver mechanism of
peacebuilding, will depend on the transparent and clear establishment of the shared
responsibilities and objectives, the ways of formalizing the partnership and the mechanisms
for monitoring and evaluating the results.
Needs assessment, ascertain mandate, manage expectations
The process of needs assessment is the first step according to the protocol. “With this process
is possible to gain familiarity and understanding of the local and regional context. This
assessment could be done through a mechanism ‘‘outside looking in’’ analysis in order to

35. 35
identify 1. key governance challenges; 2. a taxonomy of governance issues that arise in
business and economic activities; 3. how the challenges presented can be best addressed with
different types of instruments and tools; and 4. the types of implementation issues that must
be addressed so that the instruments and tools can be used successfully” (Abramov, 2010, p.
484).
The second mechanism is “in-country appraisal” which involves a systematic process to
identify key stakeholders and engage them on issues discerned from the ‘‘outside looking
in’’ analysis (Abramov, 2010, p. 484). Consultations, workshops, and seminars are used to
“bring together a coalition of private and public sector organizations, including companies
from all key sectors, business and trade associations, nongovernmental and educational
institutions, and governmental and international organizations, and engaged them in a
dialogue about their own experiences and perceptions on issues” (Abramov, p. 484).
In this context the process of the social partnerships and the Integral Interventions start with
a “diagnosis and targeting of the population and delimitation of territory” that is going to be
intervened applying the strategy ‘‘outside looking in’’. This assessment should highlight the
multidimensional poverty of the region or municipality and other kind of deprivation of the
Human Basic Needs that support the need of the intervention (Departamento para la
Prosperidad Social, 2015, p. 25).
In this phase, there are four main challenges identified. The first one, related with the
identification of needs, is that sometimes the dynamics of the PPPs respond to a limited logic
based on relationships of opportunities. For instance, the program of accompaniment for the
Internally Displaced People that are returning to their lands, promotes the adequate
investment in housing. That’s why the strategy has been looking for enterprises of cement
that could provide materials with prices socially favorable to the victims (Salazar, 2016). In
this example where the private sector supply goods or services according to its core business
and the opportunity offered by the institution, is a relationship based on an opportunity more
than on an integral needs assessment and multi stakeholder dialogue.
The second challenge is the limitation of the system of identification of the victims. “Even if
the victims are registered in certain place, due to the dynamics of the country is possible they
already have moved to another place. This situation is not reflected in the registry and that
makes difficult the targeting of the projects. At the same time, the system is designed to
identify the population according to the crimes they were victims but not according to a
characterization of their work skills for example, information that is useful for the
establishment of the PPPs” (Salazar, 2016).
In the frame of the “in country appraisal” there is still a high level of disarticulation and no
communication between the different stakeholders that participate in the PPPs, generating an
unnecessary multiplication of efforts and a non-efficient use of the resources. The third
challenge, is the need of harmonizing the diversity of participants and addressing different
power balances are the main challenges associated with partnership building, the assignation
of responsibilities and the operationalization of the strategy in reality (Nelson, 2000, p. 33).

36. 36
Finally, one of the main obstacles identify by the actors is the prevalence of the particular
interests of each one of the partners. “Create the notion that all the partners are working for
the same objective to overcoming the egos is very difficult” (Londoño, 2016) How is
expected, “this situation difficulty the articulation between the different initiatives and thus,
the conformation of sustainable partnerships” (Jordan, 2016).
Precisely, nowadays “the team of the Unit of Victims is participating in the Table of
businessmen for peace of the Chamber of Commerce to identify the expectations and the
interest of the companies. The Chamber has been monitoring with surveys the interest of
business of working with the victim population and the demobilized. For instance, they
realize that the development of the peace negotiations has an incidence in the perceptions of
the businessman about these topics” (Salazar, 2016).
The Unit is also working in a Table of Partnerships which has the aim of generating a more
structured work in terms of communication and articulation. This is why currently, the Unit
of Victims is doing a consultation among the public institutions and business to “identify the
lessons learned and the opportunities of improvement in the relationships established
between the public and the private sector, specifically of the PPPs” (Unidad de Víctimas,
2016). With this consultation the Unit of Victims aims “to improve the integration and
coordination of the efforts and initiatives of the public and the private sector related with the
integral reparation of the victims” (Unidad de Víctimas, 2016).
In the case of the business, the information to be gathered include if the company has
developed any project in partnership with the public sector, the types of the relationship
established, the lines of intervention, the criteria followed in the intervention (zones of
operation of the business, the quantity of victims, among others), the mechanism of
formalization of the partnership, the incentives to establish relationships with the public
sector, the successful experiences, the factors that facilitate the partnership with the public
sector and finally, the obstacles, challenges and recommendations (Unidad de Víctimas,
2016).
In the case of the public sector, the consultation attempts to identify if the institution has
developed any project in partnership with the private sector, the business that have
participated in this partnerships, the component of the public policy of reparation that is
covered by the partnership (truth, justices, prevention and protection, attentions and
assistance, or integral reparation), the lines of intervention and the factors of success. In this
case it is also relevant to identify the existence of a work team within the institutions in charge
of the management of the PPPs (Unidad de Víctimas, 2016).
It is important to mention “that different stakeholders have competing interests and built-in
mistrust, space must be provided to allow dialogue and engagement. When such dialogue is
guided, common themes and issues emerge. Common themes lead to common interests, and
common interests lead to consensus building and, ultimately, the basis for a mandate”
(Abramov, 2010, p. 484). The challenges formulated should be faced to improve the way the
needs and the opportunities are identified and the way in which the intervention is designed.
Then, it will be possible “to ascertain a common mandate that should be aligned with the
circumstances and priorities of the country and its stakeholders” (Abramov, 2010, p. 484).