The ethnic chapter of the 2016 Colombian peace agreement and the afro-descendants’ right to prior consultation: a story of unfulfilled promises

Abstract

ABSTRACTAfter more than 50 years of conflict, the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) signed the 24th of November 2016 a final peace agreement. It included an ‘Ethnic Chapter’ that states that the agreement must be interpreted and implemented with an ethnic-based approach. This has significant implications on the relations between ethnic groups and the State in the six components of the agreement, including the right to be consulted before any implementation measure is enacted. In particular, the peace agreement opened up new understandings of prior consultation for the transitional period that favoured afro-descendants and indigenous peoples. For instance, the Ethnic Chapter incorporated the concept of cultural objection (objeción cultural), which changed the deontic content of the right to prior consultation by recognising a form of veto with respect to implementation decisions of the peace agreement, not only at the level of local administrative measures, but also at the national level of legislative measures. However, very little progress has been made in this regard. The paper aims to critically analyse the Ethnic Chapter’s first year of implementation (2017), focusing on the right to prior consultation for afro-descendants.