‘We are not Drug Traffickers, We are Colombian Peasants’: The voices and history of cocaleros in the substitution programme of illicit crops in Colombia

Abstract

Drugs and development policies lack a historical and political economy perspective. This has led to a situation where issues of everyday state-making and agrarian conflicts are ignored. Alternative frameworks that incorporate these elements do not go beyond mere procedural participation. This is also the case with Colombia's Comprehensive Plan for the Substitution of Illicit Crops (‘PNIS’), resulting from the recent 2016 peace agreement. Through ethnographic work and content analysis of coca growers' demands, we demonstrate how coca growers are the ones who best understand the historical reasons that led them to participate in this economy and therefore, who can most clearly design and implement transition strategies in drugs and development policies. In addition to history and political economy, alternative approaches must draw on the experiences of those who have suffered from state-building processes.