ViolencePolit Change:Andes

3 Credits · Level: Graduate, Juris Doctor, Undergraduate

The Andean region -- for the purposes of this course comprising principally the countries of Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia --is perhaps the most politically as well as conceptually interesting area of Latin America. It is also a region undergoing profound social transformation, political instability and political violence. This course will provide an immersion into the issues of understanding conflict, social change and political transformation in the contemporary Andes. It will introduce some of the best and most recent scholarly and policy research on and from the region, addressing such issues as the reconstruction of indigenous identity; the movement to reach a political settlement with the guerrilla insurgency in Colombia; the rise of what some have called the neo-populist Left; the attempt to bring justice and national reconciliation in post-Sendero Peru, including the work of the Peruvian Truth Commission and the later trial and conviction of former president Albert Fujimori; the politics of constitution making to reform the political regime (Bolivia, Ecuador, Colombia). A reading knowledge of Spanish is required, as some of the best literature is not available in English.