German-Colombian Peace Institute CAPAZ

Logo Instituto CAPAZ

The Colom­bian peace process between the Colom­bian govern­ment and the guerrilla organi­zation FARC is despite all diffi­cul­ties and imponde­rables one of the few rays of hope in the cur­rent world­wide war. In order to sup­port the peace process in the areas of research, teaching and consul­tancy, the Ger­man Aca­demic Ex­change Service (DAAD) has been sup­porting the establish­ment and work of a German-Colom­bian Peace Insti­tute (Ins­tit­uto Colombo-Alemán para la Paz (CAPAZ))  in Bo­gotá since the end of 2016 with funds from the Fede­ral For­eign Office. The Institute has since become the nucleus of a broad aca­demic net­work within Colom­bia and bet­ween Colom­bia and Ger­many in which the cent­ral themes of the peace pro­cess are dealt with. In parti­cular, univer­sities from regions of Colom­bia that are most affec­ted by the con­flict are involved.

The project is carried out by a consor­tium of German and Colom­bian research and edu­catio­nal insti­tutions. The scien­tific director of the Ins­tituto CAPAZ is Prof. Dr. Stefan Peters, who also holds a professor­ship for peace research at the Law Faculty of Justus Liebig University in Giessen. The foun­ding members of the consor­tium on the Ger­man side are PRIF, Justus Liebig University Giessen (con­sortium leader), Georg-August-Universität Göt­tingen, Freie Univer­sität Berlin and Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg. The Colom­bian foun­ding institu­tions are the Univer­sidad Nacional (consortium leader), the Univer­sidad de los Andes, the Univer­sidad del Rosario, the Pontificia Universi­dad Javeriana, and the Univer­sidad Externado de Colombia. 

In 2018, eight further Colom­bian and two further German univer­sities joined the consor­tium as asso­ciated partners. These are the follo­wing univer­sities in Colombia: Universi­dad de Antioquia (Medellín), Univer­sidad de Caldas (Manizales), Univer­sidad del Cauca (Popayán), Univer­sidad de Ibagué (Ibagué), Unive­rsidad Industrial de Santan­der (Bucaramanga), Univer­sidad de Medellín (Medellín), Univer­sidad del Norte (Barranquilla), Univer­sidad Pontificia Bolivariana (Medellín). In Germany, these are the Univer­sity of Erfurt and the Catholic Univer­sity of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt (Eichstätt/Bavaria).

A period of ten years is planned for the establishment of the Institute. Following the successfully completed establishment phase (2016-2019), the project is currently in the institutionalisation phase (2020-2023). A consolidation phase (until 2026) is planned for the following years. Two ongoing research projects in which PRIF is participating as part of the Instituto CAPAZ are “Violence against Social Activists: Causes, Patterns, and Transformations” and “The impact of the collective reincorporation of former FARC-EP fighters on the local reconstruction of the social fabric in Colombia”.

Project Lead

Jonas Wolff

Jonas Wolff

Thilo Marauhn

Thilo Marauhn

Staff

Laura Camila Barrios Sabogal

Laura Camila Barrios Sabogal