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The war in Colombia has left multiple social wounds that we have not yet managed to heal.
However, community committees, community boards or non-profit organizations have sought to address some of them and, what is more, they also seek to repair the diseased social fabric left behind by the conflict.
It is the communities who take the lead in these processes, reaching places that the State does not reach.
But what is transitional justice? Why can we see in it a commitment to lasting justice?
One of the most important points it has is the interest in decentralizing it.
Instead of the processes being developed from governmental spaces, from judges and lawyers, it is intended to take into account the voice of the victims and activists.
Despite the fact that activism is read as unreliable by traditional justice, even as dangerous, in transitional justice the voices of community leaders are appreciated and sought.
In this acclaimed strategy, reparations are proposed from the beginning, it gives the gender perspective an exemplary relevance and there is a clear desire to address the past in order for victims and perpetrators to recover from trauma.
As a result of the recognition of the seriousness that the oblivion and perpetual stigmatization of the different agents of the most extensive armed conflict in South America represents for Colombia, the country has endeavored to establish a proper investigation into the facts and contexts.
The goal of building a dialogic of truth was born with the signing of the Colombia Peace Process.
Daniela Escallón Vicaría, a lawyer specialized in legal psychology and founding member of the Colombian Association of Therapeutic Justice, explained for the Innova Pública podcast that the special jurisdiction for peace is the first model of the restorative model in the world that is part of transitional justice , and from which a constitutional duty is imposed: "The legal norms that create and govern the comprehensive system of truth, reparation and non-repetition have a guiding principle called restorative justice."
The ultimate goal of this model is to restore one's own justice.
Although the transitional is concerned in a first stay to investigate and collect data on the multiple events that took place in the framework of the armed conflict, it is not its only task;
As a repository of information, the transitional complies with the relevant task of building memory, which in turn leads to unmissable steps to find the restitution of rights: recognition of the crime, the will to repair, and the path to belonging again.
On November 17, an event was held by the Bsocial Foundation, Impunity Watch and the Javeriana University of Bogotá on women's leadership.
In the conversation, PAZos de resistencia y esperanza, leaders of the Network of Women Victims and Professionals (RMVP), Arrópame con tu esperanza, Memorias Colombia and the Association of Rural Women Victims of Vichada (ASMURVI) explained how this commitment has sheltered the communities and victims, but they also pointed out its failures and limitations.
Thinking about the sustainability of the justice mechanisms that we use in our societies is fundamental.
It is not only that the prison system is collapsed, it is also about thinking that there are new ways of looking at actions that have been criminalized for years, such as the consumption and possession of marijuana.
It is to understand that the increase in sentences does not have a statistical, cultural or social repercussion that indicates that the correct way to do justice is through criminal proceedings.
On the contrary, criminal justice is limited to enforcing the punishment and, to our regret, it is deficient when it comes to implementing reparations and when thinking about social reintegration.
One of the most compelling ways to differentiate between criminal and transitional crimes is to observe that context has an undeniable impact on how conflicts take root and aggravate and how they can be resolved.
An example of this was mentioned in the PAZos de resistencia y esperanza event when it was reiterated how essential it is to understand the role of economies in maintaining peace in the territories: peace cannot be sustainable without an economic approach, where there are resources: where there is hunger, there will be war.
In this other scenario, neither the crime nor the person who committed it is put under the magnifying glass, what is analyzed with more scrutiny are the contexts that lead to certain results, even if these are tragic.
The leadership of the communities has allowed the recognition of the urgency to address justice through unusual paths, where ties are not necessarily cut, but rather strengthened.
One of the leaders of the meeting stated: "Collective work makes there hope."
Just as they are willing to work with their community to carry out healing practices that take into account those who have been their victimizers, they also continue to be critical of the peace processes and warn that the involvement of all of society will, in the end, be , the right step to reach a sustainable peace.
Although private and public educational institutions and non-profit organizations make and have made an effort to serve as a platform to expand or sustain inescapable dialogues between the different agents of the conflict, more and better state commitments are lacking.
“While the State closes its eyes and forgets, we victims close our eyes and remember,” said a leader of the organization Arrópame con tu esperanza on November 17.
Transitional justice is a clear effort to give peace and the restoration of the social fabric a concrete chance.
Of course, it is a system that has been elaborated from informality and from self-management, so that institutionalizing and maintaining it continues to require differential strategies and, mainly, proper socialization.
It cannot be ignored how relevant it is that all people understand that justice can be delivered from the community and through multiple tactics, understanding with this that it is also in a construction period and, therefore, it is a great laboratory who has set himself the golden goal of achieving peace in a way that is lasting and humane.