Civil Resistance and Conflict Termination in Latin America

This paper seeks to understand how civil resistance has had an impact in Latin America in the context of bringing protracted armed conflict to a closure. The paper presents two empirical case studies, those of Guatemala and Colombia and analyses how nonviolent conflict carried out by civil society organisations has had an impact upon formal peace processes and informal peace building. Civil resistance in both cases was able to wield a series of important achievements, although it is questionable as to whether actors were able to transform profoundly the violent patterns of behaviour of illegal armed actors and the state. The paper then will ask what are the limits to the impact of civil resistance within the framework of conflict termination.