The Afro-Colombian Movement’s Institutional Activism and Political Impact (1991–2018)

In this chapter, the author analyzes the political negotiations that preceded the declaration of the 1991 Constitution, the subsequent debates within the Special Commission for Black Communities (responsible for elaborating Law 70 of 1993 which replaced AT55), the organizational reconfiguring of the Afro-Colombian movement after Law 70, and the eventual institutional rapprochement with the state. The chapter demonstrates that there was a strong pluralization and specialization on an organizational level of the Afro-Colombian movement throughout the 1990s. Furthermore, the chapter discusses how the multi-cultural turn of the Colombian state, the peace accords established between the Colombian government, the guerrillas and paramilitary groups, the increase in forced displacement of rural Black communities, and the political-economic relations between Colombia and the United States played an influential role on the way Afro-Colombian movements organized.