Between Jobs and Cooperatives: Lessons from Colombia’s Entornos Productivos

• In Event: Reintegration after Civil Wars

Abstract

A central challenge for societies transitioning out of war is ensuring that combatants successfully reintegrate into civilian life. Failure to do so can reignite conflict or push ex-combatants into crime. National reintegration programs often represent the frontline of these policy goals and yet we know little about how well such programs work given data scarcity and steep causal identification problems. Here, we focus on Colombia's massive and innovative Reintegration Route to shed light on the experiences and outcomes of ex-combatants who took part in the program. We are especially focused on people who have participated in the entornos productivos: a series of programs/workshops aimed at labor market integration through skill-building. Using an original survey and the analysis of a series of focus groups with excombatants we first present some descriptive evidence regarding the challenges for the economic reintegration of former rebels. We then use a series of survey experiments to assess preferences for jobs, success in economic reintegration, and the effect of stigmatization on reintegration efforts.

Authors

• Juan Fernando Tellez, University of California, Davis

• Mateo Villamizar Chaparro, Universidad Católica de Uruguay