La Minga 2020: A Historical, Decolonizing Contact Zone in Contemporary Colombia

How to Cite: Torres Molano, Marcela. "La Minga 2020: A Historical, Decolonizing Contact Zone in Contemporary Colombia". Dearq no. 36 (2023): 54-62. DOI: https://doi.org/10.18389/dearq36.2023.07

This paper explores how the Indigenous social protest of “La Minga 2020” became an opportunity for re-appropriating and decolonizing the public space of La plaza de Bolivar, while fostering collective opposition to the ongoing violence affecting Indigenous communities in Colombia. Through the analysis of “La Minga 2020”, the colonial character of the plaza de Bolivar, and the use of theoretical concepts such as Contact Zones and decolonization of spaces, the article reflects on how Indigenous people transformed the hegemonic space into a place of collectiveness.

Keywords: Contact Zone, Indigenous resistance, social mobilization, protest, La Minga, popular agency.

“a picture is worth a thousand words”

Indigenous people from Colombia have for centuries resisted the colonization process and have reappropriated colonial spaces through different social strategies. One of the most significant examples of the last decade has been the “Minga 2020”, a protest lead by Indigenous organizations opposing colonial violence in contemporary Colombia. In the middle of a global pandemic causing the world to rethink the damaging anthropocentric relations with the Pachamama and the unequal Capitalist modes of life, more than ten thousand individuals, including seven thousand Indigenous people, occupied La Plaza de Bolivar, one of the most notorious colonial spaces of Bogota. Their encounter was a declaration against the outrageous violence affecting Indigenous communities, which has abruptly increased since 2019, when the last presidential government was initiated (Human Rights Watch 2021). The protest commonly known as “La Minga 2020” generated powerful social effects for the Colombian population, allowing the broader society to question the violence faced by Indigenous people and their ancestral territories. La minga 2020, that demanded immediate solutions to the murders and abuse of all forms of life, captured the ongoing colonial violence in one forceful and devastating image: a picture of thousands of individuals surrounding an empty, elevated chair, that was intended for the president of the country to have a political dialogue with the participants (ONIC 2020). This powerful image became a physical evidence of the long-lasting authoritarian attitudes, and the indifference of the national government towards Indigenous lives.

Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui (2010), Aymara sociologist and historian, argues that images in comparison to words offer better possibilities to interpret social realities. From a historical perspective, images have allowed racialized individuals to expose their experiences without being corrupted by colonial forms of language. Thus, the empty chair in the middle of the Plaza de Bolivar, without any rhetorical excuses, became a historical moment for Colombia, and the proof of the government's direct responsibility for the loss of thousands of racialized lives (MemorArte 2020). The empty chair was a cathartic juncture for the country as it was a tangible representation of how Indigenous people have been gravely affected by the undermining of the peace accord, a lack of food and water security, and the illegal exploitation and militarization of their territories. This image is as Rivera Cusicanqui (2010) argues, a rupture of tangible actions from weak discourses, and a moment in which Indigenous people's agency succeeded over hegemonic forms of oppression, in a pure colonial space.

writing from a non-indigenous background

La Minga 2020 touched the realities of millions of Colombians, and it reached international communities immensely through social media [#minga2020]. With this article, from the perspective of a white-mestiza, Colombian woman, coming from a privileged urban background and education, I intend to demonstrate how this social protest became a Contact Zone in which Indigenous people reclaimed the power of negotiation, exposed their realities and resistance to millions of Colombians, and decolonized the main public space of the capital city of the country. Through the analysis of the case study, I will answer the question: How have Indigenous people in Colombia reappropriated colonial public spaces as Contact zones?

To accomplish this, I first present a brief analysis on the historical realities of Indigenous people in Colombia and introduce La Minga as a resistance mechanism. Afterwards, I describe and analyze the colonial character of “La Plaza de Bolivar”, home to the forms of hegemonic powers inherited from the colony. Further, I create a theoretical framework based on Pratt's (1992) and Clifford's (1997) concept of Contact Zones, and an approach to decolonization of public spaces using Rivera Cusicanqui (2010), Correia (2019) and Mavisoy Muchavisoy perspectives (2018). In the end, I analyze how La Minga 2020 became a contact zone, in which power dynamics were powerfully shifted by Indigenous people.

colonialism and lack of tangible actions

In what is now known as Colombian territory, Indigenous people have suffered diverse forms of oppression and continue to face the consequences of an ongoing colonial process enforced by hegemonic forms of power (Alto Comisionado de las Naciones Unidas para los Refugiados [ACNUR] 2011). Even after the independence from the Spanish crown, Indigenous people have suffered multiple forms of violence and discrimination. For instance, in 1886, with the constitution of Tunja,¹ Indigenous people were categorized as “savages or half civilized” and were legally considered as unqualified minors, unable to be appropriate members of society. In the nineteenth century, Indigenous people did not have the right to vote or to hold any political roles. In 1904, in the southern west region of Colombia, Indigenous people were prohibited to cultivate their own crops, to comply with an assimilation and “modernization” process (Mora García and Correa Alonso 2020). It was only until 1991, with a constitutional reform, that Colombia gave official recognition to Indigenous people. After long social fights, they achieved the recognition of their jurisdictional autonomy, self-political representation, and the inclusion of Indigenous political parties in congress (Esneider López, member of CRIC, personal communication, 4th April 2021).

Nevertheless, despite their constitutional rights being officially declared, Indigenous people have been disproportionately affected by the armed conflict. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Indigenous people in Colombia are among the highest numbers of forced displaced population (ACNUR 2011). They are particularly vulnerable to the consequences of displacement because of the strong interconnection of their modes of life with their lands (Wirpsa et al. 2017). The assaults suffered by Indigenous people have been growing in the last decades. In 2005, around thirty percent of Indigenous individuals were victims of the conflict (Wirpsa et al. 2017). In 2008, the UNHCR reported that “many indigenous groups were in imminent danger of extinction” as a consequence of military actions (Wirpsa et al. 2017). The reason why in 2013, Indigenous social movements began demanding the protection of their territories, their self-government autonomy and sovereignty over their lands. They requested prior consultation on extractive projects and the revocation of mining concessions on Indigenous lands. They opposed free trades with northern countries, asked for the demilitarization of their towns, and the safe exercise of territorial control through the Indigenous guard (Mora García and Correa Alfonso 2020).²

“The situation of the human rights of Indigenous people in Colombia continues to be extremely serious, and deeply worrying” (ACNUR 2011), despite the constitutional recognition of their fundamental rights, the Colombian ratification of the International Labour Office Convention (currently Law 21), and the previous governments' support to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (IWGIA 2020).

Nonetheless, Indigenous communities in Colombia have defended their rights to autonomy, life, traditions and lands. “They have sought local, regional, national and international alternatives for peaceful coexistence, and non-violet environmental and economic sustainability” (Wirpsa et al. 2014, cited in Mora García and Correa Alfonso 2020, 174). Their resilience has been proved by the systemic changes during the last decades. Resistance is central to their mode of lives, which became more evident with the social manifestation of the Minga 2020.

minga power

Multiple Indigenous groups from Abya Yala (Latin America) have developed their own legal frameworks to protect their communities from violence inflicted by the state and extractive practices of multinational companies (Benavides Vanegas 2009). One communal approach of the Andean Indigenous groups is the Minga, an ancestral pedagogy that incentives collective work to foster a common wellbeing. Minga comes from the Quechua Minka, a practice of communal labour to create Sumak Kawsay (Good life for everyone) (La Minga en Movimiento 2008). However, the concept of Minga in Colombia has also obtained a politically charged meaning during the last decades (Bolaños 2019). In the last twenty years, the national organization of Indigenous people of Colombia (ONIC) have conducted over fifty Mingas with social connotations (Bolaños 2019). According to Mora García and Correa Alfonso (2020), in the Colombian context the Minga has become a form of decolonial resistance to defend Indigenous rights to democracy and self-autonomy. Minga has also become a demilitarized strategy for defending Indigenous territories from offenders and the state (Sánchez Montenegro 2015).

Likewise, the Minga has allowed Colombian society to understand Indigenous organization capacity, their symbolic strategies for connecting with communities, and their holistic concept of coexistence (Belalcázar Valencia 2011). According to the ONIC (2020), the last decades have witnessed the recognition of the Minga as a political participation tool and a protest mechanism. The Indigenous Regional Council of Cauca (CRIC), the largest Minga organizers, have transformed Mingas into a land restoration tool, and an opposition to the neoliberal model, aiming for a more balanced economy and respect for the environment (Sánchez Montenegro 2015). The reason why in March 2019, Indigenous people conducted the “Minga for Life and Peace”, which involved communities from all across the country. The 2019 Minga lasted twenty-seven days, occupied the Pan-American highway, and established negotiations with the national government on territory protection. Despite the accords being officially accepted and signed by the two parts, they were neither implemented or respected by the state (IWGIA 2020).

The disregard of the 2019 commitments became the precedent for the Minga 2020, a mobilization for “the defence of life, the right to territory, democracy and peace”. According to the ONIC (2020), the COVID-19 pandemic made evident how the forms of western life have been leading the planet to a serious crisis, taking away the lives of thousands of Indigenous people. Hence, the Minga 2020 became a mechanism for denouncing the abuse face by racialized communities in Colombia (CRIC 2020a). For the CRIC (2020b), the Minga 2020 was an official rejection to the indifferent attitude of the government towards Indigenous lives. It was a demand for real and efficient actions to the assassinations of Indigenous people, the illegal occupation of their territories, and the massacre of their communities. Through the Minga, the CRIC demanded the government in power the protection of the peace accord and urgent actions to guarantee the respect for human rights in Colombia. It also became an Indigenous jurisdiction procedure to ask the president of the country for a political judgment as a result of their lack of support for the peace process (CRIC 2020b).

la plaza de bolivar, the ultimate colonial space

In October 2020, the Minga occupied numerous roads across the southwest region of Colombia, including the Pan-American Highway. During fifteen days Minga gatherers walked across the territories from Cali, southwest of the country, to the central territory of Bogota. When participants arrived in the city, they appropriated different public spaces while following strict biosafety measures and demonstrating deep respect for the urban territory. The central encounter of the manifestation occupied the prominent Plaza de Bolivar, a colonial space par excellence, that clusters the principal forms of hegemonic power of the country. The plaza is home to the Congress Palace, the Supreme Justice Court, the Mayor Office, and three catholic cathedrals; all institutions responsible for violence against Indigenous people since the beginning of the colony.

Over the centuries, the colonial character of the plaza has had multiple transformations, however all of them have maintained a close relation to European forms of architecture, initially brought by Spaniards during colonial times. In the so-called foundational period, the plaza was built as a home for the public, religious and civil buildings. It was proclaimed a space to fear the force of god, the state, and the supreme hierarchy of the Spanish royalty (Forero Benavides 2016). During the next centuries the space was transformed by different needs and uses, until the nineteenth century, when the government renovated the space to recover the traditional colonial forms of architecture (Uribe González et al. 2015). Between 1959 and 1960 the national government transformed the site to commemorate an anniversary of the independence day. According to the Colombian Society of Architects, the plaza was renovated with the purpose to enhance the “magnificence” of colonial institutional buildings (Uribe González et al. 2015). The space aimed to highlight the most “dignifying” architecture, the national congress, to represent the civic quality of the country. The renovation was a cleansing operation to reestablish a colonial order in accordance with the “democratic” values of modern Colombia (Duarte Martínez 2016). Values that over centuries have privileged the miscegenation of white people to maintain hegemonic orders, and oppress Afro Colombians and Indigenous populations.

Besides changing the architectural components, the names of the plaza have consistently evolved, maintaining their colonial essence. Willian Mavisoy Muchavisoy (2018) argues that the art of “baptizing places” was another approach of colonizers to invade, dominate, and exercise their power over ancestral territories; it was their mechanism to appropriate and disrupt the relations between humans and nature. This becomes evident with the different names given to the colonial plaza during centuries. It was first called “La plaza mayor,” a common title for public spaces in Spanish cities; then the Colonial Plaza, the Constitutional Plaza and later the Plaza de Bolivar (Duarte Martínez 2016). Named after Simón Bolivar, a Criollo who publicly declared that the lands of the “Gran Colombia” did not belong to any Indian or Spaniard, but exclusively to the miscegenation of white invaders with other populations (Mora García and Correa Alfonso 2020). A position that supported the erasure of Indigenous people inhabiting their ancestral territories for millennia, before any Spaniards descendants were born in the so-called new continent.

Furthermore, the colonial essence of the plaza has always lived through historical acts. During the Spanish invasion it was the space for celebration of European attacks, and a site to pay tribute to the kingdom (Torres 2019). In addition, it was the site for Catholic celebrations, that for centuries blessed the genocide of Indigenous people (Torres 2019). In 2020, La Plaza de Bolivar became the scenario in which the president of the country, the main figure of the hegemonic power, demonstrated how the ongoing colonial orders keep neglecting millions of Indigenous people their right to life.

Prior to the Minga arrival, and as a response to protect the colonial built-environment, the local government chose to carefully cover the facades of the buildings and the main statue of Bolivar. The picture of the plaza before the appearance of the participants is another proof of how the priority of the government was to maintain intact the image of the “national” forms of power, and to impose control over their opponents. The response of the authorities to protect the colonial structures while neglecting the lives of millions of Indigenous people became another tangible proof of their despotic power. Sanchez Montenegro (2015) argues how authoritarian power is not only displayed in the governmental apparatus, but it transcends different areas of daily life. This became evident with the portrait of the plaza before the mobilization, which projected the intention of protecting a stone sculpture of Bolivar and the buildings of power, while being accomplice to the violence affecting the lives and ancestral territories of Indigenous people from across the country.

As a consequence, I argue that the gathering of la Minga 2020, occupying a pure colonial space and with the specific conditions that Indigenous people generated, developed into a Contact Zone. A zone in which Indigenous people demonstrated how to decolonize a space with symbolic and forceful actions. Because only powerful communities would have the strength to gather in the middle of a pandemic, in a space that not only belongs to a despotic government, but where all forms of architecture endorse colonial violence. The evidence of this historical moment remains in different images of the manifestation. In particular, the famous and painful “Empty Chair,” and the finely protected colonial Bolivar Square, prior to the arrival of the Minga.

the epistemological foundations

Contact Zone, a term coined by Mary Louise Pratt (1992, 4), is defined as the “social spaces where disparate cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each other, often in highly asymmetrical relations of domination and subordination”. For instance, contact zones can refer to physical, geographical and historical spaces where colonial encounters occur in contemporary times. According to Pratt (1992, 7), contact zones, in many opportunities, could implicate unequal conditions such as coercion from one side, uneven relations of power, and a high possibility of conflict. Pratt explains that the contact zone represents a spatial and temporal encounter in which “subjects are constituted in and by their relations to each other”.

James Clifford (1997), in the text “Museums as Contact Zones,” adds a creative, political and urban aspect to Pratt's concept. According to Clifford, contact zones could be reciprocal encounters in which control and power relations are negotiated, even from the less authoritative part. They are spaces of confrontation in which identity-making and “transculturation” finds a space for existence. Clifford (1997) argues that contact zones are “power-charged” exchanges that can happen in urban locations, generating opportunities for cultural production. In addition, he introduces the concept of [conflict] contact zone, in which audiences from different historical, cultural, and geographical perspectives, challenge the control of authorities and find in “mobilizations and representations” an opportunity for confrontation. Those [conflict] contact zones are “places of hybrid possibilities and political negotiation”.

According to Silvia Rivera Cusicanqui (2010), city settings are environments in which multiple cultures coexist, complement themselves, and in many occasions antagonize each other. As a consequence, an urban scenario is generally a space where conflict is imminent because of the presence of numerous relations that easily clash in moments of disagreement. Further, city scenarios are spaces where hierarchical relations and social stratification prevail. Historically speaking, urban centres in Abya Yala have inherited stratification relations from the colony, perpetuating damaging racial stigmatization. Cities are the less active scenarios of decolonization of societies, reinforcing a system controlled by the hegemonic forms of power. Thus, a truly decolonization process requires challenging colonial urban forms by generating embodied practices of colonial opposition and emblematic symbolic actions (Rivera Cusicanqui 2010).

According to Correia (2019), space is fundamental for decolonization since numerous Indigenous movements use their relation with spaces/territories to nurture traditional practices between human and non-human actors. Spaces can be understood as a dynamic process, in which relations of power and historical moments create material constellations. Thus, evaluating different spaces through Indigenous mobilizations promotes a decolonized territorial shift that includes social, political and economic configurations of Indigenous conceptions. Moreover, Mavisoy Muchavisoy (2018) argues that to build a decolonized society, it is important to use pedagogies that promote memory-space and intercultural relations in space, which allows the rupture of forced homogenization. Mavisoy Muchavisoy invites individuals to reflect in collectivity, to recognize the forms of hegemonic power in the space, and how their discourses have antagonized the existence of “others.”

la minga 2020 as a decolonizingcontact zone

La Minga 2020 developed into a Contact Zone between Indigenous representatives and Colombian broader society by congregating different social sectors, and exposing the oppression suffered by Indigenous people. The Minga became a precedent for the country since it generated a powerful collaboration between Indigenous representatives, Afro-Colombian communities, students, teachers associations, and other social sectors (Revista Semana 2020a). Despite the efforts of the government to criminalize Indigenous leaders by blaming participants as terrorists and threatening them with criminal charges, the mobilization was massively welcome by residents of Bogota (Mercado 2020). As a result of the absence of participation of the president, the Minga became a trigger for representatives of official institutions, surrounding La Plaza de Bolivar, to raise their voices in support of Indigenous communities. For instance, the mayor of Bogota publicly requested the president of the country to respect the demands of thousands of people occupying the plaza (Revista Semana 2020a). Further, representatives of the MAIS Indigenous party³ argued that the lack of response from the government was another proof of the generalized racism and the need of structural changes in the country (Revista Semana 2020a). Other non-Indigenous senators explained that the manifestation, occupying a nearby space, pressured the senate and house of representatives to listen to the participants' voices, while exposing how the national government is afraid of the cosmological forces of Indigenous people, who have survived centuries of genocide (Revista Semana 2020b).

According to Gabriel Jeromito (personal communication, 4th April 2021), a Paez Indigenous man living in Bogotá, la Minga raised a feeling of collective empowerment, since Indigenous agency and strength was demonstrated through national and international media. For Esneider Lopez (personal communication, 4th April 2021), a Minga participant from the Nasa community, this encounter was a wake up call to the entire country, and a display of Indigenous resistance in an ongoing colonial structure. Lopez declared that “This Minga was a dialogue with the entire country and not only with a government; it was about Indigenous people demonstrating their power of resistance and inviting every other citizen to oppose the violence that has affected Colombians for over seven decades” (personal communication, 4th April 2021).

Moreover, the occupation of the urban plaza allowed city dwellers to recognize the conflict in their own territories. According to Father de Roux, president of the Colombian Truth Commission, “city residents only know the conflict through television,” and do not understand the enormous ethical responsibility that Colombians have towards the the victims (Criollo 2014). An aspect that changed with the participation of La Minga 2020 and their occupation of the main public space of the city. According to Beatriz Ramos (personal communication, 4th April 2021), a resident of Bogotá and participant of the encounter, this Minga generated conversations with people about how much urban dwellers ignore the reality of the country. For Lesly Castro, another resident of the city, the Minga made her realize that the violence suffered by Indigenous people only affected dwellers of Bogota once Indigenous groups occupied the city spaces (personal communication, 4th April 2021).

Furthermore, the symbolic images generated by the encounter will be a reminder of the collective resistance of Indigenous people. The empty chair in the middle of the colonial space became a proof of how the national government consciously ignore the reality of many racialized populations. According to Jorge Jiménez, a Truth Commission volunteer, even though the reaction of the president was something the country expected, the Minga 2020 was an opportunity to expose how the work of protecting territories and lives has exclusively been done by Indigenous people and other affected populations (personal communication, 4th April 2021). For María Cuervo, a Minga supporter from Bogota, with this protest Indigenous people”destabilized and occupied the most colonial and patriarchal space, where national forms of government impose their counterproductive governability” (personal communication, 4th April 2021).

With the occupation of the Plaza de Bolivar and the re-appropriation of its historical meaning, Indigenous people generated a contact zone with the border society, and a [conflict] contact zone with the institutional orders. Through the Minga 2020, Indigenous communities, in collaboration with residents of Bogota, developed a collective process against the oppression of the state, allowing to temporary decolonize the plaza and the history of the city. This contact zone promoted a collective reflection on the damaging racist structures inherited from the colony, and it raised a powerful consciousness on the importance of unity for the healing of the country. Further, through the [conflict] contact zone, Indigenous people shifted power dynamics by questioning the absolutist and despotic power of the presidential figure. This negotiation of power orders allowed racialized communities to expose their realities in a more material and immediate approach, becoming a historical reference for the country. The controversial encounter of the Minga 2020 created an unprecedented decolonized moment for Colombia, which fostered a spirit of intercultural support and emancipation desire. The occupation of La Plaza de Bolivar, in the middle of a global crisis, challenged structural racism and provided opportunities for antiracist approaches. It also made us question the need to transform and renamed colonial spaces, to honour the history and resistance of Indigenous people. The question to conclude is: should this plaza be renamed as “La Plaza de la resistencia Indígena” (The plaza of the Indigenous resistance).

bibliography

1 The constitution of Tunja established the first republican form of government independent from the Spanish Crown, creating the United Provinces of New Granada.

2 The Indigenous Guard is an unarmed protection group constituted by men, women and children. Their main job is to defend and preserve Indigenous culture and territories.

3 MAIS is the Alternative Indigenous Social Movement, a Colombian political party that emerged originally within the National Indigenous Organization of Colombia (ONIC), to put into the political sphere the historical process of indigenous resistance