Journal of Borderlands Studies

ISSN: 0886-5655 (Print) 2159-1229 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rjbs20

The Colombia–Ecuador Border Region: Between

Informal Dynamics and Illegal Practices

Marcela Ceballos Medina & Gerardo Ardila Calderón

To cite this article: Marcela Ceballos Medina & Gerardo Ardila Calderón (2015) The
Colombia–Ecuador Border Region: Between Informal Dynamics and Illegal Practices, Journal of
Borderlands Studies, 30:4, 519-535, DOI: 10.1080/08865655.2016.1179208

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/08865655.2016.1179208

Published online: 19 May 2016.

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JOURNAL OF BORDERLANDS STUDIES, 2015
VOL. 30, NO. 4, 519–535
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/08865655.2016.1179208

The Colombia–Ecuador Border Region: Between Informal

Dynamics and Illegal Practices
Marcela Ceballos Medinaa and Gerardo Ardila Calderónb
a
Lecturer, Urban Studies Institute, National University of Colombia, Bogotá, Colombia; bDirector, Urban
Studies Institute, National University of Colombia, Bogotá, Colombia

ABSTRACT
This paper examines two different phenomena in the Amazonian
border region, taking into account the analytical framework of
international relations to understand the way in which States face
them: (1) the informal dynamics of everyday life that have been
part of the State formation process, and (2) illegal practices. We
argue that they are different but not independent processes. First,
informal sectors are part of the “political economy of war,” due to
the incipient consolidation of the State, linked to historical
isolation and the strong influence of the internal armed conflict in
Colombia’s border region and its transnational dynamics in
Ecuador. Legal activities often finance illegal activities of non-state
armed actors and depend on it. Second, public policies in the
region are based on a national or regional security point of view
without articulating with regional integration policies. Finally,
States act individually in the Andean region with no policies of
cooperation at all. This lack of articulation has had a negative
impact on human security. States’ responses to illegal activities
have failed, leading to a capturing of the political system.
Nonetheless, guerrilla and Colombian government peace talks
have opened a new path to think differently on how to
consolidate the State control and to build social linkages based on
regional integration, social inclusion and consolidation of
democratic rule.

Introduction. borders: integration or contention?

This paper is based on empirical research in Putumayo, Nariño and Ecuador between 2004
and 2013. Studies were undertaken over a 10-year period of migration dynamics, magni-
tude, causes, and effects on international relations. The methodology combines: fieldwork
observation and social cartography, focus groups and deep interviews (24), official stat-
istics form UN and government databases, non-official statistics from NGOs, academic
qualitative and quantitative studies. During the fieldwork visits were made to the Colom-
bian border (Putumayo province 8 times, Nariño province 4 times, for two weeks each
time) and the Ecuadorian border (Sucumbíos province twice for two weeks each, Esmer-
aldas province twice for two weeks each and four times to Quito for one week each time).

CONTACT Marcela Ceballos Medina mceballos2000@yahoo.com

© 2016 Association for Borderlands Studies
520 M. C. MEDINA AND A. CALDERÓN

Figure 1. Map of the Colombia–Ecuador border.

The Colombia–Ecuador border region (see Figure 1) is 568 kilometers long and can be
differentiated into three regions: the coast (the Pacific Coast area in Nariño department in
Colombia and the Esmeraldas province in Ecuador); the Andean zone (the Andean moun-
tain range in Colombia’s Nariño department and Ecuador’s Carchi province); and the
Amazonian zone (Putumayo department in Colombia and Loja and Sucumbíos provinces
in Ecuador). This border region presents precarious conditions in three senses: (1) fragile
states with a low level of consolidation (based on extractive, deregulated economies, illicit
commerce, institutions coopted by private groups and particular interests, and violence as
a way of social control and of conflicts resolution); (2) historical marginalization of
borders related to national development and main political decision-making processes
have created the conditions to access the benefits of globalization through illicit activities;
and (3) the relationship between internal armed conflict and illicit activities and its trans-
national dynamics. Each of these three senses is elaborated upon below.
First, the consolidation of the State in Colombia since the 19th century has been differ-
ent in each region and has created multiple types of relationships between the State and
rural populations, mediated by local and regional elites in charge of social control and
social order (González 2004). In some cases, these elites are rich families with political
influence, or private groups, but very often they are guerrillas or paramilitary groups.
The absence of the State in matters related to borders allowed these groups to regulate
not only economic activities but also cultural, political, and filial ones.1 Drugs and arms
trafficking have been a part of the economic system in regions with a fragile State
(Naím 2005).2
Both sides of the border have been isolated from their respective national administra-
tive centers, and have been excluded from the social benefits of the national development
process. Poverty levels are higher in these areas than in the rest of the country; extractive
economies—mainly oil extraction and wood exploitation in the Amazonian region—have
brought almost nothing to the population in terms of well-being. While Colombia
 JOURNAL OF BORDERLANDS STUDIES 521

documented a national average of 27.8% of the population with unmet basic needs in 2012
(National Department of Statistics 2014), these numbers on the border with Ecuador were
43.8% in Nariño and 36% in Putumayo. Ecuador’s national average for unsatisfied basic
needs was higher, at 41.8% of the population, while in the provinces of Carchi it was
41.4%, in Esmeraldas 55.8%, and in Loja 47% (Ministerio de Coordinación de Desarrollo
Social del Ecuador 2011). These statistics demonstrate that 44.8% of the population in the
Colombia–Ecuador border is living in poverty conditions. The situation is even more pre-
carious if we consider that the majority of the population in the border regions lives in
rural areas. Some 72.2% of the rural population have unmet basic needs in Ecuador; in
Colombia, 69 of the 77 municipalities in the Ecuador border region exhibit unmet basic
needs (International Crisis Group 2011).
This situation is due in part to the historic alignment of development policies that have
prioritized the large urban centers over other regions, making them “development poles”
(the cities of Bogotá, Medellin, Cali, and Barranquilla in Colombia, and Quito and Guaya-
quil in Ecuador). Consequently, there is a large regional disparity between these cities on
one hand, and the border regions, other rural areas, and small cities on the other. Other
indicators of the region’s isolation are the poorly developed transit infrastructure connect-
ing to the main cities and the State’s weak presence that is often little more than the Armed
Forces. The roads have deteriorated despite the considerable investment in the region
from the United States’ social and military aid package to Colombia, known as “Plan
Colombia.” The package sought to eradicate the social causes of the armed conflict in
Colombia and illicit crop production.
Second, the two countries’ border provinces have low levels of binational integration
due to the failure of policies adopted within the Andean Community of Nations (Comu-
nidad Andina de Naciones—CAN) and the absence of national policies and binational
spaces that promote border development.3 The special border regimens for Border Inte-
gration Zones (Zonas de Integración Fronteriza—ZIF), as a figure approved by the
Andean Community of Nations in 1989, have not been put into practice. The Colom-
bia–Ecuador ZIF was the first zone created in South America, and it initially included
Nariño and Putumayo departments in Colombia and Carchi, Esmeraldas, Sucumbíos
and Imbabura provinces in Ecuador. It was later expanded to include two-thirds of Ecua-
dor’s national territory and a third of Colombia’s territory (Montenegro 2008). However,
to date, mechanisms have not been implemented that would facilitate commerce and
human mobility on the border via a binational center that brings together customs
measures and special immigration rules for border residents. This is due to the two
countries’ excessive centralization of foreign policy and integration policy, along with
the growing impact of the Colombian armed conflict on the shared border.
Third, the growing impact of the Colombian armed conflict and illicit drugs trade in
Ecuador’s territory both have contributed to a vision of the border as a boundary rather
than as a region in itself. Juan Gabriel Tokatlián (2011) remarked that the anti-drugs
policy in the Andean world has promoted individual State policies coordinated by the
United States government and based on military aid to the Andean countries. The defi-
nition of drug trafficking as a national security threat resulted in prohibitionist campaigns.
Forced eradication measures, such as aerial fumigation with glyphosate in the Colombian
border, not only have had environmental and health damages in both countries, but also
created political tensions with Ecuador and a breakdown of cooperation in policies
522 M. C. MEDINA AND A. CALDERÓN

(Ceballos 2010). This coercive profile has been the focus of regional security with punitive
practices, weak legal alternatives for consumption and shy compensatory policies for coca
crops to be eradicated (Tokatlián 2011).
Since 9/11, the intersection of counter-terrorism and anti-drugs policies in borders
where guerrilla and paramilitary groups control illicit trade has deepened armed confron-
tation. These developments have modified transnational dynamics with the emergence of
new actors, new alliances, and diverse strategies of production, distribution, and commer-
cialization.4 As Tokatlián observes:
A long-term perspective to the Andean region also shows something that has happened in
Mexico (and much of the Caribbean Basin) and could be replicated in the rest of the Southern
Cone: state hasn’t been strengthened and organized crime drug has been achieving significant
tactical advantages. The sequence is familiar: after each phase of partial accomodation follows
a period of virulent confrontation in which he announced a resounding victory in the anti-
drug fight, but given that the crux of the problem is not resolved, the drug re-emerges harder
(using, again, the intimidation, cooptation and violence) with creativity (improving their
adaptive capacity and entrepreneurial), it returns to a new accommodation. This is repeated
at different times. (Tokatlián 2011, 111)

The failure of the anti-drugs policy in the Andean region had negative effects on areas of
production, mainly borders. Alliances between “narcos” and other organized armed
groups, consolidated an organized crime structure in this border region:
Meanwhile, in Latin America in many regions, provinces and municipalities, rural and urban,
rich and in marginal areas, it is becoming increasingly clear that there thrives a symbiotic
phase of organized crime. Hence the proximity of a consolidated mafia pax in different geo-
graphical areas; that is, the growth and consolidation of a criminal class–for now local–level
capacity and will to establish order in that space to the disorientation of the ruling elites and
state weakness. It is not, at least in Latin America in general nor in the Andean world, in par-
ticular a national phenomenon, such that the country is completely “taken” by organized
crime. It is not an episodic affair, as organized crime, fueled by the drug emporium, that
takes years of territorial dispersion and social, political, and economic rise ( … ) The business
of illicit drugs in the region has been mutated to acquire power and a remarkable influence.
On the way it has been consolidating into organized crime that can no longer be analyzed as
the expression of a joint criminal mode; in many places in the area they have constituted de
facto a new social class and forged a certain order. (Tokatlián 2011, 117)

A realist approach has predominated over cooperation in these international relations

(Tokatlián 2011). The Ecuadoran and Colombian governments have bolstered the idea
of the borderline as being something of a “retaining wall” against illegal armed groups
that use the region for rest, supplies, rearguard support, and trade in weapons and
drugs that finance war activities. From this perspective, security is conceived as principally
a military issue and it is obtained by guaranteeing the State’s control of the territory
(Rangel 2008). Border policies do not include an integral security approach that involves
protecting people from human rights violations, promoting regional development as a
means of improving access to basic services, reducing the gap between rich and poor,
or improving the quality of life for the inhabitants. The presence of illegal armed
groups on both sides of the border has also exacerbated the region’s precarious economic
conditions, given the widespread practice of non-state actors to collect taxes on the inhabi-
tants’ economic activities, as well as to control or impede transit through the territory
at their own convenience. The increasing forced migration and other impacts of the
 JOURNAL OF BORDERLANDS STUDIES 523

socio-political violence against the civilian population also contribute to these deteriorat-
ing conditions.
This situation has recruited youth and working-age members of the population into
illicit economies and their direct involvement with the armed conflict. The state’s ineffec-
tive oversight mechanisms in these regions have facilitated the confluence of high levels of
corruption in the local government, illegal economies associated with non-state armed
actors, and the involvement of the official armed forces in these processes. Moisés
Naím (2005) refers to organized crime as a political force.
There are cross-national social networks that emerged independently from—not
necessarily against—the state and its administrative logic. Those networks and relation-
ships obey informal territorial dynamics that establish one single binational region
(rather than two national entities divided by a line), consolidate economic and migratory
strategies that are part of everyday life in these areas, and determine the way in which the
population adapts to reality. These informal dynamics are not illegal and we suggest that
public policies should respond to them, rather than try to change them, in order to
promote local governance.
We want to identify the difference between the informal transboundary networks and
the consolidation of “illegal political economy,” as well as the features and relationships
between them. Bagley and Bonilla refer to narcotrafficking as a political economy:
The phenomenon clearly transcends physical and political boundaries in the country;
involves relationships of Ecuador and other Andean nations with the United States, con-
ditioning in one way or another, all areas of what is called “developing” (…) Ecuador is
not only sensitive to conflicts arising from the international drug traffic condition, to the
extent that its effects would seriously harm the economy or alter the conditions on which
the production system is based, it is also highly vulnerable, given the institutional weaknesses
characterized by its political system. (Bagley and Bonilla 1991, 3)

In the second section, we determine the impact of these processes on human security in
the region by examining specific variables of human security in specific periods and
sectors, and determine the challenges to democratic governance.

The border region’s informal dynamics

The informal economy results from globalization and can be explained by three economic
factors that are typical of the process: the deregulation of markets, the re-structuring of pro-
duction (by way of outsourcing and subcontracting), and the deregulation of the State
(Rosales 2003). Rosales’ definition of informal economy takes up the WIEGO proposal
(Women in Informal Employment: Globalizing and Organizing), and considers as informal:
All workers (rural and urban) that do not have a constant and adequate salary and all own-
account workers (except technicians and professionals) are part of the informal economy.
Small merchants and producers, micro-entrepreneurs, domestic workers, own-account
workers that work in their own homes and casual workers (shoe-shiners, carriers, home-
based workers in clothing production or electronics, and street vendors) comprise the infor-
mal category of the economy. (Rosales 2003, 3)

The informal economy tends to be the rule rather than the exception in border zones,
especially in Latin American countries and other regions of the world that have been
able to enjoy some benefits of globalization, mainly through informality. Vuletin (2008)
524 M. C. MEDINA AND A. CALDERÓN

estimates the size of the informal economy and the relative contribution of underlying
factors in 32 (mainly) Latin American and Caribbean countries in the early 2000s (includ-
ing Ecuador and Colombia), concluding that:
(…) a burdensome tax system, rigid labor markets, higher inflation, and dominance of the
agriculture sector are the key factors in determining the informal economy, representing
altogether around 79 percent of the informal economy variance. The results also confirm
that a higher degree of informality reduces labor unionization, the number of contributors
to social security schemes, and enrollment rates in education. The size of the informal
economy differs considerably across countries. While in countries like Paraguay and Nicar-
agua the informal sector reaches values around 70 percent of total GDP, in economies like the
Bahamas, Cyprus, Grenada, St. Kitts and Nevis, Trinidad and Tobago, and Barbados, the
informal share is below 25 percent of GDP. (Vuletin 2008, 14)

Colombia and Ecuador fit in the first group of countries with a size up of 50%. In Colom-
bia, the Finance Ministry data demonstrate that 51.8% of the total economically active
population (EAP) falls in the informal category (Agencia Española de Cooperación Inter-
nacional al Desarrollo [AECID] 2010). In Ecuador, estimates range from 33% to 44% of
the economically active population as having informal work. In both countries the level
of informality has remained high during the last decade and growth has been mainly in
commerce. In Colombia, the sectors with the greatest rates of informality are commerce
(with 40.6% of all informal workers), restaurants, hotels, warehousing, and communi-
cations. Our fieldwork on this border allows us to say that the majority of the inhabitants
of the Amazonian provinces of Putumayo in Colombia and Sucumbíos in Ecuador (the
largest border sub-region) and those in Nariño and Carchi, make their living from infor-
mal economic exchange. These incomes primarily come from small- and medium-scale
commercial activities (buying and selling imported merchandise such as products from
China, but also artisan work made in Ecuador or Colombia).5
The purchase and sale of agricultural and non-perishable food products is part of this
economic dynamic. Many Colombians buy these products in Ecuador as part of their basic
food staples, particularly in areas with extensive coca crops (Putumayo department)
because agricultural products such as fruits, vegetables, and grains are scarce. In the
Andean region of Nariño-Carchi, informal economic trade also involves agricultural pro-
ducts (potatoes and milk), not necessarily because of an existing economic circuit, but
rather due to seasonal changes in the prices of those products that create comparative
advantages for the two countries’ populations. Also, this happens due to the advantages
that dollarization in Ecuador creates for the Colombian farmers who sell products in
Ecuador (Montenegro 2008).6
Other products such as natural gas and gasoline are subsidized by the Ecuadoran gov-
ernment within its territory,7 but not by the Colombian government. This situation leads
to the purchase of these products in Ecuador and their non-authorized sale in Colombia.
Contraband gas and natural gas cylinders for domestic consumption are a significant part
of cross-border flows, as we could confirm during the fieldwork.
There is another type of trade that involves legal goods for illegal purposes, such as the
provision of canned foods, agricultural products, uniforms, and footwear from Ecuador to
Colombia for illegal armed groups. Although these economic transactions occur outside of
the regulatory framework of the State and they involve non-regulated and non-authorized
economic activities, we consider the term “illegal” to be an inappropriate term. Rather, for
 JOURNAL OF BORDERLANDS STUDIES 525

these transactions we can use the term misleading activities. Illegality on the border is a
term that we reserve to refer to activities that are punished by states and associated
with organized crime, mediated by a system that is controlled and structured fundamen-
tally by armed groups.
Beyond cross-border economic activities, informality also includes social interactions
that form transnational conduits between both sides of the border and are part of everyday
life for Colombian–Ecuadoran populations. Family and kinship relationships signify that
many of these exchange activities are solidarity-based relations where work is often not
paid for with cash. Other dynamics such as circular migration are frequent. For
example, many small-scale farmers sleep in Ecuadoran territory and work during the
day in rural areas of Colombian territory—often on their own farms—as a method of
self-protection against periods of intensified armed conflict. This also occurs because
the prices placed on rural work are significantly different from one side to the other. Unre-
gulated work migration across the border is ongoing and daily, although there are rules
within the Andean Community of Nations that should help govern these migrations
using a special borders regulatory framework. For example, the CAN’s unimplemented
policies include Decision 501 and other measures regarding the regulation of the
Andean migration card as the only document required for traveling between Colombia,
Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, and Venezuela (the latter included prior to its withdrawal from
the CAN).
Irregular migrations from Colombia to Ecuador have increased following the
implementation of migratory controls that impose difficult requirements for the border
inhabitants (International Organization for Migrations [IOM] 2013, 55). As a response,
we found through interviews with local authorities and migratory national authorities
of Ecuador that some Colombians illegally acquire an Ecuadoran citizenship card to be
able to travel through the territory without restrictions. Some refugees that flee the
socio-political violence in Colombia cross the Ecuadoran border without formally
seeking refuge. Others request refugee status from the Ecuadoran State as a protection
mechanism, but having been denied, they stay in the country without the proper migratory
status. Other people prefer to come and go continually (Ceballos 2010).
A different type of cultural dynamic is seen among the Awá, Cofán, and Secoyas indi-
genous peoples, and other ethnic groups. These groups maintain continuous interaction
between the two sides of the border because their territories are not separated by the bor-
derline (Santacruz and Walsh 2006). Furthermore, their traditional kinship relationships
generate a greater sense of belonging to their respective ethnic group than to the Colom-
bian or Ecuadoran nations. For these populations, the state’s logic is in opposition to the
ancestral logic that has been the norm in these cultures.
The traditional border flows that we have described have been affected in recent years
by the socio-political violence and by the implementation of regional security policies—
mainly Plan Colombia—that are oriented towards closing the border in order to
contain the internal armed conflict in Colombia and to weaken transnational drug traf-
ficking networks. In addition, there are no precise regulations about inter-border trade,
since the Colombian and Ecuadoran governments apply the international trade norms
to these activities, despite belonging to the regional integration block CAN, which could
facilitate the implementation of special agreements for shared border regions. Conse-
quently, the policy of prohibition overlaps with the policy of integration, which is why
526 M. C. MEDINA AND A. CALDERÓN

the majority of informal activities are classified as illegal and are subject to punitive actions
by the authorities.
There are also factors coming from foreign trade policy that affect the border
economy. Romero finds that the adoption of the Free Trade Agreement between Colom-
bia and the United States in 2012 and the massive influx of products from China into
Ecuador, could negatively affect 54% of trade flows between Colombia and Ecuador
(Romero-Pérez 2008).
In synthesis, the public policies implemented by the Colombian and Ecuadoran States
in the border regions reflect a perception of the border as a boundary and as a passageway
for the flow of international trade, contraband, and illegal economies. This perspective
appears to be changing to some extent with the Program for Border Prosperity (Programa
para la Prosperidad Fronteriza) of the administration of Colombian President Juan
Manuel Santos (2010–2014).8 This program wants to give the border region populations
a greater role in integration policy, and to distribute to them a higher percentage of roy-
alties from the mining and energy sectors. However, the de facto policy of the Colombian
government for the border regions is reflected in the National Plan for Territorial Conso-
lidation (Plan Nacional de Consolidación Territorial) (International Crisis Group [ICG]
2011). With this plan, the Colombian government seeks to recover the State’s territorial
control in areas with high levels of conflict among guerrillas and paramilitaries. The
plan seeks to do this with an increased military presence, strengthened democratic govern-
ability, and infrastructure to provide basic services. Of the eight intervention zones in
Colombia, four are located on borders (see Figure 2), making cooperation with neighbor-
ing countries to contain the armed conflict a fundamental necessity.
But there are differences between the perceptions and dynamics held by the central
State and those of the local communities. Academics from the two countries met in
Ecuador for a binational conference to examine the current situation on the Colombia–
Ecuador border. They summarized the situation thus:
While the political center perceives the border regions as areas of illegality and insecurity,
those regions’ inhabitants consider that when the State intervenes, it destroys their spon-
taneous and informal integration with their neighbors. And when the State formalizes inte-
gration with other countries via binational or subregional agreements, such as those in the
Andean Community or South American summits, the State unleashes processes such as
trade dynamisms and physical integration megaprojects that nullify the traditional roles of
the local population, as related to customs, transportation transfers, and national protection,
without helping the population to restructure or adapt to the new situation. In these cases, the
overlap between state sovereignty and spontaneous cross-border relations that are typical of
the border area, create problematic situations when facing development or security chal-
lenges. These situations tend to be treated differently on the local and national levels, and,
furthermore, are also subject to severely divergent approaches from the neighboring
countries’ leaders as well. (Ramírez, 2008, 258)

Illegal Economies and Armed Conflict

The association between armed conflict and drug trafficking in Colombia translates into
the use of economic activities linked to drug trafficking to finance illegal armed groups’
war activities. This implies a linkage between the paramilitaries’ and guerrillas’ armed
structures and the armed structures that control the production, trade, and transportation
 JOURNAL OF BORDERLANDS STUDIES 527

Figure 2. Map of consolidation zones.

528 M. C. MEDINA AND A. CALDERÓN

of drugs in strategic zones. In these areas there are tacit agreements for non-aggression or
cooperation between armed groups who control business (mainly in border areas’ land
and sea ports).
This situation has specific implications for border regions, given that these areas are
militarily strategic for the guerrillas and paramilitaries. Economically, the regions fulfill
a basic function for the armed groups and the structures that control drug trafficking,
arms trafficking, and human trafficking. The illegal economies in the border zones
include not just the planting of illicit-use crops9 (coca and poppy, mainly concentrated
in Nariño and Putumayo departments), but also the processing of the crops, their trans-
portation, and their sale. This relationship is seen in Ecuador in the articulation between
the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de
Colombia—FARC) guerrilla camp locations and small fields of coca crops (Espinosa
2008). This is also seen in the correlation between increased violence in Ecuador’s Sucum-
bíos province and the growing influence of micro-illegality.
Illegal economies also involve the collection of taxes called “vaccinations”—a form of
control using violence exercised by groups belonging to organized crime—on legal and
informal activities (including small commercial establishments, restaurants, hotels, trans-
portation companies, and street vendors). The pressure on these activities occurs in
Colombia as well, where there is also a presence of guerrilla groups, paramilitaries and
drug trafficking structures (Espinosa 2008).
Illegal economies in border areas also include what some academics have called “the
dark side of globalization:”
In addition to illegal economies, in many parts of the world these areas are also important
because they contain strategic natural resources in terms of demand for energy and the
basic raw materials that sustain the global economy. So when you see the conflict dynamics
in Africa, for example, rather than illegal economies, they are more related to the use, pro-
cessing, control and illegal sale of this type of resources—diamonds, oil, wood—that are licit
goods. Some analysts suggest that this illegal private control facilitates the economic
exchange much more quickly, and with fewer taxes (…) This has benefited a series of inter-
mediaries that are primarily found in countries like India, Switzerland, Israel, or South Africa.
(Vargas 2008, 470)

This, coupled with the factors of isolation and a lack of economic opportunities due to the
absence of comprehensive policies to promote development and border integration, has
facilitated the working age populations’ involvement in the internal armed conflict (as
militants for guerrilla or paramilitary groups), in organized crime, and in economic net-
works controlled by drug trafficking in the area. This situation occurs in both Colombia
and Ecuador, and particularly affects vulnerable populations including indigenous com-
munities, youth, and single mothers.
Ecuador is a transit country for the sale of drugs from Colombia and has benefited from
its geographic position by way of three segments of drug trafficking according to Espinosa:
(1) large-scale Colombian cocaine exports that are transported from Ecuador to their final
destinations by trafficking empires or networks; (2) micro-illegality on the border that
involves the Ecuadoran population in Carchi, Esmeraldas, and Sucumbíos in the small-
scale planting, processing and sale of drugs; and (3) money laundering that comes from
three sources in Ecuador (large-scale trafficking, laundering inside the country of
moneys generated by the transit of cocaine within Ecuador, and illicit capital that is
 JOURNAL OF BORDERLANDS STUDIES 529

generated in Colombia and laundered in Ecuador through the equivalents of foreign direct
investment or portfolios investments) (Espinosa 2008, 455–456).
Espinosa (2008) calculates the value of the cocaine trafficking through Ecuadoran ter-
ritory to be $450–500 million US dollars per year, equivalent to 2% of Ecuador’s gross
domestic product, and between 10% and 25% of the total cocaine produced in Colombia
between 2000 and 2007.
There are other types of illegal activities linked to the armed conflict and its transna-
tional dynamics. Take for example, the trafficking of arms from Ecuador, Venezuela,
Peru, and Panama that is bound for Colombia’s illegal armed groups. These transactions
involve members of the neighboring countries’ armed forces to such an extent that the
police in Colombia have seized munitions that belong to the Ecuadoran government
(Rangel 2008).
Public policies designed by the states to respond to this level of insecurity have focused
on increasing the military presence on the border. Ecuador has 7,000 soldiers on the
border, which represents 15% of its forces, and Colombia has 4,000 members of the mili-
tary on that border, which corresponds to 2% of its forces (Rangel 2008).10 The presence of
soldiers challenges the argument that there is an absence of the State in the border region,
and that this absence is what allowed the consolidation of illegal economies. We make a
different argument: it is the almost exclusively military presence without civilian control
components that has contributed to the consolidation of this illegality by way of corrup-
tion. Repression as the major answer to illegality and informality, as well as the widespread
violence in contexts where the State’s social investment and infrastructure are precarious,
have contributed to the strengthening of illegality.
In the case of the Colombian government, the policy of consolidating democratic secur-
ity with the aforementioned National Plan for Territorial Consolidation continues to
combine the fight against drugs with the fight against terrorism, identifying and targeting
spaces of regionalization and overflow of the Colombian armed conflict on the border
(Vargas 2008, 467). This vision recognizes the transnational nature of the organized
crime structures in Central America, Panama, Mexico, Venezuela, and Ecuador (Vargas
2008, 475), and for that reason insists on military cooperation with those countries. Ecua-
dor’s importance as a transit country and a place of cocaine processing necessitates a refor-
mulation of drug policy, in particular the forced eradication component. The failure of
forced eradication among other tactics is evident in the now diffuse and dispersed
nature of coca planting throughout the Colombian territory (in 2012 there were 22 depart-
ments with coca crops, while in 2000 when forced eradication began there were only seven
departments). Economic alternatives to coca growing require a greater commitment by the
Colombian government to promoting binational integration and border development,
improving infrastructure, and modifying the regulatory framework around binational
trade.

Border security: failed responses and failed states

The Colombia–Ecuador border inhabitants’ security, defined as real conditions that guar-
antee the right to life, personal integrity, and liberty, is threatened by many factors: (1) the
expansion and consolidation of illegality; (2) the absence of a regulatory framework that
responds to the daily exchange on the border and its economic circuits, most of them
530 M. C. MEDINA AND A. CALDERÓN

informal; (3) the intensification and regionalization of the internal armed conflict; (4) the
absence of institutional mechanisms and public policies that promote binational inte-
gration and border development; (5) the absence of State institutions dedicated to social
investments and the increased militarization without strengthening civilian oversight
agencies; and (6) the political and diplomatic tensions between the two countries’
administrations.
The definition of security we adopt to understand these problems from a multi-dimen-
sional perspective corresponds to the United Nations’ definition of Democratic Security.
That definition includes two dimensions: (1) the physical security that refers to objective
conditions that guarantee the protection of life and personal integrity (or the absence of
violence); and (2) the legal security provided by legal guarantees to protect individual lib-
erties, enact the rule of law, and put limits on the abuse of power. According to the United
Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) in Colombia:
(…) there should be no contradictions between “public order” and the security of the indi-
vidual. Democratic public order is part of public security, understood as the state of circum-
stances within which the population of a national territory is free from risks or harm from the
abuse of state power, the breakdown of peaceful coexistence by illegal armed groups, or the
actions of any type of crime (…) the national authorities have the obligation to take all
necessary measures, within the parameters of human rights, to protect the security of the
inhabitants of the territory from possible attacks from illegal armed groups’ actions or
common crime. (UNHCHR 2003, paragraphs 6 and 7)

If we adopt that definition, it is evident that the border’s conditions are far from meeting
the requirements. Although Colombia has seen a reduction in homicide rates on the
national level, from 56 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants in 2003 to 34 in 2010 according
to National Police statistics (ICG 2011, 2), the specific border region statistics are instruc-
tive. Nariño department recorded a rate of 34 homicides per 100,000 people in 2003 and
39 in 2010. Putumayo went from 130 homicides per 100,000 people in 2005 to 64 in 2010.
The two departments have higher rates than the national average. This is an indicator of
the conditions that persistently affect the right to life. There are homicides not reported in
these borderlands, and because a context of impunity has been chronic and widespread, it
is difficult to cite precise statistics.
The presence of illegal armed groups in this border region dates back to the 1980s for
the Colombian side and the late 1990s for Ecuadoran territory. Nariño and Putumayo
shelter FARC guerrillas and the National Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación Nacio-
nal—ELN) guerrillas, criminal groups associated with drug trafficking, and new criminal
gangs11 (mainly “Los Rastrojos” and “Las Aguilas Negras”). The guerrilla presence in
Ecuador and the presence of new criminal gangs that charge war taxes in border provinces
such as Carchi, Esmeraldas, and Sucumbíos have been reported by academic studies that
collect qualitative field data (Espinosa 2008). Forced migrations are an indicator of this
situation. The number of people in need of protection that cross the border from Colom-
bia to Ecuador is alarming. According to Ecuador’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in August
2011 there were 54,527 refugees recognized by the State, 98% of whom are from Colombia.
Furthermore, there are at least 68,344 other people in need of refugee protections but
without any official recognition or protection mechanism (ICG 2011, 3).
Underlying the armed conflict are alliances between political and economic elites and
illegal armed groups with the goal of strengthening regional and local structures that
 JOURNAL OF BORDERLANDS STUDIES 531

constitute the true de facto powers in many areas (they manage “taxes,” public treasury
funds, the execution of public works in many municipalities, the appointment of officials,
and maintaining public order). This situation has a negative effect on the indicators of
democratic consolidation, such as the State’s legitimate monopoly on force, the rule of
law in a national territory, public trust in institutions, and the effective enjoyment of
rights for Colombian society. The Prosecutor’s Office investigations into governors’ and
mayors’ ties to paramilitary groups have included members of the local government in
Putumayo.
Finally, we could say that human security on the border has been negatively affected
and the humanitarian crisis continues to worsen. Following Sánchez (2011, 99–100),
this situation can be summarized as follows:
1) Lack of guarantees for legal security, for a dignified life, and for the exercise of individual
liberties and the defense of human rights. 2) The impediments to communities staying in
their territories. 3) Direct persecution against residents and community leaders, and
making the victims of the armed conflict invisible. (Sánchez 2011, 99)

In the first, there is a situation in which there is widespread fear of denouncing or filing
complaints. This fear is mediated by a distrust of institutions that have been pressured
by, or in some cases infiltrated by, members of illegal groups.
In the second, forced displacement and militarization of indigenous reserves and pro-
tected areas, as well as regions with abundant, exploitable resources, favor unregulated
economic intervention in the region. The presence of oil companies with concession hold-
ings and the incorporation of peasants into productive chains are expanded without any
corresponding social or infrastructure investments. These activities also do not respect the
principles of prior consultation, and go against the life plans held by social organizations
and indigenous peoples that live on this territory. The absence of alternatives to this model
of development and to coca production affects the dignified survival of the peoples, com-
munities, families, and inhabitants in general.
In the third, we find a situation of permanent stigmatization of leaders, which invites
violence against them. They are stigmatized by the armed forces due to their opposition
to the military and economic intervention models previously described. They are stigma-
tized by the guerrilla because they oppose the guerrillas’ recruitment of youth into their
ranks. These leaders’ opposition to threats and homicides committed by groups that
appear to be in the process of rearmament put them further at risk.

Conclusions
In the text we confirm that informality is not the same as illegality. There is no legal frame-
work that regulates the dynamics of social, cultural, and economic exchange in the border
area—called “traditional border flows.” This results in a realist approach based on punitive
action from the State in response to many of these activities and migratory dynamics,
which worsens the border inhabitants’ marginalization, isolation, and exclusion. More-
over, a significant part of the economically active population on the border is linked to
illegal economies and activities. This situation is facilitated by an absence of civilian,
formal, and legal spaces for social integration, which is the result of several factors: (1)
the increased militarization on both sides of the border due to a conception of the
532 M. C. MEDINA AND A. CALDERÓN

border as a transit space for armed groups and illegality; (2) the growing influence of illegal
armed groups linked to the Colombian conflict, drug trafficking, and organized crime; and
(3) the absence of border development policies and the failure of binational integration
programs between Colombia and Ecuador.
Finally, the humanitarian crisis caused by the deterioration of the Colombian armed
conflict, the transnational dynamics of the war and illegal economies, as well as the secur-
ity policies focused primarily on the State’s military presence and territorial control of the
border, have all prevented the implementation of policies for comprehensive security and
have worsened human security for the inhabitants of the region. This is manifested mainly
in situations that negatively affect the rights to life, personal liberty and integrity, as well as
public trust in the local government institutions. It is further manifested in the corruption
and infiltration by armed groups in public administration, the illegal control of legal econ-
omic activities, and the stigmatization of inhabitants of the border zones.
Public policies need to respond to the border realities, and not operate against them.
Understanding the border as a region in itself, and not a retaining wall against illegality,
and consequently promoting border development and binational integration, calling upon
the local actors to participate and be protagonists of the process, will help to improve the
human security levels and increase the democratic governability on the micro level.
Present peace talks between the Colombian government and FARC introduce a new
scenario: states need different kind of policies, based on cooperation with neighbors to
face social development, democracy consolidation, economic integration, and political
stability in borders. Punitive and coercive politics, essentially high levels of investment
in military force, must be replaced by alternative and compensatory initiatives in order
to weaken the political economy of war by strengthening civil society, judiciary systems,
and political institutions. A different type of State presence must be consolidated with
complementary strategies to guarantee public order, democratic rules, and human
rights protection.

Notes
1. The FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) developed a sophisticated mechanism
of social control over everyday life activities (mobility, garbage disposal, conflict resolution at
a mciro level, among others like collecting taxes for commerce activities). Manuals distribu-
ted throughout Putumayo department show a high control at all levels (see Sánchez 2014).
Paramilitary groups have a similar way of social control in the region.
2. The colonization process derived in a high level of land concentration since the 18th century.
It explains the permanent migration fluxes from rural to urban areas in Colombia, more
massive and expanded with civil wars and internal armed conflict during the 20th century
(González 2004, 64). Borders have been the ideal scenario to access land and coca crops
began to consolidate an important activity where the possibility of agricultural trade is
almost null.
3. The Neighborhood Commissions (Comisiones de Vecindad), responsible for dealing with
migratory phenomenon and border development, have not met since the late 1990s and
border matters have been addressed in bodies focused on security, such as the Binational
Border Commissions (Comisiones Binacionales Fronterizas—COMBIFRON).
4. In 2014, the Sinaloa Cartel delivered 60 rifles to the two groups who admittedly united to
control the underworld of Medellin, an important drug trafficking hub in Colombia (Colom-
bia Reports 2014).
 JOURNAL OF BORDERLANDS STUDIES 533

5. Artisan crafts made by indigenous peoples in Otavalo, Ecuador, are marketed and sold by
them all over the world, building solid transnational networks and economic circuits, includ-
ing in the Colombia–Ecuador border territory. Small municipalities, as La Hormiga in Putu-
mayo, are examples of this informality. Interviews and observation shows an everyday image
of people crossing the border laden with this type of merchandise for sale. People from bigger
municipalities in Nariño, go to Ipiales (in the border area) to buy clothes and other goods that
come from Ecuador, because they are cheaper.
6. However, Nariño department has the 23 municipalities with the greatest level of vibrant
social, cultural, historic, and economic exchange.
7. On October 15, 2015 Rafael Correa signed the 799 Decree that shortened the petrol subsidy
(before this Decree it was 40% of the final price) in order to guide the subsidy towards inhabi-
tants with lower incomes. The amount of the subsidy is not pre-fixed but depends on the
international price. See the document: http://lahora.com.ec/frontEnd/images/objetos/
subsidios_de_combustibles.pdf
8. International Relations Ministry (nd). Plan Fronteras para la Prosperidad.
9. Colombia recorded a total of 57,000 hectares cultivated with coca in 2010, according to the
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime survey (UNODC 2001). Tumaco municipality, in
Nariño department on the Pacific coastal border area with Ecuador, reported the largest
number of cultivated hectares with 5,025 ha, or 9% of the total area planted with coca in
Colombia.
10. Despite the importance of drug trafficking and the armed conflict for the two countries’ gov-
ernments, there is no joint military cooperation, partly due to Ecuador not wanting to get
involved in an armed conflict that overwhelms its military capacity and affects its stability.
11. The term used by the Colombian government to refer to reactivated paramilitary groups that
demobilized under the disarmament and reinsertion process between the United Self-
Defense Forces of Colombia (Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia—AUC) and Alvaro Uribe
Vélez administration between 2002 and 2008.

Acknowledgments
This research was part of the master thesis on International Relations, National University of
Colombia. Master thesis “Impacto de las migraciones forzadas de colombianos a Ecuador en las
relaciones interestatales” En: Colombia 2010. ed:IEPRI-Universidad Nacional de Colombia-La
Carreta Editores ISBN: 978-958-8427-30-0.

Funding
National University of Colombia has supported the Master Thesis that support this paper.

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