How has the Colombian government responded to so much mobilisation?
The Colombian government – which is clearly neoliberal and authoritarian, and of an extremely undemocratic nature – has turned a deaf ear to the people. It is refusing to listen to the opinions of an immense set of organisations, including all the peasant organisations, small and medium producers (including some agribusinesses), the trade unions, environmental organisations and the indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities. The Colombian government has simply replaced these people – Colombia’s real civil society -with what the government calls “civil society” – in reality, tiny organisations that it has created and funded to give some kind of façade of social participation in the negotiations. It has also ignored not only social organisations, independent analysts and various universities, but also Senators and Representatives from the opposition. The core of the US FTA – before the additional protocol was negotiated between the Bush administration and the US Democratic Party – got the
