Colombia is the least understood of Latin American countries. Its human tragedy, which features terrifying levels of kidnapping, homicide and extortion, is generally ignored or exploited. In this urgent new work Forrest Hylton, who has extensive first-hand experience of living and working in Colombia, explores its history of 150 years of political conflict, characterized by radical-popular mobilization and reactionary repression. Evil Hour in Colombia shows how patterns of political conflict, from the mid-nineteenth century to today's guerilla narco-traffickers and paramilitaries, explain the wear currently destroying Colombian lives, property, communities and territory. In doing so, it traces how Colombia's "coffee capitalism" gave way to the cattle and cocaine republic of the 1980s, and how land, wealth and power have been steadily accumulated by the light-skinned top of the social pyramid through a brutal combination of terror, expropriation and economic depression.

The most up-to-date book on Colombia: from the mid-19th century to today's guerrilla narco-traffickers and paramilitaries.

In Evil Hour is the thrilling story about the smears, defamations, infidelities, and torrential rains that afflict a small Colombian town, and the sacrifice of a boy that brings torment and chaos to an end, from the masterful Gabriel García Márquez, author of One Hundred Years of Solitude and Love in the Time of Cholera. One morning, slanderous posters start appearing all over the town, revealing family secrets and maligning individuals. Ghosts of the past reappear, along with old feuds and infidelities. Torrential rains then flood the town and chaos is everywhere. Neighbors suspect each other, yet no one knows who is responsible. Finally, a boy is made the scapegoat and tragedy ensues. In Evil Hour contains vivid characters who reflect the humor and pathos of everyday life. This brooding novel clearly points the way to the flowering of García Márquez’s genius in his later One Hundred Years of Solitude.

Evocation of corruption, both political and individual as it steadily overtakes a small South American village.

The Palgrave Encyclopedia Imperialism and Anti-Imperialism objectively presents the prominent themes, epochal events, theoretical explanations, and historical accounts of imperialism from 1776 to the present. It is the most historically and academically comprehensive examination of the subject to date.

By combining chronological coverage, analytical breadth, and interdisciplinary approaches, these two volumes—Histories of Solitude and Histories of Perplexity—study the histories of Colombia over the last two centuries as illustrations of the histories of democracy across the Americas. The volumes bring together over 40 scholars based in Colombia, the United States, England, and Canada working in various disciplines to discuss how a country that has been consistently presented as a rarity in Latin America provides critical examples to re-examine major historical problems: republicanism and liberalism; export economies and agrarian modernization; populism and cultural politics of state formation; revolutionary and counterinsurgent Cold War violence; neoliberal reforms and urban development; popular mobilization and counterhegemonic public spheres; political ecologies and environmental struggles; and labors of memory and the challenge of reconciliation. Contributors are sensitive to questions of subjectivity and discourse, observant of ethnographic details and micro-politics, and attuned to macro-perspectives such as transnational and global histories. These volumes offer fresh perspectives on Colombia and will be of great value to those interested in Latin American and Caribbean history.

This book challenges the conventional wisdom that civil war inevitably stymies economic development and that ‘civil war represents development in reverse’. While some civil wars may have adverse economic effects, Civil War and Uncivil Development posits that not all conflicts have negative economic consequences and, under certain conditions, civil war violence can bolster processes of economic development. Using Colombia as a case study, this book provides evidence that violence perpetrated by key actors of the conflict – the public armed forces and paramilitaries – has facilitated economic growth and processes of economic globalisation in Colombia (namely, international trade and foreign direct investment), with profoundly negative consequences for large swathes of civilians. The analysis also discusses the ‘development in reverse’ logic in the context of other conflicts across the globe. This book will be an invaluable resource for scholars, practitioners and students in the fields of security and development, civil war studies, peace studies, the political economy of conflict and international relations.