Date/Time: Tuesday 24th April 2018, 1:00-6:00pm

Venue: Research Beehive 2.21

In 2018, Costa Rica will celebrate the 70th anniversary of the abolition of its army; an event that has been instrumentalized to support notions of pacifism and education as part of the national identity. Corrales and Cubero notices that “a ‘civilist vocation’ has been part of the Costa Rican nationalist ideal since the XIX Century… [and that] particularly from the 1980’s on the civilist tradition has been vehemently boosted to differentiate Costa Rica from the armed conflicts occurring in the rest of Central America” (2005, pp.11-13). Anchored as much on factual evidence as in mystification, this idealized image, as any, is underpinned by a number of issues: tensions and struggles related to social stability; development; and democratization and equity, which are overlooked when Costa Rica is presented as a peaceful country, and more recently, as one of the happiest places on earth. This image is branded as a national exceptionalism on the Latin America region.

A critical analysis of the conditions surrounding the army abolition, as well as present day challenges, yield a richer and more complex perception of how the absence of an army defines a nation. A less well-known state endorsed violence that followed the army abolition informs current events related to the fight against drug trafficking or a growing economic and social polarization. It is at this point that a reflection on what constitutes peace, criminality, non-violent conflict resolution and social welfare brings forth how violence is enacted beyond army institutions. For Solís the peace discourse is twisted to the point of coercion, “if there is peace and there is no protest, there is investment and progress, regardless of salaries. If there is protest we can vanish in the mist of history, because that means to lost our identity as the cradle of civilization for peace.” (2002, p. 46). An examination of the army abolition in Costa Rica and the tensions behind its peaceful identity allows to reflect on democracies’ challenges for pushing forward human rights.

 Guest speakers:

• Antonio Jara Vargas, Master of History, Researcher at the Central American Centre for Historical Research, University of Costa Rica.
• José Enrique Castillo Barrantes, Costa Rican Ambassador to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. 
• Sharon López, Master in Human Rights and Education for Peace, coordinator of the Master Degree in Human Rights, National University, Costa Rica.

Programme:

1:00pm. Welcome and opening remarks
1:15pm. Screening of “El Codo del Diablo”
2:45pm. Refreshment break
3:00pm. Roundtable: Jose Enrique Castillo, Mr Antonio Jara, Sharon López (Luis Fallas, Moderator)
4:30pm. Reception
6:00pm. Close