Revisiting Operation Genesis: State Terror Behind the Veil of Displacement
Summary
This thesis contains a qualitative analysis of Operation Genesis in Colombia and its aftermath. Although officially framed as a military offensive against guerrilla forces, the operation led to severe human rights violations, including mass displacement and the appropriation of abandoned land by private companies. While recent literature has largely focused on the roles of paramilitary groups and corporations in these violations, the role of the Colombian state remains absent from dominant narratives.
To uncover the state’s involvement, this thesis answers the central research question: How did Operation Genesis serve as a strategy of state terror, promoting displacement and neoliberal economic restructuring? To address this question, the thesis is structured into three analytical chapters. Each chapter draws on primary sources analyzed through specific theoretical frameworks. This analysis is supported by secondary literature to address three key research gaps.
Chapter one analyzes the economic and political underpinnings of Operation Genesis. Using postcolonial development theory, it demonstrates how neoliberal reforms, mostly Structural Adjustment Programs (SAPs) sponsored by institutions like the World Bank, restructured Colombia’s economic policies. These reforms focused on privatization, deregulation, and the growth of agribusiness, undermined protective legislation like Law 70, which was designed to safeguard Afro-Colombian land rights. This chapter concludes that the displacement resulting from the operation was not incidental but rather a consequence of broader efforts to restructure the economy and territory in line with neoliberal objectives.
Chapter two analyzes state terror's physical violent dynamics using the geographies of terror framework. It discusses how the systematic use of military and paramilitary violence systematically deterritorialized Afro-Colombian communities, restricted their mobility, and cultivated landscapes of fear to discourage return. This chapter contends that displacement was not a collateral effect of conflict but a deliberate tactic designed to reshape territorial control and consolidate state power.
Chapter three explores the state’s use of proxies to maintain plausible deniability. It demonstrates how the Colombian state collaborated with paramilitary groups and enabled corporate land acquisitions, thereby distancing itself from direct responsibility while reaping economic benefits. Legal manipulation allowed corporations to claim lands once occupied by Afro-Colombians, facilitating the expansion of palm oil plantations. This chapter highlights how the state concealed its role in orchestrating a violent and legally sanctioned dispossession.
In conclusion, this thesis demonstrates that Operation Genesis was not merely a counterinsurgency effort but a deliberate and coordinated strategy of state terror. It emphasizes the interplay of military violence, economic policy, and legal instruments in facilitating displacement and enabling the commercialization of Afro-Colombian land. In doing so, this thesis contributes new theoretical insights into the nature of state terror and offers a methodological framework for analyzing it in contexts of displacement.