Existing research demonstrates the central role of mid-level commanders as either spoilers or leaders of peace but treats this group as unitary, defined by its communication function in hierarchical non-state armed organizations. Drawing on life history interviews with “middle managers” (mandos medios) of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia–People’s Army (FARC-EP), this article explores heterogeneity of mid-level commanders. Individuals follow multiple trajectories into mid-level roles. The nature of their roles depends on their specific position and the needs of the organization. As a result, they develop diverse skills, status, and ties that differently position them for post-war influence, from leading to spoiling peace. These elements underlie a processual approach that focuses on these actors’ process of “becoming,” boundaries of their position, and how their wartime roles fit in their post-war trajectories. A provisional typology drawing on this approach helps better understand mid-level commanders’ varied, and contradictory, post-war influence.
Álvarez VanegasEPardo CalderónDCajiao VélezA (2018) Trayectorias y Dinámicas Territoriales de las Disidencias de las FARC. Fundación Ideas para la Paz.
2.
ArangoC (2016) FARC. Veinte Años de Marquetalia a La Uribe. Ediciones Aurora.
3.
AriasGIHerreraNPrietoCA (2010) Mandos Medios de las FARC y su Proceso de Desmovilización en el Conflicto Colombiano. Fundación Ideas para la Paz.
4.
ArjonaA (2016) Rebelocracy: Social Order in the Colombian Civil War. Cambridge University Press.
5.
AzambujaRIslamGAncelin-BourguignonA (2023) Walling in and walling out: Middle managers’ boundary work. Journal of Management Studies60(1): 1819–1854.
6.
BalogunJJohnsonG (2005) From intended strategies to unintended outcomes: The impact of change recipient sensemaking. Organization Studies26(11): 1573–1601.
7.
BeltránA (2008) FARC-EP: Una reflexión sobre su organización política y militar. Carlos Medina Gallego (coord.) FARC-EP. Temas y Problemas Nacionales, 1958-2008. Universidad Nacional-UNIJUS, pp. 72–101.
8.
Boulanger MartelSP (2022) ¡Zapatero, a tus zapatos! Explaining the social engagement of M-19 ex-combatants in education and social work institutions in Colombia. Third World Quarterly43(4): 760–778.
9.
Brewer-OsorioS (2024) From spoilers to builders: Collective reintegration, leadership, and peace in Colombia. Conflict, Security & Development24(2): 79–110.
10.
ChristensenMMUtasM (2008) Mercenaries of democracy: The “politricks” of remobilized combatants in the 2007 general elections, Sierra Leone. African Affairs107(429): 515–539.
11.
DalySZ (2012) Organizational legacies of violence: Conditions favoring insurgency onset in Colombia, 1964–1984. Journal of Peace Research49(3): 473–491.
12.
DalySZ (2014) The dark side of power-sharing: Middle managers and civil war recurrence. Comparative Politics46(3): 333–353.
13.
DriscollJ (2012) Commitment problems or bidding wars? Rebel fragmentation as peace building. Journal of Conflict Resolution56(1): 118–149.
14.
Ferro MedinaJGUribe RamónG (2002) El Orden de la Guerra. Las FARC-EP: Entre la Organización y la Política. Centro Editorial Javeriana.
15.
GatesS (2002) Recruitment and allegiance: The microfoundations of rebellion. Journal of Conflict Resolution46(1): 111–130.
GjerdeSAlvessonM (2020) Sandwiched: Exploring role and identity of middle managers in the genuine middle. Human Relations73(1): 124–151.
18.
Grzymała-BusseAM (2002) Redeeming the Communist past: The Regeneration of Communist Parties in East Central Europe. Cambridge University Press.
19.
Gutiérrez SanínF (2008) Telling the difference: Guerrillas and paramilitaries in the Colombian war. Politics & Society36(1): 3–34.
20.
Gutiérrez SanínFGiustozziA (2010) Networks and armies: Structuring rebellion in Colombia and Afghanistan. Studies in Conflict & Terrorism33(9): 836–853.
21.
HaerR (2015) Armed Group Structure and Violence in Civil Wars: The Organizational Dynamics of Civilian Killing. Routledge.
22.
HardingNLeeHFordJ (2014) Who is ‘the middle manager’?Human Relations67(10): 1213–1237.
23.
Hoover GreenA (2016) The commander’s dilemma: Creating and controlling armed group violence. Journal of Peace Research53(5): 619–632.
24.
JohnstonP (2008) The geography of insurgent organization and its consequences for civil wars: Evidence from Liberia and Sierra Leone. Security Studies17(1): 107–137.
25.
KasfirN (2015) Constructing a field of inquiry: Definitions, scope, patterns, order, causes. In: ArjonaAKasfirNMampillyZC (eds) Rebel Governance in Civil War. Cambridge University Press, pp. 21–47.
26.
MampillyZC (2011) Rebel Rulers: Insurgent Governance and Civilian Life during War. Cornell University Press.
27.
MartinPA (2021) Commander-community ties after civil war. Journal of Peace Research58(4): 778–793.
28.
MartinPAPiccolinoGSpeightJS (2021) Ex-rebel authority after civil war: Theory and evidence from Côte d’Ivoire. Comparative Politics53(2): 209–232.
29.
MittonK (2008) Engaging disengagement: The political reintegration of Sierra Leone’s Revolutionary United Front. Conflict, Security & Development8(2): 193–222.
30.
NeumannPEvansRPantucciR (2011) Locating Al Qaeda’s center of gravity: The role of middle managers. Studies in Conflict & Terrorism34(11): 825–842.
31.
NussioE (2018) Ex-combatants and violence in Colombia: Are yesterday’s villains today’s principal threat?Third World Thematics: A TWQ Journal3(1): 135–152.
32.
NussioEHoweK (2016) When protection collapses: Post-demobilization trajectories of violence. Terrorism and Political Violence28(5): 848–867.
33.
ParkinsonSEZaksS (2018) Militant and rebel organization(s). Comparative Politics50(2): 271–290.
SharifS (2022) Can the rebel body function without its visible heads? The role of mid-level commanders in peacebuilding. International Peacekeeping29: 709–740.
36.
ShesterininaA (2020) Committed to Peace: The Potential of Former FARC-EP Midlevel Commanders as Local Leaders in the Peace Process. SPERI.
37.
ShesterininaA (2022) Civil war as a social process: Actors and dynamics from pre- to post-war. European Journal of International Relations28(3): 538–562.
38.
ShilsEAJanowitzM (1948) Cohesion and disintegration in the Wehrmacht in World War II. Public Opinion Quarterly12(2): 280–315.
39.
SieboldGL (2007) The essence of military group cohesion. Armed Forces and Society33(2): 286–295.
40.
SieboldGL (2011) Key questions and challenges to the standard model of military group cohesion. Armed Forces and Society37(3): 448–468.
41.
SöderströmJ (2020) Living Politics after War: Ex-combatants and Veterans Coming Home. Manchester University Press.
42.
StanilandP (2012) States, insurgents, and wartime political orders. Perspectives on Politics10(2): 243–264.
43.
StanilandP (2014) Networks of Rebellion: Explaining Insurgent Cohesion and Collapse. Cornell University Press.
44.
StankovicT (2015) Microdisarmament and compliance costs: An analysis of disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration programs. Studies in Conflict & Terrorism38(9): 691–709.
45.
StedmanSJ (1997) Spoiler problems in peace processes. International Security22(2): 5–53.
46.
TheidonK (2007) Transitional subjects: The disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of former combatants in Colombia. International Journal of Transitional Justice1(1): 66–90.
47.
TheidonK (2016) Peace in Colombia: A time to believe?Current History115(778): 51–56.
48.
ThemnérA (2011) Violence in Post-conflict Societies: Remarginalization, Remobilizers and Relationships. Routledge.
49.
ThemnérA (2012) Former mid-level commanders in big man networks. In: UtasM (ed.) African Conflicts and Informal Power: Big Men and Networks. Zed Books, pp. 205–223.
50.
ThomasRLinsteadA (2002) Losing the plot? Middle managers and identity. Organization9(1): 71–93.
51.
ThurstonA (2020) Jihadists of North Africa and the Sahel: Local Politics and Rebel Groups. Cambridge University Press.
52.
UtasM (2005) The reintegration and remarginalization of youth in Liberia. In: RichardsP (ed.) No Peace, No War: An Anthropology of Contemporary Armed Conflicts. Ohio University Press, pp. 137–154.
53.
VerweijenJ (2018) Soldiers without an army? Patronage networks and cohesion in the Armed Forces of the DR Congo. Armed Forces and Society44(4): 626–646.
54.
WeinsteinJM (2007) Inside Rebellion: The Politics of Insurgent Violence. Cambridge University Press.
55.
WieginkN (2024) Renamobilised: Former combatants and an armed opposition party in Mozambique. War & Society43(4): 398–410.
56.
WoodEJ (2009) Armed groups and sexual violence: When is wartime rape rare?Political Studies Review37(1): 131–161.
57.
WoodEJ (2018) Rape as a practice of war: Toward a typology of political violence. Politics & Society46(4): 513–537.
ZyckSA (2009) Former combatant reintegration and fragmentation in contemporary Afghanistan. Conflict, Security & Development9(1): 111–131.
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
