Abstract

BACARES JARA, Camilo. The Biological, Economic, and Terrorist Discourses of the War and its Implications on the Child and Adolescent Combatants. A Critical Reading from the Colombian Context. Estud. Polit. [online]. 2020, n.58, pp.112-139. ISSN 0121-5167.  https://doi.org/10.17533/udea.espo.n58a06.

This article calls into question the discourses based on biological, economic, and terrorist theories about the figure of the child and adolescent combatants, and the tension they arise with the category of the child and the adolescent understood as a victim of war in the Colombian context. To this aim, the study problematizes the thesis that proposes adolescent and child soldiers as natural and sexual products; as well as, the discourse that considers them as mercenaries; and, the one that denies their rights by characterizing them as terrorist. The documentary research, based on secondary sources and testimonies, concludes that due to the political and military preponderance of these discourses, interpretative tensions that disable the notion of the child victim in confrontations, combats, and military intelligence operations emerge.

Keywords : Armed Conflict; Rights of the Child; Child Soldiers; Childhood; Adolescence; Colombia.

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