Luis Carlos Arenas

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Since 1993, the U´wa people, a small indigenous community of Colombia, have been waging a successful battle against the American oil company Occidental Petroleum Corporation, to keep it from drilling for oil on their ancestral lands. The conflict surrounding the oil issue began in 1991, when Occidental and other associated comapnies acquired exploration and drilling rights for what is known as the "Samoré Block", a large swath of land that cuts across a portion of their ancestral lands in the foothills of Colombia´s eastern mountain range, the home of the U´wa people for countless generations. The oil companies started moving into U´wa territory in late 1992, and the U´wa´s staged their first public protests sometime in 1993. However, their opposition to the drilling did not receive national attention until 1995, when the recently created Ombudsman´s Office took their case against the oil companies to the highest court in the land. Since that time, not only has publicity on the case increased, it has gained surprising force, spilling over the national borders. In fact, for several reasons we will address later in this document, the U´wa case has remained on the international forefront since 1997, during which time it has provided unexpected revelations as to the current dimensions, potential and limits of contemporary globalization processes.

Since the earliest days of the oil companies/Colombian Government/U´wa Community conflict, two decisive legal changes -one national and one international- affecting indigenous peoples´ rights have played a major role: 1) International Labor Organization ILO Convention # 169 , that established a new international framework of regulations for indigenous peiples; 2) the 1991 changes framed in the Constitución Política de Colombia, one of which provided for ample protection for indigenous peoples. As we will see, these two key legal instruments will be a continous reference in the issue of oil found on the U´wa´s territory.

The "U´wa case" has now become the symbol for the broad range of battles currently being waged in and outside Colombian borders by indigenous people´s, environmental and human rights movements and in the mobilizations against multinational companies.

How can an indigenous community that has been insulated and forgotten for such a long time become the center of worldwide attention? Why has the U’wa case been so attractive to very different kind of activists and the mass media? What can we learn of this process of local struggle that then became global? How did it become a symbol in the struggle against hegemonic globalization? These are some of the questions that this paper will try to address.

Despite the fact that the study of forms of collective actions beyond national borders is a very new academic area, in the last five years some very influential documents about different forms of collective action beyond national borders have been published on this subject.

However, this bibliography usually perpetuates the confusion regarding the role and interaction of grassroots movements and international NGO´s in building up these transnational coalitions. Doubtless, international NGO´s have been the most visible agents of change and have certainly played an important role in helping take these social struggles global. However, NGO´s are not the only actors, and in many cases are not the leading players. There are many varied and rich experiences in local struggles, that for different reasons have managed to establish international ties, thus changing the balance of power in their specific fight. In order to fully appreciate these local struggles, we must look beyond the international NGO´s. By no means are we suggesting that the two are in opposition, in fact, the most sucessful cases of social struggle are those with dynamic local-national-global interaction and ties. In this sense, as emphasized by Boaventura de Sousa Santos, the U´wa case is paradigmatic (Santos, 2001: 201). The international NGO´s facilitate the transnationlization process of local social battles, but they cannot assist in all of them, and certainly cannot take the place of local efforts. (Evans, 2000). Nevertheless, as we will see in the U´wa case study, the success and emancipatory potential of transnationalized social struggles depend to a great extent on the local organizations, working day to day and serving as the grounding force for a specific social effort. One of the paradoxes faced by any social movement transversing national borders is the ongoing temptation for international NGO´s and their allies to usurp the role of local groups, and for analysts to fail to recognize the importance of local battles. Any solidary-emancipatory focus should always seek to increase the success potential of local groups through transnational actions, while attempting to ensure that any decision making power as to the direction of the struggle remains in the hands of local organizations. The emancipatory potential of these movements also lies in creating horizontal solidary ties, be these North-South or South-South, and working to avoid falling back on traditional forms of interaction based on imposed conditions, subordination and vertical relationships, otherwise, the emancipatory potential of the movement will be greatly reduced. As we will see, the U´wa case is a good example of the success that can be achieved through a high degree of cooperation among international NGO´s, social organizations, and in this case, the traditional authorities of the U´wa Community, who undoubtedly still hold decision making power as to the direction in which they wish to take their fight, despite its marked transnationality.

Another argument in favor of the importance of taking a closer look at local dvelopments in social movements that manage to establish transnational ties is related to the fact that the current hegemonic globalization process is bringing about a major institutional transformation on both global and national levels. These changes have led to the creation of new institutions or have transformed existing ones, as witnessed by the current reforms in justice systems, the creation of Ombudsmens Offices, and the adoption of "multicultural constitutionalism" in Latin America (Van Cott, 2000), as well as the adoption of ILO Convention #169.

Within the framework of contemporary globalization processes, any social struggle now has the potential to take its case beyond national borders . The U´wa case provides examples of the specific forms these efforts can take. Nevertheless, I propose to focus on the different situations that favor the creation of collective activism outside the national borders in question. Social movements are generally efforts to influence decisions makers (either all or part) and so change social conditions seen as unjust or damaging (or potentially unjust or damaging) by those who are subject to, or concerned by, such conditions (or who fear being subjected to them in the future). Below I cite at least two different situations in which social movements have the potential to generate collective transnational actions:

First, when the power to make a decision depends on a national government or a state institution. However, sometimes social mobilization or actions at the national level do not succeed in changing the situation, or the state institution does not work (for example, judicial institutions). These kinds of situations can open a group of possibilities of action beyond national borders for the following reasons:

Second, when the power of decision-makers is in a high proportion outside of the hands of the national government. This kind of situation could be generated at least for three main reasons:

(a) The power of decision is in the hands of an international institution: International financial institutions in most cases are the institutions that have this power, such as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, regional development banks, etc. One of the classic examples, is the case study that Margaret Keck analyzed (Keck, 1998) about the project of Planafloro, funded by the World Bank in Brazil.

The change of place of the power of decision about more general matters is one of the main characteristics of the current hegemonic globalization process. National sovereignty is not destroyed, but transformed. The power that national states are losing is displaced to international financial institutions, multinational corporations or hegemonic powers. Social mobilizations undoubtedly make a contribution to the reversal of this process.

The U’wa currently inhabit North Eastern Colombia, close to the border with Venezuela. Their ancestral territory however, extended from the territory around the Sierra Nevada del Cocuy, in the department of Boyaca, Colombia, to the Sierra de Mérida in Venezuela (Osborn, 1985). Traditionally, the U’wa have lived and moved inside their territory around three different altitudinal spaces, the low areas, the foothills and the mountains of the Eastern cordillera of the Colombian Andes (Osborn, 1982). For more than three centuries they were kwon as Tunebos, a nickname that was introduced by the Spanish conquerers, and that only ten years ago they finally abandoned. Since that moment, in a process of growing cultural affirmation they have been using their real name: U’wa, which means, "people that think, people that know how to speak".

The U’wa are a very ceremonial people, who through the song relate and recreate their own system of thinking. Songs are complemented by their own system of rituals and structure of social relations (Osborn, 1985:18). The U’wa society is "very flexible and decentralized" (Ibid:27), it was divided formally in eight groups, according to their mythical texts. Some of these groups have disappeared (Ibid: 27). Osborn stated that "currently two groups or remnants of groups try to continue celebrating their myths and rituals that accompany them" (Ibid: 36). The most traditional group is the Kubaru’wa. All U’wa groups speak the same language, Uw’aka, which means "the soul of the people" (Ibid: 26). Their language is very flexible and each group has their own variations, and additional variations exist in each group between the spoken language and the ceremonial language (Ibid: 26).

The process of modern social organization between the U’was has followed a parallel path with the modern Colombian indigenous movement which since the beginning of 1970's started to create social organizations to fight for their rights. In 1974, the U’wa founded the "Comité Pro-Indígena de Colombia -Sarare" (Mesa Cuadros, 1996: 171). In 1976, working with the region´s peasants, the U´wa leaders founded the first U´wa association, the "Asociacion Tunebo -ASOCTUNEBO". The ASOCTUNEBO leaders were immediately accused of being ´leftists´, a common accusation made of all indigenous organizations attempting to organize in those days, and were subjected to relentless persecution by landowners, local politicians representing traditional parties, and by the army. At the same time, in 1977, some Catholic priests promoted a parallel U’wa organization, called "Organizacion Tunebo- OTUN, that some U’wa considered a trick by the Catholic priests (Mesa Cuadros, 1996: 172), but it lasted only two years because the members were prosecuted and dispersed (Berichá, 1992:28).

At the beginning of the 1980s, some U’wa leaders decided to create cabildos, the kind of indigenous organization promoted by the most important indigenous organization at that moment, the CRIC. In 1984, representatives of the majority of the U’wa communities created the "Cabildo Tunebo". In 1986, the U’wa´s took part in a national indigenous congress for the first time: the second ONIC Congress (Mesa Cuadros, 1996: 172).

Between 1987 and 1989, with the aid and guidance of ONIC, the U’wa founded the "Organización Indígena Tunebo del Oriente de Colombia" --OITOC. Prior to this, the traditional U´wa authorities had never had representation in any of the organizations founded from the late 70´s on. For this reason, the U´wa community initiated an internal dialogue with its traditional authorities to determine what name would best represent the entire indigenous community. In 1990, after extensive internal debate, a consensus was finally reached to call themselves U´wa, and rename the organization. Thus, the name, OITOC, was changed to that of " Organización Regional Indígena U´wa del Oriente Colombiano" - ORIWOC".

-ORIWOC". The final consensus was the name "Asociacion de Cabildos y Autoridades Tradicionales U’wa", or "Cabildo Mayor U’wa", which was legally changed in 1994.

Beginning in the 1940's, the U’wa communities started to lose their land from peasants who wanted to colonize the Sarare region, which was the last big frontier of the ancestral U’wa territory. The colonization process slowly ate away at the U´wa territory. Even so, relations between the U´wa and the peasants never became violent (Rucinque, 1972:46). In the early 1970´s, the U´wa began to claim their land, and call for a reservation to be created (Osborne, 1982:8) and some Kubaru´wa traveled to Bogotá to discuss the issue with government representatives (Osborne, 1982: 8-9).

In 1974 the Colombian Institute for Agricultural Reform, INCORA, created a special 45,440 hectare reservation for the U’wa within the jurisdiction of the Cubará (Boyacá) municipality on the territory of the Kubaru’wa, Kaibaká and Tagrinu’wa clans. In 1979 INCORA created the special 8.000 hectare reservation called Tauretes-Aguablanca^. Finally, in 1987, INCORA created the first U’wa ´resguardo´, called the Cobaria-Tegria-Bokota-Rinconada reserve. It was comprised of 61,115 hectares all told, and included the land set aside for the first reservation, plus an additional 15,675 hectares.

In 1992, ONIC and the U’wa put together a territorial reorganization team whose mission was to reconstruct the historical borders of the U´wa territory, and create a territorial entity in the future, similar to that of the 1991 Constitución Política Colombiana. And this effort led to the idea of building the Resguardo Único U´wa (IDEADE, 1996:8). At the beginning of 1993, the U’wa made a request to INCORA asking for the creation of the Resguardo Unico U’wa, that would put together the U’wa communities living in the departments of Boyacá, Santander and Norte de Santander. The petition coincided in the time with the beginning of the search for oil by Occidental Petroleum through their contracted enterprises. With time, the U’wa community started to perceive that the oil issue would be an obstacle for the success of their territorial requests.

Between August 1995 and October 1996, the Instituto de Estudios Ambientales para el Desarrollo, IDEADE, from the Javeriana University, lead the group of institutions that completed necessary studies to identify the U’wa territory, and to study the social and environmental viability of the proposal. The Association of Cabildos and U’wa Traditional Authorities participated actively in the study.

3. THE U’WA OPPOSITION TO THE OIL DRILLING: THE NATIONAL SCENERY

3.1. The oil contract and Occidental´s first contact with the U’wa people

In late 1991, Colombia´s state owned petroleum company -ECOPETROL- began signing equal partnership contracts (50-50) with various oil companies for drilling and exploration in what was known as the Bloque Samoré. Between 1992 and 1993, Occidental Petroleum and Shell acquired stakes in Bloque Samoré. From that time on, Occidental and Shell each held 25% of the rights ceded under the contract, while ECOPETROL held the remaining 50%.

On May 14, 1992, Occidental applied to INDERENA, Colombia´s National Institute for Renewable Resources, for an environmental license to start drilling for oil in the Bloque Samoré zone. At around the same time, Occidental, used one of its subcontractors to begin geological testing on the U’wa territory (Project Underground, 1998:27). The first public complaint filed by the U´wa may well have been on March 31, 1993, against a company called Grand Tensor, for unauthorized seismic activities as part of oil related exploration on its territory, (Mesa Cuadros, 1996:174). On this date the U´wa issued the following communiqué (excerpt):

"The company known as Gran Tensor commenced oil exploration on a portion of the Traditional U’wa territory, despite the fact that in January 1993, this same Company held a meeting in which it agreed to respect the borders of the duly constituted Indigenous Reserve and Reservation. We, the U’wa people hereby restate our opposition to any type of study or tampering with the natural Resources of our land (...) We are against exploration because: The land has a head, arms, and legs, and the U’wa territory is its heart, it is the wing that sustains the Universe; if it is bled dry, it cannot continue to give life to the rest of the body. Oil and other natural resources are its blood, and for this reason, we must take care of them" (U’wa Communiqué, March 31, 1993).

Between 1993 and 1995, Occidental developed programs of relation to the U’wa community, highlighting the benefits of the Company’s investment in the area, such as health and education programs, roads, etc (Project Underground, 1998: 27). Occidental took advantage of the absence of any government institution, and attempted, through numerous strategies, to convince the members of the U’wa to sign documents approving and accepting the oil exploration project on their lands. At the same time, the company divided the community between a few members in favor of Occidental’s position, the U’wa authorities and the majority of the community that was opposed to it.

3. 2. The Conflict Related to the Previous Consultation Process in Administrative Instances

On November 1, 1994, the Cabildo Mayor U’wa sent a letter to the DGAI expressing their opposition to the oil project, and asked for a meeting (Jimeno Santoyo, 1995, September 7: 8).

The DGAI wrote up a document citing general criteria for the dialogue with the U´wa, and made it public on December 22, 1994 after meeting with the Ministers of the Environment, of Mining, and with ECOPETROL (Ibid: 7), and scheduled a meeting for early January, 1995 in Arauca, a city in the Department of the same name (Ibidem). In this document, the DGAI emphasized that Occiedntal and the Colombian government must provide the U´wa with "ample information and effective intercultural communication" (DGAI, 1994). The DGAI further pointed out that the U’wa people "should independently consider the different aspects of the project proposed, and inform the national government of their conclusions through the pertinent institutions (the Ministry of Government - DGAI) which would then issue an opinion on the consultation and make the pertinent recommendations" (Ibid). The DGAI emphasized two main concerns with respect to the project. One was the absence of a study of possible social and cultural impacts of the project, and, the other was the severe impacts that other previous national projects had on the life of the U’was (Ibid).

A few days prior to the meeting in Arauca, the U’wa held the Third U´wa Congress in el Chuscal, Boyacá. In the course of the Congress, the U’wa representatives repeated that Occidental had never attended its group assemblies or congresses and, as for the seismic study, stated: "we, the indigenous U’wa ethnic communities, had no knowledge of the existence of this project". The Assembly added, "in our territory there have been assemblies and congresses and the Oxy was never present. They always talk with some U´wa members and the majority of the population does not know about it" (Centro de Bienestar Indigena, 1995).

The meeting in Arauca was held with the participation of the Ministry of Mines and Energy and the Ministry of the Environment, the DGAI, Ecopetrol, Occidental and the U’wa. The minutes of the meeting stated: "there is unanimity to begin to study the modifications to the seismic project of Samoré, with the participation of the U’wa authorities". The meeting concluded that an inter-cultural commission will be created and integrated by the Cabildo Mayor U’wa, the DGAI and Occidental, with the purpose of recognizing the terrains in which the project will be take place, and recognize the terrains in which the resguardos and indigenous reservations are involved (DGAI, 1995, May 4). However, on February 3, 1995, the Ministry of the Environment (through Resolution # 110) gave to Occidental the environmental license. That decision took everyone by surprise.

The second meeting that had been programed to follow the first meeting was held on February 21, 1995, as scheduled. The U’wa representatives at that meeting protested because the license was given without the process of consultation (Corte Constitucional, 1997). In that meeting, "some representatives of the indigenous community expressed the necessity of not compromising with any kind of agreement before consultating with their respective communities" (Ministerio de Medio Ambiente, 2000). After consultations, the U’wa made public a communique which stated:

"... In view of a secure death as a result of the loss of our lands, the extermination of our natural resources, the invasion of our sacred places, the disintegration of our families and communities, the forced silence of our songs and the lack of recognition of our history, we prefer a death with dignity: THE COLLECTIVE SUICIDE OF OUR COMMUNITIES. This type of death corresponds with the pride of our ancestors that challenged the domination of the conquerors and missionaries"(U’wa Communique, 1995).

The DGAI took the threat of collective suicide seriously and through a press release dated May 4, 1995, they stated: "It is true that the characteristics of life and culture and the current social conditions of the U’wa people are special. They are special in the sense that they are different with respect to the national and regional society, and with respect to the risks for its survival as an ethnic group if they have any kind of contact with agents of the national society(...)" (DGAI, 1995, May 4). Finally, the DGAI strongly emphasized that the conditions agreed in the meeting of Arauca had not yet been accomplished, "for that reason, the DGAI considered that currently there are no legal base to act in the U’wa territory" (Ibid).

3. The Conflict Regarding the Previous Consultation Process in Legal Instances: The First Round (August, 1995 to March, 1997)

On August 22, 1995, the Peoples’ Defender (Defensor del Pueblo) filed two different legal suits against the environmental license emanated from the Ministry of the Environment. As the decision that conceded the environmental license was an administrative decision, the regular legal path for this kind of petition was the action of nullification before the Council of State (Consejo de Estado), the highest Administrative Court in Colombia. However, since the main purpose of the suit was to avoid irreparable damage to the U´wa people, the Ombudsman also recurred to an extraordinary measure, that of ççguardianshipçç, as a rapid, temporary protective mechanism. This meant that the U´wa´s legal dispute entered the court system on two different legal routes. The ççguardianshipçç petition was filed with Bogotá Superior Court. Twenty days later, the Court ruled in favor of the petitioners. The Court´s opinion was that each indigenous group should be the master of its own destiny, and no court could decide for them, noting that the U´wa community had expressed its "radical opposition" to the project, and " had even announced its decision to commit collective suicide" if the seismic activity within its territories did not cease. The result was that the Court agreed with the claimant´s argument that "one of the reasons behind the petition for ççguardianshipçç in defense of the U´wa indigenous people is the right to continue living" (Bogotá Superior Court, 1995). Finally, the Court concluded that the administrative decision of the Ministry of the Environment attempted against the right to live of the U’wa, because "it did not take into account their own will", and was "precipitated", because it took everyone by surprise, including the officials of Indigenous Affairs Office. To enforce its argumentation, the Court reminded us that consultation with indigenous communities is regulated by an international treaty that was adopted by Colombia as an internal law. Its conclusion was that the "supposed ‘consultation’" that the Ministry of the Environment made was not adjusted to the purpose of that regulation. The Court decided to declare inapplicable the administrative decision of the Ministry of the Environment until the "culmination of that process of consultation in a proper and legal way" (Ibid).

The specific outcome of the Bogotá Superior Court´s decision was that all siesmic activities within U´wa territory be suspended until a true consultation process was completed. Then, two days later, on September 14, 1995, there was news regarding the suit filed with administrative authorities. The Council of State issued its initial decision, admitting the claims made by the Ombudsman, but it also ruled that the seismic testing could not be suspended while the case was under consideration, effectively blocking the main legal consequences of the Bogotá Superior Court decision..

Occidental and Ecopetrol contested the unfavorable decision of the Bogotá Superior Court. Thus, the ççguardianship went before the Supreme Court on appeal. On October 19, 1995, the Supreme Court ruled that the competent judicial authority to make a decision on the case was the Council of State. The Supreme Court reversed the Bogotá Superior Court decision without considering the case in depth. According to the Supreme Court, the differences in the interpretation of how the consultation process was to be managed did not constitute a violation of any constitutional right (Supreme Court, 1995).

In early 1996, the Constitutional Court, exercising its discretional powers of review, selected the U´wa ççguardianship case for review. This meant that two of the highest courts in Colombia were simultaneously studying the U´wa case in different jurisdictions. Finally, on February 3, 1997, a year after it began considering the case, the Constitutional Court reached a decision. As we will see, the Council of State made its decision almost immediately afterward, only one month later.

The Constitutional Court framed the constitutional discussion of the case as a conflict "created as a result of the exploration of natural resources in indigenous territories, and the special protection that the State should have to the indigenous communities to conserve its ethnic, cultural, social and economical identity and integrity" (Corte Constitucional, 1997). With respect to the exploration of natural resources inside indigenous territories the Court expressed that it was necessary, to look for an equilibrium or balance between the economic development of the country that requires the exploration of resources and the preservation of integrity (ethnic, cultural, social, and economical of the indigenous communities), which is condition to the subsistence of the indigenous human group (Ibid).

Then, the Court concluded that the right of the indigenous community to preserve their cultural integrity is a fundamental right, as it is the right of those communities to participate in the decision that affects them, "through the mechanism of the consultation". The latter is the way to secure and make effective the former. To the Constitutional Court, the right of participation stipulated in Article 40 (2) of the Colombian Constitution, and Convention 169 of the ILO (approved by Colombia through Law 21 from 1991) represents a group of norms that "tend to secure and make effective that participation" (Ibid). With respect to the concrete situation that they were analyzing, the Constitutional Court found that the meeting of January 10 and 11, 1995, do not structure or configure the required consultation. In conclusion, the Court estimated that the procedure to the expedition of the environmental license was accomplished in an irregular way, and resolved to order the realization of a consultation process during the next 30 days.

After awaiting the decision for more than a year, the U’wa were very critical about the decision of the Constitutional Court, as we can see in an open letter where they stated:

The reaction of the ONIC to the decision of the Constitutional Court showed no emotion either. The ONIC stated: "The Court is not clear in the fundamental: the defense of the right to life and to the cultural integrity, and to the decision of the U’wa people about not permiting the entrance of the oil companies to their territory" (ONIC, 1997:13). The ONIC added: "the U’wa consider that there is no sense to go do a new consultation, because all of us know, their thinking is against the oil project"(Ibid). The suspicions of the indigenous organization went beyond, and concluded: "The Government and the OXY accepted the judicial decision with optimism, because they have their hopes in the Council of State" (Ibid: 14).

As we said before, the Council of State decided a month later than the Constitutional Court. The Council of State concluded that the license was granted with the accomplishment of the legal requirements, and that a new process of consultation was not necessary. The Council of State emphasized that their decision would be the final decision one regarding this case. The main issue the Council of State analyzed to arrive to that conclusion was the right of participation that the indigenous communities have through the process of consultation. Their conclusion was that the process of consultation is an ideal that the State would accomplish; however, it is not mandatory. The decision is a competence of the Ministry of the Environment and not from the indigenous community. The Council of State added that due to the fact that the norms regulating the consultation do not specify the way to accomplish that. As a result it is not possible to require the environmental authority any specific procedure. It is only necessary that a representative of the state and the multinational company do a presentation of the project for the indigenous community, and that they express their opinions about the issue. As a result, the meeting of Arauca in January 1995 was deemed valid as a "consultation" on this issue (Consejo de Estado, 1997).

In the first semester of 1997, the U’wa/Oxy conflict entered into the international scenario. That entrance was made on two different and simultaneous paths. In May, 1997, the U’wa left the country for the first time to present their situation beyond Colombian borders, initially to the United States. At the same time, the Colombian government officially asked the Organization of American States (OAS) to intervene in the case (Arenas, 2000).

In early May, 1997, U’wa leader Berito Kubaru’wa and some members of ONIC were invited to the United States by the environmental group, Amazon Coalition. Berito and the other indigenous leaders initially visited the cities of Washington D.C, New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco. The trip was deemed a great success, comparable only to the national success of the "U’wa Hearing for Life". The meetings with Berito Kubaru’wa made a great impression on the U.S environmental, human rights and indigenous organizations. In Washington D.C., Berito and the Chairman of ONIC presented the case of the U’wa people before the Inter-American Human Rights Commission (CIADH), with the legal assistance of the Earth Justice Legal Defense Fund, CEJIL and the Colombian Judiciary Commission. Later, Berito traveled to New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

The success of the first visit to the U.S. led to another invitation extended to Berito five months later, in October, 1997. During the second visit, Berito Kubaru’wa went to Washington, D.C, Nueva York, Cambridge, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Berkeley. In the course of that visit, , Berito Kubaru’wa sent an open letter to the Chairmen of Occidental and Shell, in which he stated:

In the middle of 1996, Colombia ex-Defense Minister Rafael Pardo, at that time a fellow at Harvard University, contacted a group specializing in the resolution of conflicts at the same University (PONSACS group), and suggested the possibility to organize some mediation in the conflict with the U’wa (Macdonald, 1998b). A year later, in May 1997, the Colombian Minister of External Relations formally asked the Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS), headed by a Colombian ex-President with a close relationship to Pardo, to conduct a research project about the dispute between U’wa and Occidental taking into account that the U’wa had a petition before the IACHR. Rafael Pardo, working at that moment with the Organization of American States, suggested the participation of the PONSACS group in the mediation process (Arenas, 2001). As a result, the Secretary General created an ad-hoc project OAS/Harvard under the responsibility of the Unit of Promotion of Democracy (Ibid) and funded by Occidental through Harvard University. The group OAS/Harvard visited Colombia a couple of times, and elaborated a document with recommendations that were presented before the Colombian government on September, 1997 (Ibid).

The OAS/Harvard team made eight recommendations:

(1) An immediate and unconditional public statement by Oxy and Shell, "In which they commit to suspend the execution of plans for oil exploration or exploitation in the Samoré Block as a first step toward creating better conditions for any future resumption of oil development activities" (Macdonald, Anaya, and Soto, 1998).

(2) The "normalization of the process to expand the U’wa Resguardo", as a way to eliminate the perception that it was stopped "as a means of exerting pressure on them" (Ibid).

(3) "A moderation of public rhetoric", especially, "from statements that link those who have opposed the oil companies to the guerrilla movement or drug traffickers" (Ibid).

(4) "Recognition of and respect for the U’wa system of leadership and authority". As a result, if there are some internal differences among the U’wa, "they must be allowed to resolve their differences using their own system of authority" (Ibid).

(5) "Establishment of a consultation process under the responsibility of the Government of Colombia", that should be divided into two phases. The first phase in the near future, and the second phase later. The purposes of the first consultation would be: "to reach agreement on the geographical limits of their territory, which should also serve to identify the area outside of which the suspension of oil operations could be lifted". The purposes of the second would be: "to develop measures to prevent harm to the U’wa that might result from renewed operations in the Samoré Block".

(6) The Colombian Government should train and bring technical assistance to the U’wa to be sure that "the U’wa are adequately prepared to evaluate and to decide on the issues under consideration" (Ibid).

(7) "Creation of a program to promote greater cooperation among the parties" (Ibid).

(8) "Creation of a program for conflict prevention and resolution", with the assistance of the OAS/Harvard project.

The conclusions and recommendations from the OAS/Harvard team was largely diffused in the Colombian mass media. They were presented as a big success of the U’wa claim. The Colombian government and the oil companies sent letters to the OAS accepting the recommendations and showing their interest with the continuation of the process (Avila, 2000). However, the U’wa and ONIC reacted with precaution. The U’wa and ONIC were worried that the recommendations could open the door to the possibilities of future oil exploration inside the U’wa territory. The ONIC answered through a communique, where it was highlighted that they agreed with some of the conclusions, but where very critical of the entire framework of the ad-hoc project. ONIC stated: "a dialogue where one group convinces the other, is not a dialogue, but an imposition (...) These recommendations seem to prefigure a result and there is not space to deliberate. As a result, the procedure that is recommended and the temporary suspension of the project will benefit the oil companies and the government, and will extend the anxiety of the U’wa People" (ONIC Communique, October, 1997).

The continuation of the OAS/Harvard team was conditioned to a written answer from the U’wa expressing their interest to continue with the process. The U’wa verbally said that they were interested, but never sent a letter (Avila, 2000). As a result a new phase in the work of OAS/Harvard team was squashed .

The U’wa-Oxy conflict is not the same since it arrived to international spaces. Now, it is more complex, more public. Perhaps that is why, upon taking a partial balance of the U´wa struggle, it is clearly quite exceptional within the context of contemporary Colombia, where absolutely all social movements, including those of other indigenous peoples, have been harshly and bloodily repressed by paramilitary groups, with close collaboration from the Colombian army representing the interests of landowners, drug traffickers, and local and national politicians.

Occidental tried to take the main decisions relating to the conflict back to the national scenario. For this reason it was not very active in promoting a second stage of the OEA/Harvard project. The publicity received by the case changed the balance of power between the oil company and the U’wa. The first result of this was Shell´s decision to divest, and sell its shares to Occidental in 1998 (Avila, 2000)

Clearly the Colombian government changed its strategy in the U’wa conflict, particularly due to ideas contained in the OEA/Harvard report (Arenas, 2001). President Samper´s government (1994-1998) began the process by designing a new legal framework that would change the reference points of the U’wa-Oxy conflict, and President Pastrana´s government (1998-2002) has maintained and reinforced these changes. Legislation regarding the consultation process with indigenous communities, the requirements for issuance of an environmental license to oil companies, and the status of the oil companies all changed, undoubtedly in ways that very much favored multinational companies. At the same time, in an apparently contradictory measure, the government increased the size of the U´wa territory, and issued an environmental license to Oxy, allowing them to begin oil exploration on U´wa land.

As we saw before, the extension of the U’wa resguardo was an old aspiration of the U’wa people. As part of the new strategy of the government, the Minister of the Environment decided to push that petition before INCORA. For that reason, the Minister started a process of approaching the U’wa community. The first step was his participation in 5^th U’wa Congress, on December 30, 1998 (Mayr and Pérez, 1999b). The discussion about the U’wa territory started formally on January 23, 1999 in Samoré. One of the most controversial points was the fact that after the process of delimitation made by IDEADE in 1996, INCORA proposed a change in 1998 to that study, a situation that was rejected by the Cabildo Mayor U’wa. In that meeting, the Minister of the Environment proposed again "take into account, the limits established in the map of socioeconomic study, due to the fact that they were the result of a work made in consensus with the different parts" (Ibid).

On March 6, 1999 a new meeting was celebrated in Cubará with the group that participated in the prior meeting. The accord was made by consensus "to advance the definition of the U’wa territory based on the limits established by the map of the socioeconomic study"(Ibid.) The resistence of INCORA to accept the limits established by the socioeconomic study were clear, they wanted to exclude a specific point of the U’wa territory called "Gibraltar", were the Gibraltar I Well was located. However, the arguments were technical, of course: the necessity to clarify the limits through cartography and field work. In a new meeting in Cubará on June 18 and 19, 1999, "the U’wa were precise that the extension of the current resguardo should start accounting to the limits established in the map of the socioeconomic study, as was agreed upon with the Minister of the Environment" (Ibid). A month later, the work of delimitation was done. On July 19, 1999, the Minister of the Environment went to Cubará and presented the results of the study. The modifications to the previous work were minimal, only some small parts of previous study were excluded, and added others in other end of the U’wa territory. For that reason, the minute of that meeting stated: "The U’wa highlighted the accomplishment of the activities accorded by the Minister and the institutions involved in it. They manifested their complacency seeing the advances of their territorial aspirations" (Ibid). In fact, in six months a petition that was made more that ten years ago was resolved.

On August 23, 1999, the Colombian Government formally gave the U’wa community the title of the extension of their territory, and promised 150 million dollars to indemnify the area to buy the land from the colonists who lived there. The Ministry and the Cabildo Mayor U’wa signed a joint statement to the following effect:

In this same communiqué, the U’wa added: "The U’wa hereby state (...) that the process that was just culminated in no way compromises their position of disagreement with oil exploration either on or off their land. (...)" (Ibid). The Cabildo Mayor U’wa also sent a letter to President Pastrana stating:

A the same time that the reserve´s boundaries were being expanded (Octubre 1999) Occidental applied for a new environmental license under the new regulations mentioned earlier. This was denounced by U’wa and ONIC in February, 1999, in the following terms:

However, the environmental license was granted only after the process of extension of the U’wa territory was finished. On September 21, 1999, a month after the extension of the U’wa resguardo, the Minister of Environment authorized Oxy to explore the Gibraltar I Well, in the department of Norte de Santander. The location of the well is only 500 meters outside of the new resguardo, but still part of the U’wa’s ancestral territory. The decision caused indignation among the U’wa, who said that the government deceived them. In a communique, the U’wa stated:

a. The Solidarity of Social Organizations from the Arauca Department

The support of the U’wa among the social organizations from the Arauca Department started before the U’wa Audience for Life, in 1996. However, is since August, 1998, when the U’wa and the social organizations in Arauca started to work together. During that month the social organizations of the Sarare region, in the departments of Arauca, Norte de Santander and Boyacá organized a civic protest for two weeks. The protest involved the towns of Arauquita, Saravena, Fortul and Tame (Arauca); Cubará (Boyacá); Toledo and Labateca (Norte de Santander). The protest mobilized almost 20,000 campesinos. The main objective of the protesters was to paralyze the commercial activities in all the towns in the region. As a new thing the protest showed the participation of the U’wa, and the inclusion in the list of claims against oil exploration throughout the region, especially that inside the U’wa territory, as well as for the extension of their resguardo. One of the points of the list stated, "we demand the constitution of the ‘Resguardo Unico U’wa’, with the limits that the traditional authorities will determine. The immediate suspension of the seismic exploration and drilling of the oil wells in the foothill (Samore Block, Capachos Block) and in the savanna (Llano 17 Block), because it implies a risk the lives and existence of the U’wa, Guahibo, and Sikuani people" (Organizaciones Sociales Departamento de Arauca y Cubará, 1998).

In a communique, that followed the U’was went beyond that level and called for new solidarity with campesino organizations of the region and for "a global crusade to defend life":

The U’wa feel that the Arauca people have been their main ally in this struggle, since they mobilized the Araucas to work with the U´wa "because they already had the experience of the Caño Limón catastrophe, brought about by Occidental in their own department".

As we saw before, indigenous Senator Lorenzo Muelas, and ONIC had been very important allies of the U’wa. ONIC put the U’wa case as a priority in their agenda, together only with one other very complex case, the struggle of the Embera Katio people against a dam funded by Canadian and Swedish corporations that was built in their territory. The Embera Katios have been regularly attacked and massacred by paramilitary groups as punishment for their opposition to the dam. Without doubt, after the U’wa case, the Embera Katio case is the other social struggle in Colombia that has reached global proportions.

The directed actions by the Colombian indigenous movement in support of the U’wa and Embera Katio people started at the national level in September 1999, when ONIC, the movement Autoridades Indigenas de Colombia (AICO), and the Coordinadora Indigena de la Cuenca Amazonica (COICA), stated that the Pastrana Government had declared a war of extermination against the Colombian indigenous peoples due to the lack of fulfillment with the constitutional and legal measures that protect indigenous people, but changing that legislation to benefit multinational corporations (ONIC Communique, September 23, 1999). ONIC stated that, "there is a long process of legal developments and regulations that openly clash with the recognition of the multiculturalism of the country" (ONIC Communique, October 21, 1999). On February 25, 2000, the ONIC and environmental groups mobilized in Bogota in support of the U’wa and Embera Katio people. On April 4, 2000 the ONIC announced the beginning of a national mobilization in defense of their fundamental rights, after President Pastrana expressed interest in being part of the North American Free Trade Agreement, which Mexico has resulted in the elimination of some forms of collective property of indigenous peoples. ONIC stated: "We are in front of the imminent possibility of a counter-reform of the Constitutions that will eliminate our rights (...) Our future depends on the struggle of the U’wa and Embera Katio people. In that struggle will be define what we will have as agrarian reform, territorial organization, cultural diversity, and life" (ONIC Communique, April 4, 2000).

As stated previously, the group Amazon Coalition invited the U’was to the United States in May, 1997. Despite the fact that the news about the U’wa’s threat to commit mass suicide attracted the attention of a lot of environmental groups to their dispute beginning in 1995, the U’wa’s first trip to the United States represented the main impulse in the construction of networks and the high public profile of the case in the U.S. As a result, of that visit, the activist Terry Freitas from the United States became one of the most active supporters of the U’wa (Arenas, 2001). Two years later in circumstances which remain unclear, Freitas and two North American pro-indigenous leaders working in support of the case against Oxy were murdered by leftist FARC guerrillas on U’wa lands in Colombia.

The U’wa have been traveling to the United States regularly since 1997, twice that year, twice in 1998, once in 1999 and twice in the first semester of 2000, visiting the cities of Washington D.C., New York, Boston, Cambridge, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Berkeley, Chicago, and Madison (Appendix, Chart # 1). The most active groups supporting the U’wa in the United States has been the Rain Forest Action Network (RAN), Amazon Watch, Amazon Coalition and the U’wa Defense Project. The two first organizations have the most complete and well maintained web side (www.ran.org, and www.amazonwatch.org) about the U’wa case. One of the first strategies used by the coalition of U.S. environmentalist groups, human rights and indigenous people supporting the U´wa cause was to take out advertisements in the The New York Times.

Ex-Vice President Al Gore and investment fund giant, Fidelity Investment, have been favorite targets of the U.S. environmental movement supporting the U´wa people. Their mobilization against these targets got the attention of the most important newspapers in the United States. The main U.S. based U’wa support groups are in constant communication with the U’wa people in Bogotá and Cubará, where the Cabildo Mayor´s headquarters is located.

One of most interesting outcomes of the U´wa support networks in the United States was the fact that their cause became linked to the new and growing movemment against multinational companies. For many individuals involved in this movement, the U’wa case has been a source of inspiration. In April, 2000 the Rain Forest Action Network -RAN- organized public protests in Washington D.C within the demonstrations against the World Bank, and a more ambitious action was organized in Los Angeles during the August 2000 Democratic Convention, when nearly 3,000 people took to the streets to express their support for the U´wa.

The U’wa made their first trip to Europe in March, 1998 when they went to England. Between that date and June, 2000, the U’wa have made seven different tours of Europe, visiting at least nine countries: England, Spain, Finland, Russia, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, Holland, and Italy (Appendix, Chart # 1). It is possible that the first group to support to U’wa in Europe was the group created in Madrid, Spain in 1997. The publicity of the U’wa case in Spain resulted in the selection of Berito Kubaru’wa as the recipient of the prestigious Bartolome de las Casas Prize, awarded by the Spanish Government in April, 1998.

Many of the solidarity actions in Europe and Latin America originated from the actions of the main Ecuadorian environmental group, Acción Ecológica. They were the only non-Colombian organization that was present in the U’wa Hearing for Life in August, 1996, under the umbrella of Oilwatch. Acción Ecológica is the umbrella organization of Friends of the Earth-Ecuador and one of the most active members of the coalition of environmental group in Friends of the Earth International (FoEI). That coalition created Oilwatch in 1996, a global network of activist groups campaigning against the oil industry. Oilwatch’s International Secretariat is located in Ecuador, under the responsibility of Acción Ecológica

In a recent interview, one of the members of the Oilwatch Secretariat stated that the organization´s strategy is to work directly with local people. (Melsher, 1999b). In keeping with this philosophy, in February 1999, Oilwatch Africa organized a trip to Nigeria for Colombian indigenous leader, Senator Lorenzo Muelas, to get a first hand impression of the effects of oil drilling on the Niger river delta (Muelas, 1999). The Oilwatch International Secretariat also organized the July 1999 visit of Lorenzo Muelas, Berito Kubaru’wa and two other U’wa leaders to Ecuador, to visit the Secoya, a small indigenous community on whose lands Occidental Petroleum is conducting drilling. In late 1999, the Oilwatch Secretariat stated: "the U’wa are now at the head of the environmental movement because they are bringing new arguments to the table. This brings hope to other peoples in their efforts to resist the onslaught of the oil industry." (Melchner, 1999b).

The Colombian Minister of the Environment´s initiative to organize a conference in Brussels in the summer of 2000 entitled "Colombian-European Environmental Alliance" was hailed by many U´wa support groups as a unique lobbying opportunity. (Van de Hoek, 1999). For this reason, Oilwatch organized a European tour for U’wa and Embera Katio spokespersons. Although the event itself was cancelled at the last minute due to growing opposition and criticism of the Colombian government in many Brussels diplomatic circles (Dupret, 2000: 13), the U’wa and Emberá Katio spokespersons made successful vists to six European countries, including a presentation before the European Parliament, meetings with representatives from the International Labor Organization responsible for Convention # 169, and a meeting with the Secretariat of the U.N. Working Group on Indigenous Peoples.

The U’wa have been connected to indigenous organizations through Latin America, which have invited them to events in México in 1998, and Chile on June, 2000. Paradoxically, the interest of the U’wa to maintain control of their struggle at the national level, and to avoid manipulation, has caused a demobilization of many environmental and human rights NGOs in Colombia. Despite the fact that they are supportive of the U’wa cause, they have taken a passive role in the last couple years. This tendency started to be changed from outside, through Friends of the Earth International, that has been encouraging the environmental NGO Censat-Agua Viva to have a more active role in the U’wa case and inside the Oilwatch group. As a result, Censat-Agua Viva has became the main local point of support for many international initiatives related to the U’wa struggle.

After the environmental license was granted to Occidental, the President of ONIC appealed that administrative decision. In their answer, the Minister of the Environment stated that Oxy manifested in its request that "based on the information contained in the socioeconomic study of environmental impact presented, it was possible to establish with certainty that there was no presence of indigenous or black communities in the region of the well, nor inside the area of interest to the drilling, nor its areas of direct or indirect influence" (Ministerio de Medio Ambiente, 1999a).

The Minister of the Environment stated that they asked the Ministry of the Interior and INCORA, the institutions responsible for certifying the presence of indigenous peoples in areas of oil exploration, as is ordered by Decree # 1320 of 1998. The Office of Indigenous Affairs of the Ministry of the Interior, based only on maps, concluded and certified that there was not permanent presence of indigenous peoples in the area of the project. INCORA, also based only on maps, certified that in that area, an indigenous territory was not legally defined. As a result, the Minister of the Environment washed his hands of the issue and concluded, "In this way, the Ministry of the Environment accomplished strictly and diligently the legal mandates that ordered it to document with certifications of the competent authorities the facts related with the presence of indigenous communities and the properness of the realization of the previous consultation" (Ibid). There is no doubt that Minister Mayr new that what the DGAI was certifying was patently false. He had personally visited the U’wa territory several times, but the civil servants who wrote the certification based their information only on maps. Perhaps for this reason, Mayr added the following to his response:

With respect to the previous consultation process, the Minister concluded:

Despite the fact that the People’s Defender Office continued supporting the U’wa, especially the delegate of indigenous affairs, it did not support the new complaint against the Ministry of the Environment’s decision to grant an environmental license to the Oxy. This time, the U’was had the legal support of MINGA, a Colombian human rights NGO.

The U’wa’s lawyer opposed a tutela (writ of protection) against the Minister of the Environment, the Minister of the Interior and Occidental Petroleum for violation of the fundamental right of the indigenous communities to be consulted.

The Judge in the first instance concluded that the legal problem was to determine if in the process of granting an environmental license to Occidental, the administration omitted the committment of the fundamental right of consultation to the indigenous communities, established in ILO Convention 169. Supporting her arguments in the Constitution, precedent decision from the Constitutional Court, ILO Convention 169, and especially, ignoring Decree 1320, the Judge of the 11^th Circuit Court of Bogotá concluded that the license was granted without previous consultation. Additionally, the Judge found "serious doubts" and contradictions in the process respecting the possible existence of indigenous peoples, and indigenous resguardos in the area of the environmental license. The Judge concluded that the plaintiff should carry the case before the administrative jurisdiction to decide about the matter of contention. However, at the same time she accepted the tutela as a transitory mechanism of protection, until the administrative jurisdiction made a decision. Finally, the Judge decided to order the suspension of the activities in Gibraltar I Well to avoid an irreparable harm to the indigenous community.

The decision of the 11^th Circuit Court of Bogotá, was impugned by the Ministry of the Environment, the Ministry of the Interior and Occidental Petroleum. Occidental argued that the decision ignored the current norms related to the previous consultation process to indigenous communities, and that the order of the suspension of activities generated serious damage to the country. The Superior Tribunal of Bogota studied that petition in its second instance, and centered its analysis on two main issues. The first one was the issue of the protection of fundamental rights invoked by the plaintiff. The Tribunal concluded that because Occidental Petroleum annexed a study of environmental impact and a study of the ethnography of the region to their petition of an environmental license, the Minister of the Environment arrived at the conclusion that the life of the U’wa community was not in danger, nor was as the natural and cultural richness of the area of influence of the project either. The Tribunal added: "the area of exploratory interest of the Gibraltar I Well is located totally outside of the new U’wa resguardo". (Tribunal Superior de Bogotá, 2000).

The second issue that the Tribunal analyzed was the juridical path used by the plaintiff. In this respect, the Tribunal concluded that the tutela is not the way to decide about these matters, but the administrative jurisdiction, because the impugnation of an ethnographic study and the social and anthropological reality of an indigenous community take time and require the advice of experts. The Tribunal added that the ancestral territories are not recognized by the Constitution nor ILO Convention 169. As a result, the Tribunal revoked the decision of the 11^th Criminal Circuit Court of Bogotá.

After the Ministry of the Environment approved Oxy´s new environmental licence in 1999, the U’wa launched a series of direct actions that they termed civil disobediance. In the first action, 250 U’wa indigenous people peacefully occupied the drilling site. In late January, 2000, the Colombian government decided to take back the Gibraltar I well by force, and sent 5,000 soldiers to do the job. As the U’wa reported: "The military forces used helicopters to throw us off our property, resulting in the loss of three of our indigenous brothers." (U’wa communiqué, January 25, 2000). In the midst of the dispute, the U’wa people publicly announced that they were in fact the owners of the property from which they had been evicted. This was true: Only a few months earlier, in one of its best moves to date, the U´wa people had purchased two small pieces of property, 11 hectares called Bellavista and 24 hectares known as Santa Rita, the site of the Gibraltar I well is split between the two. The purchase was made as a direct result of international support for the U’wa, since they used the money from international awards, plus other international donations received.

In response to the eviction from their property, the U´wa and Arauca indigenous organizations called a strike by the general population in Sarare on January 31, 2000, (Comunicado U’wa, Enero 31, 2000), and began to block off the region´s roads. Two weeks later, on February 11, 2000, the army and police violently dispersed the indigenous people, causing the deaths of three U’wa children (U’wa communiqué, February 11, 2000). Days later, more than 1,200 U’wa and 4.000 peasants from the region staged a demonstration at the Gibraltar site, in the municipality of Toledo, Norte de Santander (U’wa communiqué, February 21, 2000). The Colombian government, who was responsible for the decision to begin oil drilling on U´wa territory, chose to completely ignore most of the direct actions taken by the U’wa. In late June, 2000 the social organizations of the region launched a new popular strike by blocking the Saravena-Pamplona highway (U’wa communiqué, June 29, 2000). A week later the blockade was called off after a partial agreement was reached with the government, who promised to start negotiations to seek a solution to the conflict.

At this time, the U’wa filed a complaint against the mayor of Toledo, for the denial of due process during their eviction from the Bellavista and Santa Rita properties. The Pamplona Superior Court of first instance ruled partially in favor of the U’wa community, and ordered the mayor of Toledo to return the Bellavista and Santa Rita lands not affected by the court order that awarded Occidental title to a strip of the said properties. (Pamplona Superior Court, 2000). On July 8, 2000, after the court ordered return, the U’wa reoccupied to their properties, with the exception of the Gibraltar I well, and later denounced the fact that the army had planted mines in the area (U’wa communiqué, August 22, 2000).

On September 11, 2000, after increased incidents and rising tension with the police and the army, the U´wa community issued the following statement:

Consequently, days later the U’wa community decided to walk out on the negotiations with the government. In a surprise action, the U’wa community called a press conference to announce that the deeds to their land issued by the King of Spain in 1661 had been found (U’wa Defense Working Group, September 15, 2000). Even so, the Colombian government and the national mass media chose to ignore the U’wa people´s new argument, and through mass militarization of the zone, they managed to allow Occidental to start exploration by the end of the year 2000. The mobilizations of the year 2000 basically closed out another cycle of direct local struggle. Given the intense militarization to which the zone was subjected, and the repression of all peaceful protest, there was little they could do. Since that time, the U’wa community has intensified its actions on an international level. At the time this article was written, there was still no news that oil had been found at Gibraltar I. Whatever the results of the exploration now underway, the outcome of the Oxy-U’wa conflict remains uncertain.

If any one trait can be used to describe the Latin American indigenous communities, it is their tenacity; their refusal to disappear as a people. In recent decades this trait, combined with their ability to adapt their struggles to the historical moment, have once again demonstrated the originality and wealth of ideas of the cause they defend. In an era of transationalization of indigenous movements, they have achieved one of the most dynamic and original linkages among local, national and transnational efforts seen to date. As Boaventura de Sousa Santos points out, even when an initially local struggle becomes national, it remains local, just as occurs with transnationalization. But at the same time, when a struggle is taken up outside national borders, it becomes deterritorialized, and new national and local dynamics are created (Santos, 2001:211); These new local dynamics, are transformed in turn, and have a permanent influence on all actors and transnational spaces.

Some have suggested that international solidarity with the U´wa was aroused due to their dramatic strategy of threatening mass suicide, which elicited an unexpected international response. The truth is that the suicide threat did initially help attract both national and international attention to the U´wa community´s cause. However, as I have attempted to show in this document, all individuals and organizations who have come into direct contact with the U´wa people have been struck by the richness of their culture, the charisma of many of their spokespersons, and by the originality and emancipatory potential of their exemplary discourse and struggle. For the great majority of their supporters, it is the preservation of the U´wa culture and their very special relationship with nature that has motivated their solidarity. It should be noted that as time goes on, the issue of group suicide is less and less frequently cited in news about the U´wa struggle, but solidarity with their cause has continued to grow .

The U´wa case contained a series of special circumstances that helped it transnationalize so successfully: 1) the strong cultural heritage of the U´wa people; 2) their collective pride and incredible ability to speak for themselves, as well as their talent for adapting the presentation of their arguments to many different scenarios; 3) the extensive use the U´wa made of public communiqués and open letters (I have had access to 31 of these), which helped keep their allies informed, as well as provide an ongoing update on the facts regarding their case; 4) the existence of a national and international human rights movement focused on Colombia (with headquarters in large cities like Washington D.C., Madison and Brussels) possessed of extensive experience in legal work and lobbying, plus national and international contacts and resources that have helped support and build promotional networks for the U´wa cause in Europe and the United States.; 5) the fact that Occidental Petroleum´s headquarters is located in the U.S., a hegemonic global power, and principle player in Colombia´s economic and political affairs.

In this document I have attempted to illustrate the social and institutional complexity underlying a specific social struggle before it became an issue taken up by a "transnational promotional network" . I have offered a detailed analysis of the process the U´wa community was involved in before the issue of oil exploration placed them in the national and international spotlight. The oil conflict arose at a time when the U´wa were immersed in a positive process of reconstructing their culture and identity as a people, linked to consolidating their social organization, to a willingness to fight to recover a large portion of their ancestral lands, and to the growing national prestige of the indigenous movement. I have also described the complex institutional, administrative and legal developments that can be activated in cases such as this, which serve to mobilize and test such institutions. Many of the national institutions involved in the case, such as the Ombudsman´s Office and the Constitutional Court, were newly created under the 1991 Constitution. Some of the legal concepts and regulations are also new, such as the concept of guardianship (tutela), and ILO Convention # 169.

I have attemped to give equal time, and assign equal value to all processes: local (the U´wa´s development of a process of modern social organization, their fight for their lands), regional (the social struggles in the Arauca Department), national (the responses of administrative and legal institutions to the conflict between the U´wa and Oxy, the national solidarity in the Colombian indigenous movement and others), and transnational (the construction of solidarity networks, and promotion of the U´wa cause, as well as describe how transnationalization has created a new dynamic and fostered new relationships among local, national and transnational causes.

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