March 27-April 6, 2009
Youth Arts and Action Delegation

Building on last year’s dynamic Youth delegation and the fall 2008 Drop Beats Not Bombs Tour [1], this spring 2009 delegation and organizers exchange to Colombia will continue to expand the network of youth in the US and Colombia who are seeking creative ways to resist militarism. This delegation will also be the focus of a documentary film produced by two participants through the Dar Papaya Project. The Dar Papaya Projects seeks to “tell the story of the delegation through individual experiences of the participants in the form of a film. The film will focus on the meeting of youth from different backgrounds and cultures, what happens when they come together, share their personal experiences and interact while in Colombia.”

In the United States, activism focused on counter-recruitment, support for conscientious objection and war resistance have grown dynamically. Together with the grinding brutality of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the indifference of the system for veteran care, this growth of activism has caused the armed forces to have difficulty meeting its recruitment goals and face significant limits on its capacity to wage or expand war.

In Colombia, the recipient of the most US military aid outside the Middle East and Afghanistan, there is also a conscientious objection (CO) movement. As in the US, youth face an overwhelmingly militarized society structured to use young people from poor neighborhoods for warfare. Over the last twenty years, CO groups that object to conscription into any armed group have developed around Colombia, many of them using art and theater to project their presence. Prominent among these are the Medellin Youth Network (Red Juvenil) and the Collective Action of Conscientious Objectors (ACOOC), which is a Bogota-based organization of conscientious objectors. Although Colombia’s constitution does recognize freedom of conscience, it also requires all young men of 18 years of age to fulfill their obligatory military service.

The first youth arts and action delegation in March of 2008 was a dynamic experience for both US and Colombian activists alike. An amazing group of youth activists and youth allies, including a conscientious objector discharged from the US military, a counter-recruitment organizer from Oakland and representatives of the Not Your Soldier Project, came together to spend a week with youth activists in Colombia.

Following the delegation, Fellowship of Reconciliation’s (FOR) Youth and Militarism and Colombia programs, in collaboration with the Not Your Soldier Project put on a Hip-Hop, speaking and workshop tour with a Colombian conscientious objector, a Detroit-based political hip hop artist and a youth organizer who resisted the poverty draft in the US. The purpose of the tour was to train and empower youth to support each other in resisting militarism through creative action, including building the international conscientious objector’s movement.

Delegation: The exchange will be a space for sharing skills and experiences, workshops, strategies and other creative forms of resistance. The delegation will visit and work with COs and youth activists in Bogotá, Medellín, and rural communities in eastern Antioquia. The aim is for US participants to both offer and receive skills, stories, and experience interactively. We also anticipate and encourage artistic actions as an integral part of the delegation, by bringing materials, planning activities, and collaboration between US and Colombian participants in creating theater, visual art, puppets, poetry, that express resistance to militarism.

Spanish skills are not necessary for US participants as translation will be provided for all sessions. Participants will stay in the homes of Colombian youth activists.

Funding and costs: We aim to obtain commitments from co-sponsoring organizations with an interest in conscientious objection, war resistance, and Colombia to support the participation of key US-based activists and COs. There will be a base cost per person of $1,000 plus airfare to Colombia (usually $550 - $750, depending on departure city). This amount may be reduced by organizational sponsorship, fundraising, and scholarships. The availability of scholarships will depend on the number of delegates who commit to go.

To download an application for the delegation, click here [2].

To read an article about last year's delegation click here [3].

To see more pictures of the March 08 Youth Arts and Action delegation to Colombia, click here [4]

FOR Task Force on Latin America and the Caribbean
369 15th Street, Oakland, CA 94612
Tel: 510-763-1403