Swimming Against The Tide: Youth policy and contexts of chronic violence in Medellin

The violence that erupted in Medellín in the late 1980s provoked a number of responses from the state and numerous civil society organisations. The 1990s saw a boom in civil society activism and municipal initiatives in response to this violence. Another response concerned punitive ‘securitisation’: the police and army --‐ often in collusion with paramilitary groups --‐ were deployed to pacify the most violent precincts of the city. These ‘securitisation’ processes have been counterproductive, compounding criminal structures and chronic violence in Medellín. In this context civil society organisations and the emergence of municipal youth policies have struggled to reduce youth violence or challenge the power of gangs in poor neighbourhoods, hence the title of this chapter Swimming Against the Tide.