Julián Cortés

Julián Cortés is a Mechanical Engineer with a MSc in Development and Rural Innovation from Wageningen University, where he is currently a PhD candidate in Social Sciences in the Chair Group Sociology of Development and Change. He also belongs to the research group Agriculture, Environment and Society, AGRAS of the department of Agrarian Sciences at National University of Colombia. He was a member of the FARC- EP armed movement, political prisoner and refugee in Europe. Currently, he is member of the educational committee of Social Economies of the Common, ECOMUN (a cooperative created as a strategy for social and economic reintegration of FARC-EP ex- insurgents).

Political disenchantment by doing militant research: An autoethnography of a FARC-EP ex insurgent on the process of reintegration

The process of doing militant research has regularly been assessed in an optimistic way showing perhaps a utopian view of the aca demic work with social movements. While most of the literature shows arguments in favor of the positive impact of acting while rese arching, there are not enough accounts on the emotions that occurs among engaged researchers. This paper autoethnographically reflects on the disenchantmen t process of the militants of a Colombian revolutionary movement after the signature of the peace process by describing different situations that motivates the researcher and other scholars and militants to leave their political activity with that movement.

Affiliation: Wageningen University, Netherlands