Abstract

CHAMBERS, Paul Anthony. "Civil War by Other Means": Normative and Ideological Dimensions of Social Scientific and Historical Knowledge about the Colombian Armed Conflict. Estud. Polit. [online]. 2013, n.42, pp.37-60. ISSN 0121-5167.

The social-scientific analysis of the Colombian armed conflict has become a "civil continued war by other means", which is due to the inevitable normative and ideological dimensions of the social and human sciences. These dimensions can be seen in some historical arguments about how to characterize and explain the violences and the armed conflict in Colombia, as well as in conflicting analyses of ex-president Uribe Velez's "democratic security" policy. The article analyses the problem in light of the arguments of Alasdair MacIntyre and István Mészáros and concludes that, in order to avoid theoretical, normative and methodological arbitrariness in the social scientific and historical analysis of the Colombian conflict, it is necessary to engage the theoretical and normative bases of our analyses in systematic dialogue with moral philosophy.

Keywords : Social and Human Sciences; Colombian Armed Conflict; Ideology; Methodology; Moral Philosophy; Normative Dimensions.

        · abstract in Spanish     · text in Spanish     · Spanish ( pdf )