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The purpose of this paper is to determine the basis for a management agenda for the Tolima Coffee Cultural Landscape (CCLT) in Colombia. To this end, a delimitation model has been developed. However, the approach taken to institute the agenda of the CCLT, as a comprehensive academic and policy-based theme, is based on the formulation of a social agenda that supports its construction.

A theoretical framework is proposed that addresses the sociocultural complexities of the Tolima cultural landscape. This is based on an ethnohistorical approach that elucidates the development of this landscape as a collective construction of pre-Hispanic origin. Therefore, this investigation has been perceived through the theoretical and conceptual framework of the cultural landscape concept and the unique historical and cultural phenomenon that help to define all landscapes. More specifically, the authors have demonstrated the close links that exist between nature and culture, requiring increasingly accurate methods in order to adapt the landscape definition to the specific Latin American context, rather than adhering to the institutional framework proposed by UNESCO.

The assessment methods currently in use support the interpretation of a set of qualitative and quantitative attributes inherent to the Tolima region. However, additional methods still remain similar to those of the Coffee Cultural Landscape of Colombia (CCLC) that has already been inscribed on UNESCO's World Heritage List. The CCLC is considered to be a representative landscape—or “type” landscape—that “mirrors” the CCLT. Taken as a whole, this theoretical construction combined with the official designation allows local communities to understand the spatial phenomena of the CCLT. This will have the effect of enabling communities at all levels, from local government to landholders and farmers, to authorize its existence and allow for its continuing development and governance. The additional approval for further academic research, combined with the totality of these elements, also has the added effect of empowering communities, their economic future and their cultural interests.

The management agenda that the authors are proposing may form the beginning of regional policy initiatives that reflect a positive strategy for highlighting the value of cultural heritage, thereby ensuring the protection of cultural properties and landscapes and allowing for a more sustainable environment and livelihood for its occupants.

This paper aims to assess whether governance processes that are taking place in the Chinchiná River basin, a coffee culture region in the Andean region of Colombia, are adaptive to climate variability and climate extremes.

A mixed research method was used by reviewing secondary research sources surrounding the institutional governance system of water governance and disaster response and semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted with producers and members of organizations within the institutional governance system.

This study found that there is a low response to extreme events. Hopefully, the growing national awareness and activity in relation to climate change and disaster will improve response and be downscaled into these communities in the future. Although, some learning has occurred at the national government level and by agricultural producers who are adapting practices, to date no government institution has facilitated social learning taking into account conflict, power and tactics of domination.

This paper improves the understanding of the vulnerability of rural agricultural communities to shifts in climate variability. It also points out the importance of governance institutions in enhancing agricultural producer adaptive capacity.

Colombia has one of the highest levels of inequality in landholding in the world. This inequality has persisted in spite of numerous state-led land reform efforts, which leads to the question: why has it been so difficult to reverse unequal land distribution in Colombia? To answer this question, the chapter examines the role of the state, non-state armed groups, land inequality, land reform efforts, and a history of violence to reveal the relationship between land, inequality and violence in Colombia. This chapter explores the nature of this relationship to understand Colombia’s enduring inequality and to inform theoretical approaches to statehood and power. Rather than reducing state capacity to common Weberian binary constructions of state and statelessness, I explore how state capacity takes on different forms in different regions of Colombia – analyzing how various actors shape land inequality and violence across the territory. Using a comprehensive longitudinal panel data set of displaced persons, I use a negative binomial regression model to demonstrate how land reform, land inequality, and a history of violence have directly affected current displacement of citizens. I argue that several constellations of powerful social actors have at various points converged to control land, through non-state armed groups, to exert a local form of logistical control outside the scope of the federal state, deeply affecting the dynamics violence across different territories. These groups have subsequently engaged in a land grabbing process that has resulted in a reverse form of land reform – leading to persisting inequality in Colombia.

This chapter is intended to present the onset, evolution, and decline of Compañía Minera El Zancudo, considered the largest Colombian company in the nineteenth century. Additionally, the chapter will examine its role in both the development of manufacturing industries and the introduction of modern capitalism in the country.

The case is based on secondary information collected according to a documentary research method in which the authors selected, categorized, interpreted, and confronted different sources concerning El Zancudo.

The inception and evolution of El Zancudo involved local and foreign knowledge, techniques, and capital investments that contributed to the company growing to the point of reaching the unprecedented figure of 1,350 workers in the year 1890. Its transition from a failed local mine to a prosperous and intricate business group is full of referrals and links to foreign investment, knowledge transfer, industrial development, and an orientation toward entrepreneurship that contributed to the understanding of subsequent enterprises not only in the Antioquia region but also across the entire country.

This case study was written using limited reliable secondary sources about El Zancudo. Other significant Colombian companies in the nineteenth century (Ferrería de Pacho, Ferrería de Amagá, Empresa Textilera de Samacá, and Cervecería Bavaria) and their links to El Zancudo were mentioned but not deeply analyzed in this chapter.

The clear-cut causes that led El Zacudo to close its operations within the first decades of the twentieth century are worthy of discussion, not only by scholars and business practitioners, but also by policy makers in order to understand the phenomenon and possibly prevent existing companies from failing in a similar manner.

This case brings together the scattered literature on El Zancudo and analyzes the drivers and consequences of both its rise and fall, taking into consideration the specific historical, political, and economic contexts, furthermore, it establishes some linkages between this case and other companies under similar situations.

The purpose of this research is to study the Colombian avocado export industry, identify key insights associated with creating and sustaining the avocado value chain, and to understand the impact of the public policies affecting this industry.

The approach consists of two case studies to shed light on the opportunities and challenges of developing a sustainable avocado value chain in Colombia. One case deals with a vertically integrated business (Arcángel Miguel) while the other focuses on an association of small growers (Asohass). The analysis was informed by a series of interviews with key actors along the avocado supply chain to uncover the business strategies to move avocados to destination markets. The authors compare and contrast approaches to business development, international expansion, and role of public policies.

The authors found that the strategies followed by these organizations differ in means but aim for the same objective: maximize profits, improve environmental performance, and enhance the social wellbeing of growers. The authors found that each type of business model requires distinct public policies to succeed and different strategies to appropriately allocate efforts. The findings are relevant to other high-value crops and other Latin American countries with similar geographical and social characteristics.

These insights underscore the need of public policies tailored to the specific needs of the different actors in the value chain. The current emphasis on certifications and export markets works well for large agribusinesses, but smallholder growers need policies tailored to new investments in physical, human, and social capital.

This study contributes to the literature on avocado value chains in Latin America, emphasizing the challenges faced by the emergent Colombia avocado sector, a country that only began exporting this commodity in 2010.

The purpose of this paper is to study the effect that weak enforceability of property rights has on the human resource practices of firms operating in hostile business environment.

This paper questions the role of the state as the only provider of stability and guarantor of property rights and hypothesizes that it is not governments, which tend to be weak in weak institutional settings, but private firms that act as the main force behind the protection of entrepreneurial investments. The approach consists in developing a case study about a farm (Hacienda Gavilanes) in rural Colombia.

It is found that incentives together with inclusive human resources practices and empowerment are among those strategic arrangements that contribute most to the survival and sustainability of the farm today in a setting where legal enforceability is precarious. The replication of this policy might not be easy, however, because it requires a profound shift in the way landowners perceive workers in rural Colombia and many other parts of the world.

The case presented in this paper provides valuable lessons beyond Latin America for other developing countries with similarly fragile governments and economic environments.

Wicked problems are causally complex, lack definite solutions, and re-emerge in different guises. This paper discusses how new ways of organizing emerge to tackle changing manifestations of wicked problems. Focusing on the wicked problem of poverty, we conducted a longitudinal study of Fe y Alegria (FyA), one of the world’s largest non-governmental organization, which provides education for the poor across 21 countries in Latin America and Africa. Drawing on archival and ethnographic data, we trace the historical narratives of how FyA defined poverty as a problem and developed new ways of organizing, from its foundation by a Jesuit priest in 1955 to its current networked structure. Our findings reveal the ongoing cycle of interpretive problem definition and organizing solutions for wicked problems. First, since there is no “true” formulation of a wicked problem, actors construct narrative explanations based on their understanding of the problem. Second, organizational solutions to a wicked problem are thus reflections of these narrative constructions. Third, emerging and changing narratives about what the problem is inspire new organizational responses. Our findings provide insights into the dynamic relationship between organizing for wicked problems, narratives, and the changing manifestations of wicked problems and grand challenges more broadly.

This chapter reviews Colombia's unique environmental and social features and Colombia's realities in the third decade of the twenty-first century. It is crucial to understand the country's recent past and to take its structural and historic struggles into account when building sustainable futures.

This chapter also reports the findings of a primary data research study using futures scenario methodologies. The study participants represent different stakeholders' visions of four alternative futures regarding the climate crisis and massive biodiversity loss and social and economic crises.

This chapter's empirical study identifies Colombia's constraints to building a future that is just, inclusive and centred on nature. In addition, we describe in detail the structural changes needed for Colombia to achieve the best possible future scenario (socioeconomic prosperity and resilience to climate change). Finally, this chapter offers conclusions and recommendations.