By Luis Armando González September 16 2020
In El Salvador September 15 commemorates the 199th anniversary of independence from Spain. Despite the time that has elapsed since then, some always see the date as a chance to reflect upon the significance of that event for our present time. Others find in this celebration motives to reclaim a diffuse patriotic feeling and one of belonging to what continues to be their country. Government authorities take advantage of the opportunity to pay the usual homage to those who were the principal figures of this achievement from which, one way or another, they began their course, a course marked by the emergence of different dynamics from those that previously obtained in what would become the Central American countries.
The current context of the country, with uncertain resolutions to the health crisis and with economic stresses for thousands of families, has blocked the celebration in the style of past years. However, to commemorate independence continues to be important, to the point where it would never conceivably occur to anyone to openly proclaim that it makes no sense to continue paying attention to the event since it belongs to the past.
With the Peace Accords, signed in 1992, exactly the opposite happened. In spite of the fact that at the time people – certainly not all people, but people from important strata of society experienced a second independence, as if it were a re-foundation of the nation of El Salvador – in spite of this there are those who without hesitating state that these documents are out of date, which is to say, that it makes no sense to continue to refer to them for institutional, political, or economic decisions that they will take, or are taking now, in our country.
In other words, something much more distant in time, like the proclamation of independence from Spain, is not put in question as a historical reference, while this is done with much more recent documents, with which, in addition to putting the end to a painful civil war, a series of proposals for institutional and political reforms were drawn up – although with a noticeable deficiency in the economic area – on the basis of which El Salvador built its basic framework of democracy. We are considering this framework which has allowed us to avoid excesses of political disorder, authoritarianism, and the abuses of power that characterized the previous decades, including the decade of the civil war.
Perhaps dealing with the Peace Accords as something out of style, or something with all its possibilities exhausted for indicating the reforms that El Salvador needs, might not be the most prudent course in a country as complex and conflict-prone as ours. We need to understand that the Peace Accords, although it may be true that they contain some procedures and action plans many of which certainly are no longer valid or appropriate, still cannot be reduced to being no more than a collection of recipes for political or institutional reform. They express the vision of a country founded in inclusion, solidarity and justice; a country organized politically in a democratic and legal framework. As a result, they establish dialogue and agreement as the preferred mechanisms for resolution of social, political, cultural, and economic conflicts. This is something more than the “spirit” of the Peace Agreements – this is woven into the fabric of their text. The concrete reforms, for example, referring to the Armed Forces or the creation of the National Civil Police are derived from this vision of reconciliation, democratic arrangement, and respect for law and human rights on the part of the State.
From this point of view, the Peace Accords are far and away much more current and vital than the proclamation of independence from Spain. From the latter, in reality, there is nothing relevant to the present moment in our country. Even the role of unifier that it could have had and which military governments exploit to the maximum has been diluted. The Peace Agreements, in what pertains to the proceedings that evolve from them, can and should be reviewed and up-dated constantly. But as a frame of construction of a more inclusive, just, cooperative, and democratic society they continue to have current value. It is not correct to confuse these two aspects or dimensions. It is incorrect to attempt to bury the Peace Agreements by advancing the idea that that the reforms and procedures set forth in these documents have been already surpassed. Nor is it correct obstinately to defend these reforms and procedures believing that by doing so the essence of the Peace Agreements is being defended.
Source: America Latina en Movimiento, translation Resumen Latinoamericano, North America bureau