Breaking Infrastructure: Acts of Sabotage Against Privatization in Colombia

• In Event: 50460 - Section on Comparative-Historical Sociology Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 5: Contentious Politics

Abstract

From a state-centered perspective, sabotage has often been viewed as a destructive force driven by irrational individuals. However, scholars such as E.P. Thompson, Eric Hobsbawm, and more recently Timothy Mitchell and Andreas Malm, have highlighted the political motivations behind these tactics and the efforts to create alternative futures through disruptive actions. This article examines the opposition to the privatization of the state-owned telecommunications company in Colombia during the early 1990s, arguing that sabotage can be a tool to effect change in policymaking. Drawing from infrastructure studies, political economy, and sociology and history of development, the article discusses the 1992 attempt to privatize Colombia’s Empresa Nacional de Telecomunicaciones (Telecom) and how it prompted a response from below, conceptualized here as a strategy of ‘collective bargaining by sabotage.’ Through a national strike that halted communications for seven days, the labor movement executed a ‘techno-political’ strategy that successfully delayed the privatization of this state-owned company for a few years (it ultimately closed in 2003). The article delves into this narrative in neoliberal Colombia through archival research, testimonies from former workers, and secondary sources. It emphasizes the importance of investigating local instances of infrastructure sabotage, revealing its unique conceptual histories and diverse responses across national contexts. Furthermore, it underscores the political implications of sabotage, suggesting that it is not merely a destructive tactic but rather has positive and tangible effects: it can reshape public policies, politicize society, or raise awareness about state issues. As such, the article underlines the shifting relationships between technology, politics, and economic orders, how labor movements influence development and change, and how workers reshape, resist, or adopt novel management technologies. This article seeks to understand the uneven neoliberal transition of the recent past and reflect on our current situation, where the state's commons face attacks from a radicalized far-right.

Author

• Julián Gómez-Delgado, New School For Social Research