Institutional development, police practice and gender politics in the Colombian National Police

Despite the increase in popularity of policing research, the Colombian National Police (CNP) has remained largely unstudied. The present study is a foundational analysis of the CNP. In order to explore that institution in all its complexity—from both a historical and a current, empirical perspective—several types of data and methods were used. Thus, the thesis integrates multiple disciplinary traditions (history, linguistics, sociology, criminology) and employs various methodologies (historiography, discourse analysis, document analysis, diachronic linguistics, amongst others). As well as an introduction, literature review and overviews of the thesis’s conceptual framework and methodology, it contains five substantive chapters. Chapter 5 discusses the semantic development of the concept of policía in Colombia as it gradually consolidated itself in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries; Chapter 6 addresses the history of the Colombian Police from before the institution’s legal consolidation in 1891 until 2020; Chapter 7 is an analysis of militarism in the CNP; Chapter 8 provides an assessment of the adoption of managerialism for the assessment and communication of institutional performance; and Chapter 9 explores perceptions of the role of women in the Colombian National Police. A final chapter draws out connecting threads and explores the ramifications of the study and possible ways forward for the Colombian police.