¡Descarga POLITICAL PARTIES AND DEMOCRACY IN COLOMBIA y más Monografías, Ensayos en PDF de Inglés Técnico solo en Docsity! 1 English Essay Leidy Elizabeth Lozano Angulo POLITICAL PARTIES AND DEMOCRACY IN COLOMBIA Our country is in a political and democratic crisis. Political parties are currently discredited due to so much corruption to which they have been exposed and the mismanagement they have had, putting economic and personal interests before the common interests of the population. In the following text we will talk about how Colombian democracy has been affected by this problem The history of political parties in Colombia began in the 19th century. At the time of Spanish independence two groups emerged, the federalists and the centralists, both had different projects on how the country should be organized, these two movements were led by great intellectuals of the time as Camilo Torre, Jorge Tadeo (federal) and Antonio Nariño (centralists). Through time, each of these movements gave rise to the traditional political parties of our country: Liberal and Conservative. On the other hand, history tells us that the Liberal party was founded by Ezequiel Rojas in 1848, and was formed by merchants and artisans. The Conservative party was created in 1837 by Mariano Ospina Rodríguez and José Eusebio Caro, to this party belonged the bureaucrats or upper class people of the time, such as landowners, high ranking military and members of the church. Therefore, we could say that our country lived in a two-party political system. Before starting to talk about the crisis of the political parties, I would like to define what a political party is: ''Political parties are understood as entities of public interest created to promote the participation of citizens in democratic life and to contribute to the integration of national representation; those who form them share objectives, interests, visions of reality, principles, values and projects to be executed totally or partially in democratic governments of countries. They are in charge of presenting candidacies to occupy different political positions'' Wikipedia Currently, the traditional political parties and the new ones that have emerged, along with democracy in our country, are going through a crisis. The question then arises, what is the reason for this? We can say that many politicians belonging to these parties have moved away from their raison d'être, 2 English Essay Leidy Elizabeth Lozano Angulo have left aside the citizens who elect them to represent their interests and have focused on personal interests or those of a select group, and have been influenced by the corruption that exists today in our country. Today voters are very skeptical of public servants and politicians. Another aspect that I believe has been one of the causes of this crisis is corruption, many people use their political power to obtain economic benefits, perform illegal actions, benefit a group of ''acquaintances'' or as they say, move levers to grant a position or benefits. All these reasons not only affect the political sector but the population in general, as it leads to many other things such as social inequality, violence, crime, among other things. Finally, we can say that this crisis is due to internal mismanagement given by those belonging to each of the political parties in Colombia and many people who only aspire to X or Y party to obtain a political office benefits on a personal level without thinking about the community or population that elected them to represent them. Today, this political problem has generated consequences in all sectors. One of the main consequences has been the weakening of political parties, this has led to the formation of coalitions at election time to elect x or y candidates and to reach a public office, another consequence is the lack of credibility of these (politicians, authorities and institutions) in front of the voters, this has led many people to decide not to exercise their right to vote, because they think it is a waste of time. For example, in my town many people say ''why vote if in the end the politicians only come to power to steal and not fulfill their promises. '' For these reasons I believe that alternatives should be generalized to generate a change in our democracy Colombian democracy and politics need a reform. As a citizen and future professional I believe that we must bet on a change to the political system of our country, and also a change of mentality towards voters, I think this is a possible alternative to solve this crisis, I think that as voters I must be responsible when choosing our leaders and politicians. Confidence must also be generated in the electoral process and in the institutions in charge, so that many people can make use of their right to vote, also politicians must be honest and look out for the good of the people who have elected them,
