Vigilante justice in Colombia: An analysis from the concepts of anger and transitional anger

Abstract

Vigilante justice in Colombia has been considered in the news in recent years and has the potential to become a considerable social issue. Why a normal person would consider that the answer to a crime is to commit another crime? This article wants to explain that the high impunity perception and the distrust in institutions lead the citizens to weariness, frustration and, finally, anger, emotion that triggers that kind of reactions; and propose that a viable way to interrupt this spiral of violence is to try to focus that anger in the pursuit of integral solutions instead of focussing it in the satisfaction of a desire of personal retribution.