Juan David Velasco Montoya

Juan David is a political scientist and an advisor to the Chief Prosecutor of the Special Jurisdiction for Peace. Much of his career has been dedicated to Colombia’s transitional justice tribunals established under the peace agreements signed by the Colombian government in 2005 and 2016 with paramilitary groups and the FARC guerrilla, respectively. Over the past decade, he has worked closely with judges and prosecutors, analysing the contextual elements of international crimes committed in Colombia. His work has focused on understanding the conditions that enabled large-scale violence, while contributing to reflections on how societies can address and repair the harm inflicted on millions of victims of the civil war.

Juan David is currently involved in legislative efforts examining the links between violence, inequality, and schooling. Together with Giovanni Álvarez, the GCPEA, Education Above All, and a representative group of legislators, he is contributing to the development of a chapter on 'attacks on education' within Colombia’s Penal Code. The initiative begins from the need to formally recognize these forms of violence, ensuring that affected children are no longer rendered invisible. It also seeks to lay the foundation for social policies aimed at repairing the long-term harm caused by ‘forced school disengagement’. Juan David is also participating in a global initiative alongside the Special Jurisdiction for Peace, Global Rights Compliance, Pontificia Universidad Javeriana, and El Colegio de México focused on preventing the recruitment and use of children and adolescents by illegal armed groups through digital platforms such as Facebook, TikTok and Telegram.

Earlier in his career, Juan David was a lecturer at Pontificia Universidad Javeriana and worked in public service. Since then, his work has moved between research, policy design, and human rights practice. He contributed to the development of Colombia’s 'provention model', an approach that brings together prevention and protection strategies. The model uses large-scale data analysis to identify risk patterns while supporting solutions designed collaboratively with affected communities, drawing on local knowledge, ancestral practices, and coordination with national and international institutions.

In 2026, Juan David will publish Elites, Power and Possible Reforms in Colombia (Bogotá: Media Pluma), co-authored with Jenny Pearce. The book proposes an original methodology for identifying and measuring elites — examining who they are, how many they are, their social characteristics, and how they transmit power across generations — through the concept of 'elite constellations'. It advances the theory of the 'Colombian singularity', which explains how Colombia has sustained macroeconomic stability and institutional continuity alongside enduring violence and deep inequality.

Juan David holds a master's degree in Political Studies from the National University of Colombia and an MSc in Inequalities and Social Science from the London School of Economics and Political Science.