Campaneando : Surveilling With the Dead in Bogotá’s Drug Markets

2026/07/03 by Andrés Romero
Social Sciences · #Conflict, Peace, and Violence in Colombia #Corporate governance #Crime, Illicit Activities, and Governance #Dead body #Ethnography #Latin American Literature Studies #Work (physics)

paper · doi:10.1111/aman.70101

openalex publication_date 2026/07/03 · openalex created_date 2026/07/04 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/25

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article offers a literary ethnography of one of Bogotá’s ollas or drug markets where centuries of violence ripple across the ambiance. It tells the story of the work undertaken by the campaneros , the lookouts who work for criminal governance to protect the olla , and how they cultivate collective attunements for surveilling the place. To perceive, intuit, or forebode threats, the campaneros create a sentineled structure that communicates across corners, while also drawing on drug‐induced states of paranoia, clairvoyance, or necromancy. Drawing on extended ethnographic fieldwork (2012–2018) and methods of fabulation, I propose a necromantic ethnography that, by constellating multiple sources, perspectives, forces, and voices, aims to conjure the resonating and palpable force of history and the dead across the olla .

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