Considered the father of sociology in Colombia, Orlando Fals Borda remains, a century after his birth, one of Latin America’s great references in social thought. His life invites us to reconsider the researcher’s role as a political, community-oriented, and critical actor.
In his centennial year, tributes to the Colombian intellectual continue to grow in a country still urgently needing to engage with its own sociology to build a more cohesive and inclusive nation.
A century of Orlando Fals Borda, the father of Colombian Sociology
Orlando Fals Borda was born on July 11, 1925—one hundred years ago today—in Barranquilla, the capital of the Colombian Caribbean. He pursued studies in English Literature and History at the University of Dubuque in Iowa (USA), where he graduated in 1947.
He continued his sociology education in the United States, earning a master’s degree from the University of Minnesota (1953) and a doctorate in Latin American Sociology from the University of Florida (1955).
During this period, he specialized in qualitative methodology with a rural focus: his master’s research took him in 1949 to a vereda (rural district) of Chocontá, a small rural town north of Bogotá. This experience later led to his book Campesinos de los Andes (Peasants of the Andes).
Upon returning to Colombia, he served as a consultant for the OAS in Brazil and was appointed Director General of the Ministry of Agriculture (1959–1961). In this role, he combined state administration with social commitment.
A pioneering role in the Sociology Faculty
In 1959, alongside Camilo Torres Restrepo and other intellectuals like Eduardo Umaña Luna and María Cristina Salazar, he founded Latin America’s first Faculty of Sociology at the National University of Colombia, where he served as dean until 1967.
From this academic hub, he promoted a sociology rooted in the national context, conscious of the challenges of an era marked by the La Violencia, rural migrations, and land concentration.
During this period, he also created Colombia’s first graduate program in the Sociology of Education (PLEDES), embodying a commitment to linking theory with national reality.
His most influential methodological contribution was developing the Participatory Action Research (PAR) approach, created alongside his wife, María Cristina Salazar. PAR integrates communities as active subjects of knowledge, challenging the researcher-observed dichotomy. This approach has been recognized internationally as pioneering an emancipatory sociology.
For decades, his work with rural and Afro-descendant communities—through initiatives like the Participatory Graphics fanzines on the coast—helped bridge the gap between academia and grassroots power.
His relationship with Catholic priest Camilo Torres was profound and defining. Together they created the Faculty of Sociology and maintained an intellectual bond marked by a conviction for social commitment. Fals Borda saw in Torres the example of militant knowledge, defending the notion that all science should respond to the aspirations of the majority.
In letters and speeches, he invoked concepts like telesis, phronesis, and praxis, aligning with liberation theology, to underscore the political purpose of research.
Seminal works and the intersection of violence and change
In 1962, he presented La violencia en Colombia (Violence in Colombia), a pioneering study conducted with Germán Guzmán Campos and Eduardo Umaña Luna under a governmental research commission. The intensity of its analysis, which did not shy away from confronting traditional elites, made it a historic and controversial text, with sold-out print runs and circulation even within the Army.
Following Camilo Torres’ death in 1966—who had joined the ELN as a revolutionary priest—Fals Borda published La subversión en Colombia: el cambio social en la historia (Subversion in Colombia: Social Change in History) in 1967, dedicated to his colleague’s legacy. In this essay, he abandoned the pretense of scientific neutrality to assume a political and militant role through sociology, proposing that researchers must commit to social transformation.
Throughout his career, he produced monumental works like Historia de la cuestión agraria en Colombia (History of the Agrarian Question in Colombia) (1975) and the magisterial four-volume Historia doble de la Costa (Double History of the Coast) (1979–1987), which explores identity, power, and memory in the Caribbean.
Today, his legacy extends beyond grand academic halls. His principal enduring lessons are: a Sociology of Commitment, in the sense of understanding that science is not neutral, and the researcher can—and must—ally with the populations they document without losing rigor.
Secondly, Fals Borda mapped Territoriality and Memory: His studies in Boyacá, the Caribbean Coast, or the Andes don’t merely catalog the social; they describe fabrics of identity and resistance.
He also embodied Insurgent Institutionality: His state and political trajectory—from the Ministry of Agriculture to the 1991 Constituent Assembly, via the Frente Unido, M-19, and Polo Democrático—demonstrates a praxis unifying critical thought and collective action.
Finally, Fals Borda built a bridge to future generations: His 2025 compilation, the documentary, the academic chairs, and institutions bearing his name ensure his voice resonates in academia, the community, and social movements.
2025: The Fals Borda centennial year in Colombia
Colombia and Latin America have kept Fals Borda’s legacy alive with commemorative events, publishing projects, and recognitions. Among the most prominent is a law passed by the Colombian Congress honoring his work, mandating the publication of his writings and the production of a documentary.
Furthermore, in May, a collection of his fundamental and unpublished texts—including Campesinos de los Andes, Historia doble de la Costa, and the Participatory Graphics fanzines—was inaugurated at the National Library and the National University.
Also in academia, the University of Atlántico declared 2025 the Orlando Fals Borda Year, featuring academic events, seminars, cultural competitions, and a donated sculpture facing the library that now bears his name.
Finally, at the Latin American and Caribbean Conference on Social Sciences (CLACSO), which he co-founded in 1967, a central space in Bogotá was dedicated to him this year.
In Colombia, the Camilo Torres – Fals Borda Chair remains active at the National University, incorporating his perspective into recent legislation on education for peace and critical thinking.
On this centenary, Orlando Fals Borda stands as an indispensable figure: not only for his academic output, but above all for being a weaver of collective knowledge, a sociologist who thought from the people, alongside the people, and for the people.
In a world so marked by the gap between knowledge and politics, his life offers an ethical, methodological, and political compass: to know in order to transform, to think in order to raise consciousness, to feel in order to act. Fals Borda remains a guiding light for those who believe that another Colombia—and another world—are possible through research, action, and hope.