Aníbal Gálvez Rivas
and Ricardo Aaron
Verona Badajoz
b.
12 MARCH 1981
16 JULY 1984
Researchers,
Instituto de Defensa Legal
LIMA, PERU
THE VOLUNTEERS
groups exist to this day, new issues have appeared. The government’s focus on macroeconomic
growth, to the exclusion of poverty alleviation, has given rise to
new social conflicts. As a result,
today’s generation is interested
in economic and social development. We are focused on improving the quality of life for
the most vulnerable of our fellow citizens. And our energies
and concerns have led to the creation of development-oriented
organizations, such as Minkando
(a Lima-based organization of
students and young professionals that focuses on youth and
adolescent development) and
Un Techo Para Mi País (an organization founded in Chile that
arranges the construction of
inexpensive homes for under-served communities).
Not only do the priorities of
today’s generation differ from
those of previous ones, so do
the political and ideological cir-
OUNG social activists are playing a newrolein
Peru today. The previous generation of young Peruvians defined
their priorities differently in response to the violence of the
1980s. Terrorist groups such as
Sendero Luminoso and the
Movimiento Revolucionario Tupac Am-aru (MRTA) provoked heavy state
repression, especially in the rural Andes and the Amazon. As a
result, youth movements at the
time focused on human rights
advocacy. Young professionals
created NGOs such as the
Instituto de Defensa Legal (IDL) and
the Asociación Pro Derechos Humanos (Aprode) and were instrumental in the subsequent
creation of the NGO La Coordina-dora Nacional de Derechos Humanos (CNDDHH) that has served
as an umbrella group for dozens
of human rights NGOs.
Our national landscape has
changed. Although many of
those human rights advocacy
