Juan Manuel Santos

Santos was born on August 10, 1951, in Bogotá, Colombia. His family long ran El Tiempo, a leading Colombian newspaper, and his great-uncle Eduardo Santos was president of Colombia in the late 1930s.⁠[1][2]

He attended Colegio San Carlos in Bogotá, completed his secondary education at the naval school in Cartagena, graduating as a naval cadet, and then earned a degree in business and economics from the University of Kansas in the United States. He went on to further studies at the London School of EconomicsLondon School of Economics and Political ScienceThe London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) is a specialist social science university in central London, founded in 1895 by members of the Fabian Society. It is known for research in economics, politics and social policy, and its alumni and staff include many Nobel laureates and national leaders.Open the full entry (1973–1974) and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, and, as a Fulbright scholar, earned a master’s degree in public administration from Harvard UniversityHarvard UniversityHarvard University is a private research university in Massachusetts, established by the Massachusetts Bay Colony legislature in 1636 and named in 1639 for early benefactor John Harvard. Its principal campuses are in Cambridge and the Allston and Longwood neighborhoods of Boston. It includes Harvard College, graduate and professional schools, and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. Two governing boards share oversight. Alan M. Garber was president as of October 2026, and the endowment stood at $56.9 billion at the end of fiscal 2025.Open the full entry’s Kennedy School of Government (1981).⁠[3][4][4]

After graduating from university, Santos was recruited by the National Federation of Coffee Growers of Colombia and went to London as head of Colombia’s delegation to the International Coffee Organization. He worked in London for nine years, taking part in several rounds of negotiations that favored Colombia’s position as a coffee exporter.⁠[3][5][4][3]

In 1981, Santos returned to Colombia to become deputy director (subdirector) of El Tiempo; from 1983 he also chaired the newspaper’s editorial board and wrote columns for it.⁠[3][3][4]

In 1985, Santos won the King of Spain International Journalism Award (print category) for Crónicas de Nicaragua, a series of reports exposing corruption in Nicaragua’s Sandinista revolution, and received the award that October in San Juan, Puerto Rico; that same year he was elected vice chair of the Inter American Press Association (SIP) Committee on Freedom of the Press.⁠[4][3][3][3]

From 1987 to 1988, Santos was a Nieman Fellow in journalism at Harvard University.⁠[4]

In April 1991, Santos joined the government of César Gaviria as minister of the newly created Ministry of Foreign Trade, becoming Colombia’s first trade minister; from January 1, 1992, he gave up all his management and editorial positions at El Tiempo. In office, he promoted economic opening, negotiated trade agreements with several Latin American countries and began building ties with Asia, and he also presided over the eighth United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, held in Cartagena in February 1992.⁠[4][3][2][3][3]

On August 11, 1993, a plenary session of the Colombian Congress elected Santos presidential designate (designado a la Presidencia). In the absence of a vice presidency, this position could exercise presidential powers when the president was absent; Colombia’s constitution later replaced the position with a vice president, making him the last presidential designate. His term as minister of foreign trade lasted until the end of the Gaviria government in August 1994.⁠[3][3][2][3]

In September 1994, Santos launched the Good Government Foundation (Fundación Buen Gobierno), which conducts research on public administration; the foundation promoted the “Third Way” ideas he had learned from the British sociologist Anthony Giddens. The following year he joined the national leadership of the Liberal Party.⁠[3][2]

In October 1997, Santos and the novelist Gabriel García Márquez jointly proposed an initiative for peace talks between the state and guerrilla groups such as the FARC and the National Liberation Army (ELN), including the designation of a demilitarized “zone of détente and dialogue,” dialogue within the zone between the guerrillas, civil society and political parties, and the convening of a national constituent assembly. Horacio Serpa, who had by then left the government, used this to allege a “conspiracy” to overthrow President Ernesto Samper; Santos denied it, calling the initiative a “constitutional proposal to achieve peace.” On January 20, 1998, he withdrew from the Liberal Party’s primary for the 1998 presidential election.⁠[3][3][3][3][3][3][3][3]

In 1999, Santos published La Tercera Vía: una alternativa para Colombia (The Third Way: An Alternative for Colombia), advocating bringing the centrist political approach put forward by British Prime Minister Tony BlairTony BlairTony Blair is a British politician who served as prime minister from 1997 to 2007 and Labour leader from 1994 to 2007. His government pursued devolution, a national minimum wage and the Northern Ireland peace process, while its Iraq War decisions drew sustained scrutiny. After leaving office, he worked in Middle East diplomacy and policy advisory services, founding the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change, where he is executive chairman. He became an advisor to the Skydance board in October 2026.Open the full entry to Colombia; he also collaborated with Blair on the “Third Way.”⁠[3][4]

In 2000, Santos accepted President Andrés Pastrana’s appointment as minister of finance and public credit, serving until 2002. Colombia was then emerging from its first recession in nearly 70 years, with rising inflation, insufficient fiscal revenue and foreign debt approaching $40 billion; he pushed reforms of regional transfers, pensions and the tax system to stabilize public finances, and for one year chaired the board of the Andean Development Corporation (CAF).⁠[5][3][3][3]

From late 2004, Santos shifted to supporting President Álvaro Uribe. On August 31, 2005, he and his allies used the legal status of an existing party, Nuevo Partido, to form the Social Party of National Unity (Partido Social de Unidad Nacional), commonly known as the U Party; 44 members of Congress initially joined, and Santos and Óscar Iván Zuluaga served as coordinators. In the congressional elections of March 12, 2006, the U Party became the largest party in the Senate with 20 seats.⁠[3][3][3][3][4]

After his reelection, Uribe announced a cabinet reshuffle on July 11, 2006, naming Santos to replace Camilo Ospina as minister of defense; Santos took office on July 19 and served until May 2009. In office, he stepped up military operations against the FARC with the support of U.S. security assistance and advanced coca eradication under Plan Colombia.⁠[3][3][4][3][3]

On May 15, 2007, Salvatore Mancuso, a jailed former leader of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC), claimed that Santos had met with him during the Samper government and asked for “help in overthrowing” Samper. Santos denied this, saying that he had wanted Samper to leave office but always through legal means. On June 13, Congress rejected a no-confidence motion against him.⁠[3][3][3][3][3]

On March 1, 2008, the Colombian military carried out an airstrike, code-named Operation Phoenix (Operación Fénix), on a FARC camp in Ecuador’s Amazonian border region, killing Raúl Reyes, regarded as the FARC’s second-in-command, along with about 20 guerrillas and foreign nationals. Rafael Correa’s government in Ecuador immediately broke off diplomatic relations with Colombia, and Colombia’s relations with Venezuela also deteriorated. In late June 2009, an Ecuadorian judge issued a preventive arrest warrant for Santos on the grounds that, as coordinator of the operation, he bore responsibility for the death of an Ecuadorian citizen in the camp; Colombian authorities provided support to Santos.⁠[3][3][3][3]

On July 2, 2008, in a military intelligence operation, Operation Jaque (Operación Jaque), the Colombian military rescued former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, held by the FARC since 2002, along with 14 other hostages, including 11 soldiers and police officers and 3 U.S. contractors, without casualties and without a shot being fired. Days after the operation, it emerged that personnel involved in the rescue had used the Red Cross emblem as cover. In 2009, Santos published Jaque al Terror, a book recounting the operations against the FARC during his tenure.⁠[3][3][3][3][3][3]

In 2008, the “false positives” (falsos positivos) scandal came to light, in which soldiers abducted and killed civilians and then falsely reported them as guerrillas killed in combat. After a Ministry of Defense investigative commission found that 19 young men from the municipality of Soacha had been extrajudicially executed, Uribe dismissed 27 officers and noncommissioned officers on October 29 for “negligence”; six days later, Santos acknowledged that some soldiers had been involved in extrajudicial executions. Army commander Mario Montoya subsequently resigned, and some groups demanded that Santos take political responsibility and resign; Santos said the government was investigating and leaving the matter to the judiciary.⁠[3][3][3][3][3][3][3]

On May 18, 2009, Santos announced his resignation as minister of defense (effective May 23) to prepare to run in the 2010 presidential election, saying that if Uribe decided to run again he would fully support him. On February 26, 2010, the Constitutional Court ruled unconstitutional the referendum that would have paved the way for Uribe to seek a third term, and Santos then formally became the U Party’s presidential candidate.⁠[3][3][3][3][3]

In the first round of the presidential election on May 30, 2010, Santos won 46.7% of the vote, while Green Party candidate and former Bogotá mayor Antanas Mockus won 21.5%. In the runoff on June 20, Santos defeated Mockus with 69% of the vote, pledging to continue the security offensive against leftist rebels and to expand economic reforms.⁠[3][3][6][6]

On August 7, 2010, Santos was sworn in as president of Colombia. In his inaugural address, he made seeking peace through dialogue one of his top priorities, provided the other side was willing to come to the negotiating table. Before taking office, he invited the political parties to form a “National Unity” governing coalition; the Conservative Party, the Liberal Party, Radical Change and the Green Party responded, and the coalition’s lawmakers made up about 80% of Congress.⁠[3][2][3]

On August 10, 2010, three days after taking office, Santos met Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez in Santa Marta, Colombia, and announced the restoration of diplomatic relations between the two countries; that November, he reconciled with Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa during a summit of the Union of South American Nations.⁠[3][3]

On April 28, 2011, Santos and the presidents of Mexico, Chile and Peru launched a four-country “deep integration area” in Lima, the origin of the Pacific Alliance; the alliance’s framework agreement was adopted at a summit in Atacama, Chile, in June 2012. At a summit in Cartagena in February 2014, the four countries signed an additional protocol immediately liberalizing 92% of trade among them.⁠[3][3][3][4]

In June 2011, Santos signed the Victims and Land Restitution Law (Ley de Víctimas y Restitución de Tierras), providing reparations to 450,000 families displaced and affected by the armed conflict. That November, FARC top leader Alfonso Cano was killed in a military operation.⁠[3][3]

On October 12, 2011, both houses of the U.S. Congress passed the implementing legislation for the U.S.–Colombia Free Trade Agreement; the agreement took effect on May 15, 2012, and Santos called it the “most important treaty” in Colombia’s history.⁠[7][7][3]

On August 27, 2012, Santos confirmed that the government had held exploratory contacts with the FARC. On September 4, he announced that after six months of secret negotiations in Havana, the two sides had signed a General Agreement for the Termination of the Conflict on August 26, setting out a road map for peace talks; he stressed that the agreement did not involve ceding territory or halting military operations. The talks opened in Oslo on October 17 and moved to Havana on November 19. This approach departed from the previous government’s policy of defeating the FARC by military means and drew strong opposition from former President Uribe’s camp.⁠[3][3][3][3][3][3][5]

In May 2013, Colombia was invited to join the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and the accession process began on October 25.⁠[3][3]

On November 20, 2013, Santos announced that he would seek reelection. In the first round on May 25, 2014, Óscar Iván Zuluaga, the candidate of Uribe’s Democratic Center party, led him by about 3.5 percentage points with 29.3% of the vote; in the runoff on June 15, Santos defeated Zuluaga with about 51% of the vote to win reelection. During the campaign the two sides attacked each other: Uribe accused Santos before prosecutors of “receiving drug money,” while Santos accused Zuluaga of “sabotaging” the peace process.⁠[3][3][3][3][3]

On June 23, 2016, Santos and FARC top leader Timochenko (Rodrigo Londoño) signed three core agreements in Havana: on a bilateral ceasefire and the laying down of arms, on security guarantees, and on the method of ratifying the agreement. On August 25, Santos submitted the final text of the peace agreement to Congress, announced a plebiscite, and ordered the military to halt military operations against the FARC.⁠[3][3][3]

On September 26, 2016, Santos and Timochenko signed the Final Agreement for Ending the Conflict and Building a Stable and Lasting Peace in Cartagena, at a ceremony attended by 15 Latin American heads of state, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry. Critics argued that the agreement fostered impunity; Santos countered that guerrillas who had committed war crimes and crimes against humanity were explicitly excluded from the political amnesty.⁠[3][3][8][3]

On October 2, 2016, the peace agreement was rejected in a national plebiscite by 50.2% to 49.8%, a margin of fewer than 57,000 votes out of about 13 million cast. Opponents led by former President Uribe argued that the agreement appeased the FARC. In a televised address, Santos conceded defeat, saying he “will not give up,” that the ceasefire would be maintained, and that he would send negotiators back to Cuba to consult with the FARC.⁠[8][8][8][8]

On October 7, 2016, the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced that it was awarding the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize to Santos for his resolute efforts to bring to an end a civil war that had lasted more than 50 years, killed at least 220,000 people and displaced nearly 6 million; the committee said the prize was also a tribute to the Colombian people and to all the parties who had contributed to the peace process. He was the sole laureate that year and received the prize in Oslo on December 10.⁠[9][9][9][9][1][3]

After the plebiscite’s defeat, Santos launched a national dialogue. On November 24, 2016, he and Timochenko signed a revised final peace agreement containing “substantive changes” at the Teatro Colón in Bogotá; both houses of Congress approved it on November 29–30, and the agreement took effect on December 1. In 2017, the main body of the FARC gathered in 26 transition zones, handed over its weapons and demobilized, but some factions that rejected the agreement continued armed activity; peace talks with the National Liberation Army (ELN) did not produce an agreement.⁠[1][2][3][3][3]

On August 7, 2018, Santos left office at the end of his term and was succeeded by Iván Duque, the Democratic Center candidate who had won the 2018 election. That year, he founded the Compaz Foundation, dedicated to peacebuilding, environmental protection and poverty reduction, and became chair of its board, and Harvard University appointed him an Angelopoulos Global Public Leaders Fellow.⁠[3][5][4][4]

In January 2019, Santos joined The Elders, an independent group made up of former national leaders and others, taking a leading role in its work on conflict resolution and prevention and on the climate and nature crises, and briefing the UN Security Council on its behalf.⁠[5][5][5]

In June 2020, the Rockefeller Foundation announced that Santos and NBA Commissioner Adam SilverAdam SilverAdam Silver is an American sports executive and lawyer who has been commissioner of the National Basketball Association (NBA) since February 1, 2014, overseeing a sports and media organization made up of the NBA, the WNBA, the NBA G League, the NBA 2K League and the Basketball Africa League. He joined the NBA in 1992 and was deputy commissioner and chief operating officer before succeeding David Stern as commissioner; as of October 2026, he is also chair of the Duke University Board of Trustees and a trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation.Open the full entry were joining its board of trustees. Santos said that joining the board was a good way to keep working toward a sustainable and just future and to address the new challenges following the COVID-19 pandemic.⁠[10][10][10]

On June 11, 2021, Santos testified before the Truth Commission established under the peace agreement, asking forgiveness from the mothers and families of the victims of the “false positives” extrajudicial executions, some of which took place while he was minister of defense; he called them an “indelible stain on the honor of the army” and attributed them to pressure, backed by Uribe, to produce high body counts. He said that after confirming the reports were true, he ordered that inducing surrender and capture be prioritized over killing, and changed the procedures for handling combat deaths and the criteria for awarding decorations. Colombia’s transitional justice tribunal has said that at least 6,402 people were killed and falsely reported as rebels between 2002 and 2008.⁠[11][11][11][11][11][11][11]

In August 2023, Santos and former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon visited Ukraine on behalf of The Elders, meeting President Zelenskyy and visiting sites of Russian atrocities in Bucha and Irpin.⁠[5]

In November 2024, Santos was appointed chair of The Elders, and as of October 2026 he remains in the role.⁠[5][5]

During his presidency, Colombia’s marine protected areas expanded from 1.2 million hectares in 2010 to 12.8 million hectares in 2018. In 2017, Santos received the Kew International Medal from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Theodore Roosevelt conservation leadership award, and was honored by the National Geographic Society; that same year he received the Chatham House Prize.⁠[5][5][4]

He was one of the early advocates of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), formally proposing them at the Rio+20 summit in 2012; in 2016, he pushed for the UN General Assembly Special Session on the World Drug Problem (UNGASS 2016). With Nobel laureate in economics Amartya Sen, he co-founded the Multidimensional Poverty Peer Network (MPPN), launched by the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI), and he has received honorary doctorates from universities including the Sorbonne and the London School of Economics.⁠[4][4][4][4]

His books include The Battle for Peace and The Battle Against Poverty. Other positions listed in his Rockefeller Foundation trustee biography include membership of the boards of the International Crisis Group, the Wildlife Conservation Society and the Global Commission on Drug Policy, and a visiting professorship at the University of Oxford.⁠[4][4][4]

Juan Manuel Santos personal website: Official website: https://juanmanuelsantos.com/ (opens in a new window).⁠[12]

X: Public account: https://x.com/JuanManSantos (opens in a new window)⁠[12]

The Elders: Official website: https://theelders.org/ (opens in a new window).⁠[5]

The Rockefeller Foundation: Official website: https://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/ (opens in a new window).⁠[4]