We bid farewell to Víctor Manuel Moncayo (1942 –2026)

From the Working Group Critical legal thinking and anti-systemic struggles We join in the sadness at his passing and in recognizing the life and work of Víctor Manuel Moncayo Cruz, Colombian jurist and critical intellectual: one of the essential ones.

Professor Moncayo studied Law at the National University of Colombia and held postgraduate degrees in Political Science from the Catholic University of Louvain. He served as Dean of the Faculty of Law, Political Science, and Social Sciences at the National University of Colombia; Rector of this institution from 1997 to 2003; and, since 2024, as the representative of the National Council for Higher Education (CESU) to the University Superior Council (CSU) of this alma mater.

His contributions to the critique of modern law and the state, as part of a broader critique of the existing social order; his advocacy for public higher education; his concern for a political solution to the armed conflict and the construction of a stable and lasting peace; and his analyses of capitalism, U.S. imperialism, human rights, and democracy, among other topics, were reflected in books and book chapters, countless articles, and numerous lectures, talks, and presentations, as well as in his leadership, involvement, and support of study groups, research centers, NGOs, and working groups, and in his constant presence in response to the demands for support from organizational, social, grassroots, youth, and student movements. For, as José Carlos Mariátegui said in 1923, for our comrade Víctor Manuel Moncayo, “the duty of intelligence is a revolutionary duty.”

April 20th 2026
CLACSO Working Group on Critical Legal Thought and Anti-Systemic Struggles

This text expresses the position of the aforementioned Working Group and not necessarily that of the centers and institutions that make up the CLACSO international network, its Steering Committee or its Executive Secretariat.