By Marcial A. G. Suarez, Luís Antônio Francisco de Souza, Carlos Henrique Aguiar Serra

This paper discusses the deadly use of violence as a public security agenda, focusing on police lethality and military interventions. Through a literature review to understanding concepts – such as “war,” for example – used in public security policy agendas, the study seeks to frame the notion of political violence, mainly referring to the policies designed to combat violence in Brazil. The objective is to problematize the public security policy based on the idea of confrontation, which adopts the logic of war and the notion of “enemy”. The paper is divided into three parts. The first is a conceptual approach to violence and war, and the second is the analysis of the dynamic of deadly use of force. Finally, the third part is a contextual analysis of violence in Rio de Janeiro, its characteristics, and central actors, using official statistics on violence in the region.

Brazil: Oñati Socio-Legal Series, 2021. 22p.

By Karamoja–Turkana and the Community Research Team 

Ipoln the Karamoja and Turkana border regions of Uganda and Kenya, there is widespread violence including armed robbery, rape, and human rights abuses, yet community complaints about failures of governance remain largely unaddressed. This Policy Briefing highlights how different insecurities reinforce one another in ways exacerbated by the international border. It stresses the need for fulfilment of the two governments’ commitments to cross-border solutions, and suggests that international policy actors can help communities gain leverage with governments towards building trustworthy and effective peace and security institutions.

IDS Policy Briefing 214,

Brighton, UK: Institute of Development Studies, 2023. 4p.

By Patrick Naef

This article provides a picture of the political economy of tourism and violence in Medellín. It analyses the way criminal actors and tourism entrepreneurs share a territory, by shedding light on the extortion of tour guides, street performers and business owners in some of its barrios populares (poor neighbourhoods). The main objective is to demonstrate how intimate relationships – between and among kin, friends, long-term acquaintances – impact what is considered the criminal governance of tourism. This contribution shows that extortion in Medellín meets only limited resistance from tourism entrepreneurs. It also emphasises how criminals, tourism actors and tourists themselves contribute to the creation of fragile secured spaces in the developing tourist-scapes of Colombia's second city.

Journal of Latin American Studies (2023), 55, 323–348

Edited by Nils Duquet  

This report contains the 7 country studies  – Belgium, Estonia, the Netherlands, Poland, Serbia, Spain and Sweden –  that were undertaken as part of the second phase of project TARGET. While the reader will be able to observe interesting similarities between the situations in these countries, it is clear that gun violence in Europe is not a homogenous phenomenon.

In the first phase of Project TARGET quantitative and qualitative data on gun violence and firearm trafficking was collected in 34 European countries (27 Member States of the European Union, the United Kingdom, and six countries in the Western Balkans). In a second phase, dedicated research teams analysed the situation in seven European countries in depth. The results of the comparative analysis of all the data collected during the different phases of Project TARGET were published in the report Targeting gun violence and trafficking in Europe that was published by the Flemish Peace Institute in December 2021.

This project was coordinated by the Flemish Peace Institute and cofunded by the European Union. The research partners in this project were Leiden University, Arquebus Solutions, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn, and the Victimology Society of Serbia. The project was supported by Europol, the Dutch National Police, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the South Eastern and Eastern Europe Clearinghouse for the Control of Small Arms and Light Weapons (UNDP’s SEESAC) and the European Centre for Drugs and Drugs Addiction (EMCDDA).

Firearm trafficking and gun violence go hand in hand in Europe. An important reason for this is that criminals generally do not have access to legally-held firearms and thus need to resort to illicit gun markets – either locally or internationally - to acquire firearms. Yet, while all European countries are confronted with a certain degree of firearm trafficking, the levels of gun violence and the availability of firearms on criminal markets differ substantially across Europe. In recent years firearm trafficking has fuelled criminal gun violence and even terrorism in several European countries, but other countries seem to be much less affected. This book contains chapters on gun violence and firearm trafficking in seven different European countries: Belgium, Estonia, the Netherlands, Poland, Serbia, Spain and Sweden. While the reader will be able to observe interesting similarities between the situations in these countries, it is clear that gun violence in Europe is not a homogenous phenomenon. The country-specific analyses in this book were undertaken as part of Project TARGET, a large-scale research project on the linkages between gun violence and firearm trafficking in Europe. This project was coordinated by the Flemish Peace Institute, an independent research institute affiliated to the Flemish Parliament (Belgium), and cofunded by the European Union’s Internal Security Fund. The research partners in this project were Leiden University, Arquebus Solutions, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn, and the Victimology Society of Serbia. The project was supported by Europol, the Dutch National Police, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the South Eastern and Eastern Europe Clearinghouse for the Control of Small Arms and Light Weapons (UNDP’s SEESAC) and the European Centre for Drugs and Drugs Addiction (EMCDDA). In the first phase of Project TARGET quantitative and qualitative data on gun violence and firearm trafficking was collected in 34 European countries (27 Member States of the European Union, the United Kingdom, and six countries in the Western Balkans). In a second phase, dedicated research teams analysed the situation in seven European countries in depth. This is done in an attempt to describe the dynamics of gun violence, firearm trafficking and the possible linkages between both phenomena. In a third phase various interviews were undertaken to complement the collected data. The results of the comparative analysis of all the data collected during the different phases of Project TARGET were published in the report “Targeting gun violence and trafficking in Europe” that was published by the Flemish Peace Institute in December 2021. This book  contains the country studies that were undertaken as part of the second phase of the project. The first chapter of this book focuses on Belgium, a European country that is traditionally known for its history and passion for firearms. Although no reliable estimates of the illegal firearms possession rate in Belgium exist, law enforcement agencies in the country believe the availability of firearms on the criminal market has increased in recent years. Belgium has a reputation as a hotspot for illicit firearm trafficking in Europe, with criminal demand driven by drugs traffickers and armed robbers. Yet, different types of criminals tend to possess and use different types of firearms in Belgium. While armed robbers tend to use handguns, including blank firing weapons and modified firearms to threaten their victims, drugs criminals more often use their firearms in shootings. Military-grade firearms - very often smuggled conflict legacy weapons from the Western Balkans but also reactivated firearms - are more often used in the drugs context than in other criminal contexts. These types of weapons have also ended up in the hands of terrorists after being trafficked via Belgium. While clear linkages can be observed between firearm trafficking and criminal and terrorist violence, the impact of firearm trafficking on domestic violence is quite limited since this type of violence is generally carried out with firearms that are available to the perpetrator at that time, including legally-held firearms and ‘non-regularized’ firearms that are not trafficked. In Estonia, the focus of the second chapter of this book, firearm trafficking and gun violence are rather rare phenomena, and a clear-cut connection between them has not been observed in recent years. While both phenomena were significant security problems in Estonia in the decade after the country regained its independence from the Soviet regime, this is no longer the case. Firearm trafficking is quite limited and often involves the reactivation of firearms. Organised crime groups are not frequently involved in firearm trafficking; it is mainly carried out by opportunistic individuals on an ad hoc basis. Criminal gun violence is rather exceptional since the use of firearms by criminals is marginal. Incidents of gun violence largely occur in the family context and involve the consumption of alcohol. The perpetrators in such incidents are generally not criminals and lack access to trafficked firearms. Unsurprisingly, almost 40% of the firearms homicides are committed with a legally-held firearms. The other firearm homicides were committed with an illegally-held firearm, but these firearms are generally not trafficked weapons. Instead, often non-regularised firearms, which have been held illegally since the Second World War or since the proliferation of firearms after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s are being used. The third chapter of this book analyses gun violence and firearm trafficking in The Netherlands. Like in Belgium, a strong nexus between firearm trafficking and drugrelated criminal violence can be observed in The Netherlands. The very lucrative character of cocaine-trafficking, but also the presence of synthetic drug production and trafficking in the country, has increased criminal demand for firearms and boosted firearm trafficking, including in military-grade firearms. This has fuelled violent competition between organised crime groups, resulted in an arms race between criminals and boosted shootings in the criminal milieu. This criminal gun violence has also spilled over to other parts of society with recent high-profile shootings of a lawyer and a crime journalist. Over the years, The Netherlands has become an important destination and transit country for the various types of firearm trafficking in Europe, including the smuggling of conflict legacy weapons from the Western Balkans and reactivated firearms from Slovakia. The fourth chapter of this book focuses on Poland, which has one of the lowest firearms homicide rates in Europe. The low level of gun violence in the country is strongly connected to the low levels of firearm trafficking and the low criminal demand for firearms in the country. Yet, like in Estonia, this was not always the case: after the collapse of the Soviet Union, firearm trafficking increased substantially with emerging criminal groups fighting each other for control over lucrative criminal markets. Since the mid-1990s the number of firearms seizures increased and reached its peak around 2000, with a significant portion of the firearms being smuggled into the country from Czechia and Slovakia. Although firearms seizures have gradually decreased afterwards, these two countries can still be considered key source countries. Poland has also become more of a transit country than a destination country with regard to firearm trafficking. In recent years the number of firearm seizures at the border has increased strongly. Especially firearm trafficking at the border with Ukraine has become a key concern for Polish law enforcement agencies, who warn about the future risk for increased trafficking in conflict-legacy weapons from Ukraine. In the fifth chapter gun violence and firearm trafficking in Serbia are analysed. Serbia is characterised by a high rate of both legal as well as illegal firearms possession, resulting from a cultural and historical tradition of firearms possession and production, and from its recent history of armed conflict and political instability. Firearms possession is dominated by young and middle-aged men and largely motivated by tradition, hunting and self-defence. Although the scope of illicit firearm possession is difficult to estimate, this possession is widely believed to be significant. The armed conflicts in the region have fuelled gun violence within Serbia and in other European countries. During these armed conflicts large amounts of firearms have ended up in the hands of civilians, where many of them have stayed for numerous years. An unknown share of these conflict legacy weapons have in recent decades, however, also been smuggled to other parts of Europe, where they are being used in the criminal milieu. Illegally-held conflict legacy firearms are not only trafficked out of the country, but also used by criminals – especially armed robbers – within the country. Gun violence in Serbia is mainly a ‘male phenomenon’ with male perpetrators and victims, with the exception of gun violence in a family context in which most victims are women. Gun violence in this context also tends to be far more lethal than in the criminal context and, like in other countries, frequently involve legally-held firearms. The sixth chapter of this book focuses on Spain, where the scope of both lethal and non-lethal gun violence has strongly decreased over the years. Yet, in the southern part of Spain gun violence, strongly connected to drug trafficking, is a significant security issue. Criminal gun violence in Spain mainly consists of (often lethal) incidents related to score-settling between crime groups involved in drug trafficking and the (generally non-lethal) use of firearms in armed robberies. In the criminal milieu especially handguns are used. The criminal acquisition of these firearms is clearly linked to international firearm trafficking, and especially the trafficking in reactivated and converted firearms. While high-level criminal groups, especially those in the south of the country, tend to have access to wide range of firearms, including automatic rifles, lower-end criminals tend to rely on lesser quality firearms. Domestic gun violence on the other hand, is not clearly linked to firearm trafficking. In such incidents of gun violence especially long guns are used, which are believed to be mainly legally held. In the final chapter the situation in Sweden is analysed. Gun violence in Sweden has increased dramatically in the last decade and this evolution is strongly connected to firearm trafficking. Increased firearm trafficking into the country has led to a greater supply of firearms in general but also automatic firearms in particular. For a long time, most of the firearms trafficked into Sweden came from the Western Balkans. Yet, since the mid-2010s the supply of firearms diversified with, next to the steady supply of firearms from the Balkans, also the increased supply of reactivated firearms and (converted) blank firing weapons. This diversification has opened up new pathways for criminals to access firearms, which in turn lowered the threshold for gun violence especially by younger criminals. As a result, the profile of gun violence in the country in recent decades has shifted away from incidents in the family context, which tend to take place in private settings and often involve legally-held firearms, towards more incidents in the criminal context, which generally take place in public settings and involve illegally-held firearms. Resorting to gun violence has become an established norm in the criminal milieu in Sweden and has, in turn, boosted firearm trafficking since criminal groups are now often involved in a miniature arms race. Consequently, Sweden has become one of the most important hotspots for gun violence in Europe. In a global perspective, levels of gun violence and firearm trafficking in Europe can be considered relatively low. Yet, both phenomena continue to have serious security implications in Europe. Policy initiatives to prevent gun violence and combat firearm trafficking are hindered by the lack of a clear intelligence picture. With this book we aim to contribute to a better understanding of the dynamics of both gun violence and firearms trafficking across Europe, and to a better understanding of the dynamics between these two phenomena. Even in a region with relatively low levels of gun violence and firearm trafficking, the lack of a sound understanding of these phenomena can have far-reaching consequences for peace and security in our societies

Brussels: Flemish Peace Institute, 2022. 444p

Sergi, Anna and Storti, Luca

This paper, which is the introduction to this special issue on ‘Spaces of Organised Crime’, aims to analyse the nexus between organised crime groups and territories. Such groups are able to exploit resources that circulate within territorial contexts in which they are embedded. They also operate concretely as entities that can take part to the transformation of spaces into places. Accordingly, we will lay out an analytical model about the processes through which organised crime groups contribute to create and shape territories. We show how these processes link with the main types of organised crime groups on a diferentiated basis. In the last section of this introduction, we present the papers included in the special issue and the logic connecting them to one another.

Shaping space. A conceptual framework on the connections between organised crime groups and territories. Trends in Organized Crime, 24 (2). (2021) pp. 137-151

Sergi, Anna

This article will present the results of a qualitative research into organised crime in the port of Genoa, Italy’s largest port, by looking at the challenges of policing the port space. Through the case of Genoa, the paper reflects on how organised crime manifests across three trajectories in seaports: trafficking through the port, infiltration in the port economy and governance of the port management. This paper argues that the space and geography of the port-city relationship are key to understand how and to what extent different organised criminal groups act in and around the port and within global drives. An integrated approach between urban criminology and organised crime studies is needed to better map the very complex picture of organised criminality in the port within the city.

Policing the port, watching the city. Manifestations of organised crime in the port of Genoa. Policing and Society, 31 (6). (2021) pp. 639-655.

Sergi, Anna and Vannucci, Alberto

This paper wishes to explore some characteristics of the relevant interconnections between mafias/ mafiosi and masonic lodges/masons in the Italian context. The paper sets out to study these interconnections from a social science perspective rooted in sociological and neo-institutional studies of organised crime and mafias, but also in criminological approaches to social constructionism, in the form of symbols and narratives. We will present a case study to reflect on the roles that (deviant) masons can assume in contexts where both mafias’ and personal, political, or economic interests are at play. The case study shows how masonic alliances can augment networking and enforcing capabilities: we call this process masonic deviance amplification. Additionally, the case study confirms the constitutive power that narratives around the masonic world hold today in the Italian context.

The Secret Nexus. A case study of deviant masons, mafia, and corruption in Italy. The British Journal of Criminology, 63 (5). (2022) pp. 1165-1183.

By Clio Andris, Daniel Della Posta, Brittany N. Freelin, Xi Zhu, Bradley Hinger, Hanzhou Chen

The American Mafia is a network of criminals engaged in drug trafficking, violence and other illegal activities. Here, we analyze a historical spatial social network (SSN) of 680 Mafia members found in a 1960 investigatory dossier compiled by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Narcotics. The dossier includes connections between members who were ‘known criminal associates’ and members are geolocated to a known home address across 15 major U.S. cities.

Under an overarching narrative of identifying the network’s proclivities toward security (dispersion) or efficiency (ease of coordination), we pose four research questions related to criminal organizations, power and coordination strategies. We find that the Mafia network is distributed as a portfolio of nearby and distant ties with significant spatial clustering among the Mafia family units.

The methods used here differ from former methods that analyze the point pattern locations of individuals and the social network of individuals separately. The research techniques used here contribute to the body of non-planar network analysis methods in GIScience and can be generalized to other types of spatially-embedded social networks.

International Journal of Geographical Information Science Volume 35, 2021 - Issue 12: Spatial Social Networks in GIScience

By  Felipe Botero Escobar

For years, Ecuador enjoyed a relative degree of peace, as its neighbors, Colombia and Peru, were wrangling with internal conflicts as chief protagonists in the international supply of cocaine. However, things have changed dramatically in recent times. On 9 January 2024, the recently elected president, Daniel Noboa, said that the country was in a state of ‘internal armed conflict’ against 22 criminal groups that he described as ‘narco-terrorists’.

One of the most visible incidents of Ecuador’s growing problem with violence occurred in August 2023 when presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio was assassinated at a campaign rally in Quito just weeks before the elections. Since Villavicencio’s murder, several incidents have occurred, including the arrest of the Colombian hitmen involved in his death and their subsequent murders in a prison, which has deprived the authorities of crucial evidence in the investigation.6 The year 2023 ended as the most violent recorded in the history of Ecuador.

The situation in Ecuador is complex, and more research into the political-economic factors behind how this once stable country descended into violent, crime-driven chaos needs to be undertaken if we are to fully comprehend the situation. Nevertheless, there are some key features of Ecuador’s criminal landscape that we do understand, and which can at least partly explain how the country has arrived at this critical juncture.

The existence of at least three intertwined criminal markets, the presence of transnational organized crime groups as well as local criminal networks, and the country’s poor resilience capacity to respond to and mitigate the effects of organized crime are all pivotal to understanding the complex criminal ecosystem that has emerged in force in recent years. In the last edition of the Global Organized Crime Index, published in September 2023, scores for Ecuador’s criminal markets and criminal actors are revealed.

This analysis provides but an initial understanding of the background. A more comprehensive assessment of how intersecting criminal markets, like arms trafficking and extortion, operate in the country will be essential in formulating sustainable, practicable responses to the crisis.

By Ryan C. Berg

Key Points

• Much of Brazil’s deadly urban violence is the direct result of territorial battles involving the country’s powerful transnational organized crime groups, many of which trace their origins to the country’s dangerous and overcrowded prisons.

• The Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC), or First Capital Command, took shape in São Paulo during the early 1990s, as inmates organized against poor prison conditions to impose order and preserve lives. Eventually, the PCC developed an ability to project its influence and control well beyond prison walls and into Brazil’s sprawling urban slums.

• The PCC has vanquished many of its domestic rivals, enjoys a footprint in every state in Brazil, runs operations in almost every country of South America, and is now more globally minded than ever before, recruiting guerrillas from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia and Venezuelan refugees and partnering with European mafia groups and Lebanese Hezbollah.

• Law-and-order strategies that “stuff” Brazil’s crowded prisons with new inmates may actually exacerbate the problem, given that the PCC has effectively converted the country’s prisons into logistical hubs and training centers of illicit activity. To fight the PCC, the US should designate it as a transnational organized crime group to confer the benefits of multiple pieces of legislation and seek extradition of key PCC leaders.

Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute, 2020. 36p.

By Abigail Weitzman, Mónica Caudillo, and Eldad J. Levy

In this review, we argue that to understand patterns and causes of violence in contemporary Latin America, we must explicitly consider when violence takes on interpersonal qualities. We begin by reviewing prominent definitions and measurements of interpersonal violence. We then detail the proliferation of interlocking sources of regional insecurity, including gender-based violence, gangs, narcotrafficking, vigilantism, and political corruption. Throughout this description, we highlight when and how each source of insecurity can become interpersonal. Next, we outline mutually reinforcing macro and micro conditions underlying interpersonal violence in its many hybrid forms. To conclude, we call for more multifaceted conceptualizations of interpersonal violence that embrace the complexities of Latin American security situations and discuss the opportunities and challenges that lie ahead in this area.

Annual Review of Criminology, Volume 7, Page 163 - 186

By David Lewis

Despite Ukraine's ongoing counter-offensive, in September 2023 Russia still controlled around 17% of Ukrainian territory, an area roughly the size of Denmark. Russia's occupation of these Ukrainian territories relied primarily on repression and violence, but economic levers also played an important role in consolidating Russian rule. This paper details Russia's illicit economic activity in the occupied territories and calls for more international attention to this aspect of Russia's invasion.

Since Russia occupied large parts of south-eastern Ukraine in March 2022, it has worked rapidly to incorporate these regions into Russia's economic and financial system. Key elements in this 'economic occupation' include:

• The seizure of many Ukrainian businesses and assets. The occupation authorities 'nationalised' many companies and reregistered them as Russian businesses with new management.

• The imposition of the Russian currency, financial and tax system, and the forced closure of Ukrainian banks.

• The forcible takeover of farms or pressure on farmers to cooperate with the occupation authorities. Russian officials oversaw the illegal export of Ukrainian grain from the occupied territories.

The reconstruction of cities such as Mariupol, the city destroyed by Russian forces in spring 2022, in a multi-billion-dollar government programme that is profiting well-connected Russian companies.

These acts were all illegal under Ukrainian law and some may constitute potential war crimes under international law.

Research Paper 20. Birmingham, UK: University of Birmingham, 2023. 43p.

By INTERPOL and ENACT Africa

Across the globe, the proliferation of new armed groups (including rebels, militias, criminal groups and gangs) has made conflict prevention and resolution even more complex . Armed groups are diversifying their revenues, which are increasingly based on organized crime activities . Organized Crime Groups (OCGs) often benefit from the turmoil of armed conflicts and violence. They can engage in violence to protect their illicit business, undermining national economic development and security. Furthermore, OCGs can team up with armed groups to access and control natural resources, competing with the state to provide public goods or even protection to their community. Different situations of violent conflict affect countries in the Eastern African region. Crime dynamics that emerge from instability in one country of the region can spill over into a neighbouring country, posing a threat to regional peace and security. The emergence of hybrid criminal groups engaged in transnational organized crime and in armed conflict most likely represents a relevant dimension of contemporary conflict in Eastern Africa. Yet, the knowledge on the multiple ways in which OCGs prey, or even amplify, local conflicts for their own benefit remains limited. In many instances, the scale of criminal activities in Eastern Africa contributes to an increase in the risk of conflict or in its prolongation. Organized crime thrives in conflict and other situations of violence in the region when goods and supplies are scarce, filling the demand often in association with armed groups. In some cases, revenue from criminal activities enables armed groups to finance their activities. The illicit circulation of weapons in the region from and into conflict-affected settings fuels violence and criminal activities. Information suggests that in some occasions, armed groups and OCGs collude to smuggle goods, migrants and drugs through the region and beyond. Moreover, the illicit extraction, control and taxation of natural resources in the region is often a source of revenue for armed groups and often links them with criminal actors. Information shows that livestock theft, or cattle rustling, poses a serious threat to many countries in the region and fuels the increase in the demand for small arms and light weapons in two aspects: for fighters to steal cattle and for ranchers to protect their livestock against such attacks. Higher levels of violence have been reported in cattle rustling cases affecting local economies and security. Organized violence for profit continues to affect Eastern Africa. Kidnapping for ransom, looting, threats and sexual gender-based violence are among the most reported incidents in the region. The driving factors for those crimes are sometimes difficult to discern and involve a combination of reasons such as economic gain, firearms sourcing (notably for cases of looting security forces), intention to control a community or territory. Illicit financial flows, and particularly, illicit taxation, allow OCGs and armed groups to generate revenue through commodity taxes, by imposing taxes on the community to move through certain areas or to run their business

Lyon, France: INTERPOL, 2021. 32p

By Zach Y. Brown & Eduardo Montero & Carlos Schmidt-Padilla & Maria Micaela Sviatschi

How does gang competition affect extortion? Using detailed data on individual extortion payments to gangs and sales from a leading wholesale distributor of consumer goods and pharmaceuticals in El Salvador, we document evidence on the determinants of extortion payments and the effects of extortion on firms and consumers. We exploit a 2016 nonaggression pact between gangs to examine how collusion affects extortion in areas where gangs previously competed. While the pact led to a large reduction in competition and violence, we find that it increased the amount paid in extortion by approximately 20%. Much of this increase was passed through to retailers and consumers: retailers experienced an increase in delivery fees, leading to an increase in consumer prices. In particular, we find an increase in prices for pharmaceutical drugs and a corresponding increase in hospital visits for chronic illnesses. The results point to an unintended consequence of policies that reduce competition between criminal organizations.

Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research, 2023. 67p.

By Raouf Farrah

The civil society of the Libyan northwest city of Zuwara has led several efforts over the last years to tackle criminal governance with notable successes and failures. In 2014-2015, Zuwara’s CSOs took an impressive stand against human smuggling, providing assistance to migrants, raising awareness of the impact and dangers of smuggling, and leveraging elites to strengthen local taboos against human smuggling. Although community efforts continue to fight against criminal governance through awareness-raising and education campaigns via media, religious discourse and university campuses, the 2014-2015 momentum has been lost. Zuwara’s civil society has the means to reignite its stance against criminal governance. To do so, it needs more political recognition, more assistance from international stakeholders and better cooperation between local stakeholders with clearer boundaries between law enforcement and CSOs.

Geneva: e Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime (GI-TOC) and Migrant Network., 2021. 29p.

By Ivan Briscoe and David Keseberg

Legend has it that Pope John Paul II, during his visit to Guatemala at the height of that country’s civil war in 1983, handed down a highly undiplomatic refrain to his official hosts: “you like to kill.” It is a conclusion that, decades on from the Cold War era of military dictatorships, left-wing revolutionary regimes, and embattled democracies, is still largely valid across Latin America, although for quite different reasons. This is the region of the world that is now least affected by armed conflict, yet most exposed to a daily dose of largely criminal violence. In 2016, 17 of the 20 countries and 43 of the 50 cities with the world’s highest rates of homicide—excluding those affected by armed conflict—were to be found in Latin America.1 In absolute terms, one in four global homicides occurs in only four countries: Brazil, Mexico, Venezuela, and Colombia.2 This lethal yet commonplace violence is most closely associated with those countries saddled with the presence of vibrant criminal organizations, groups which are in turn associated in the minds of many Latin Americans with the spread of sinister tentacles across poor urban communities, peripheral rural areas, prisons, police forces, judges, eminences of the political establishment, and international bankers and lawyers. Crime no longer appears as a mere underworld, but has become a source of fear, resentment, popular entertainment and, perhaps most crucially, livelihood and opportunity; it has become a culture. ...

Prism, 8(1); 2019.

 By Anastasia Austin and Douwe den Held 

The Dominican Republic prides itself on its openness to the world. As one of the first countries to open up during the COVID-19 pandemic, it seeks to be ever welcoming to tourism and business. But criminals may feel welcome as well. In this three-part series, InSight Crime dives into the infrastructure, the trafficking networks, and the corruption facilitating organized crime in the Dominican Republic.

Washington, DC, Insight Crime, 2022. 26p

By  Lorenzo Rodrigo Aldeco Leo, Jose A. Jurado, Aurora A. Ramírez-Álvarez

  This document studies the effect of the homicide rate on internal migration in Mexico. Reduced form evidence shows that net migration of skilled workers decreases into local labor markets where homicide rates increased after 2007, suggesting workers prefer destinations with lower homicide rates. This result is due to lower inflows, without effects on outflows, pointing to the existence of moving costs. To quantify the welfare cost of increasing homicides, we use workers' migration decisions and a spatial equilibrium model. Skilled workers' average willingness to pay to decrease the homicide rate by 1% is estimated at 0.58% of wages. The welfare cost is in the order of several points of GDP per year, depending on the assumptions. Workers who do not migrate bear the largest share of the overall welfare cost

Working Paper, 2022: 11 Mexico City: Banco de México 2022. 53p.  

By Jonathan D. Rosen and  Hanna Samir Kassab 

  According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the Americas is the most violent region in the world. The Americas has a homicide rate of 16.3 per 100,000 people, while Africa had a homicide rate of 12.5 per 100,000 inhabitants. Europe, Oceania, and Asia had much lower homicide rates with three percent, three percent, and 2.9 percent, respectively (see Fig.  1.1).1 The Americas is also home to the most violent country in the world. In 2015, El Salvador surpassed Honduras as the most violent non-waring nation. Violence has exceeded the days of the country’s civil war, which lasted for more than a decade. In fact, experts note that at one point in 2015 El Salvador had one murder per hour. Jonathan Watts writes, “Last Sunday was, briefly, the bloodiest day yet with 40 murders. But the record was beaten on Monday with 42 deaths, and surpassed again on Tuesday with 43. Even Iraq—with its civil war, suicide bombings, mortar attacks and US drone strikes—could not match such a lethal start to the week.”2 In January 2017, the country saw a rare phenomenon occur: one day without a murder.3 Much of the violence in El Salvador has been a result of gang-related activities as well as the consequences of the government’s tough on crime strategies.4 El Salvador’s neighbors, Guatemala and Honduras, have also seen high levels of gang-related violence.5 Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández argued that 80 percent of the homicides that occur in this country are related to organized crime.  

New York:London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. 165p.

By Gabriel Feltran,  Cecília Lero, Marcelli Cipriani, Janaina Maldonado, Fernando de Jesus Rodrigues, Luiz Eduardo Lopes Silva e Nido Farias

The paper proposes an explanation for the variations in homicide rates in Brazil in the past two decades. Based on the comparison of ethnographic experiences lived in the criminal universe of four capital cities (São Paulo, Porto Alegre, São Luís and Maceió), we propose two analytical strategies: 1) the breakdown of quantitative homicide rate data by victim profile, and 2) the construction of historical synopses of conflicts between factions at the local level. We demonstrate how homicide rates, in specific socio-demographic profiles, oscillate based on changes in conflicts between factions at the local level conflicts, and influence variations in the aggregate rates   

  Dilemas, Rev. Estud. Conflito Controle Soc. – Rio de Janeiro – Edição Especial no 4 – 2022 – pp. 349-386