Organized Crime and Conflict in the Sahel-Sahara Region
By Wolfram Lacher. Carnegie Endowment of International Peace, September 2012.
Fragility in the Sahel-Sahara region is driven in part by worsening organized crime. Collusion between smugglers of cigarettes, drugs, and weapons and state officials has eroded state authority and created lucrative funding channels for Islamist terrorists, ethnically-aligned militias, and criminal groups in the Sahel-Sahara region. To reverse this worsening instability, governments and international partners should aim to break up alliances between militias and other local criminal networks that lack strong ideological or principled bonds. Meanwhile, improved opportunities for genuine political participation for marginalized groups can further diminish support for organized crime.
Download the article [PDF]Justice for Forests: Improving Criminal Justice Efforts to Combat Illegal Logging
By Marilyne Pereira Goncalves, Melissa Panjer, Theodore S. Greenberg, and William B. Magrath. World Bank, March 2012.
Large-scale illegal logging operations are often linked to transnational organized criminal networks that rely on high-level corruption, intimidation, and violence. In some countries, as much as 90 percent of logging is illegal, threatening biodiversity, livelihoods, and economic development. States can better use existing information on business transactions collected by financial institutions to increase understanding of these logging networks and strengthen criminal investigations against offenders.
Download the article: [PDF]Termites at Work: Transnational Organized Crime and State Erosion in Kenya
By Peter Gastrow. International Peace Institute, September 2011.
For many African states, powerful transnational criminal networks constitute a direct threat to the state itself, not only through open confrontation but also by penetrating state institutions through corruption and subverting them from within. With a sharp rise in narcotics and illicit trafficking, countries risk becoming criminalized or captured states. Advanced investigative law enforcement units are needed to stem transnational crime and oversight of government agencies and regulations should be made more rigorous.
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Urban Fragility and Security in Africa
Estimates are that more than half of all Africans will live in cities by 2025. This rapid pace of urbanization is creating a new locus of fragility in many African states – as evidenced by the burgeoning slums around many of the continent’s urban areas – and the accompanying rise in violence, organized crime, and the potential for instability. These evolving threats, in turn, have profound implications for Africa’s security sector.
Download the Brief in: [ENGLISH][FRANÇAIS][PORTUGUESE]Crime and Instability: Case Studies of Transnational Threats
By, UN Office on Drugs and Crime, 2010.
Organized crime and attendant illicit trafficking has undermined the rule of law in various regions around Africa and become both cause and symptom of instability and conflict. Efforts to confront these challenges are too often merely national or bilateral in scope, against which the transnational complexity and sophistication of criminal networks has proven very resilient. Download the Article: [PDF]Organized Crime in South Africa
By STRATFOR, 2008.
An in-depth analysis of the history, structure, and geography of organized crime in South Africa. While cognizant of the tremendous strides the South African government has made from the apartheid days when organized crime formed a key role in many industries, the article emphasizes the continued attraction of South Africa as an attractive destination for organized crime. View the Article: [HTML]
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