Criminal War and Peace

• In Event: The Political Ramifications of Violence

Abstract

Why do conflicts between criminal groups and between these groups and the state arise, and become so intractable? It answers that changes to the balance of power among criminal groups spark vicious cycles of violence because the state’s reaction engenders further shifts to the balance of power. More specifically, I argue that competition between criminal organizations entails delicate equilibria, which rely on a stable distribution of power. Differential shocks to criminal groups’ coercive capacity can dislocate the power balance, incentivizing relatively strengthened criminal organizations to invade other armed criminal groups’ territory. Where bargaining fails, criminal turf conflict erupts, unleashing a spike in atrocity that undermines voters’ safety. Through an electoral pathway, I propose that crime-affected voters tend to demand iron-fist security policies and parties, in turn, supply mano dura; elected state-criminal group war is born. The state’s offensives – leader arrests, kingpin killings, military invasion, and drug seizures – often differentially impact criminal groups, further disrupting the balance of power between these groups, sparking further inter-criminal group turf war. I evaluate this argument with rich, ethnographic case studies and survey data from Mexico.

Author

• Sarah Zukerman Daly, Columbia University