Traditional peace treaties and the deployment of blue-helmeted peacekeepers are not fit for purpose. The international community has few tools to address the twin challenges of state and criminal violence. 13 Inequality, not poverty, is strongly correlated with murder-and inequality often rises as poverty falls. 12 Of the fifty most violent cities in the world in 2017 (based on murder rates per 100,000), fifteen are in Mexico, fourteen are in Brazil, and four are in the United States. 11 In 2018, more civilians were killed by state and paramilitary forces in the Philippines than in Iraq, Somalia, or the Democratic Republic of the Congo-as many as in Afghanistan. 10 Relatively wealthy South Africa has a violent death rate nearly double that of war-torn South Sudan. It is middle-income countries that are fast becoming the world’s most violent places. Compare the roughly thirty fragile states listed by the World Bank to the fifty most violent countries in the world, and just four appear in both compilations. These challenges are not confined to poor, “failed,” or “fragile” states. Yet it is possible that such violence may be contributing to a jump in overall violent deaths worldwide. Both are skilled at hiding their violent acts such that they often are not recorded in worldwide datasets on lethal and nonlethal violence. Politicians, police, judges, and customs officials often cooperate with cartel bosses and gangs in the pursuit of profit and power. These two types of violence-organized crime and state repression-are more intertwined than is commonly assumed. Robert Muggah is the director of research at the Igarapé Institute, a think tank working on data-driven safety and justice across Latin America and Africa, that he co-founded in 2011. 8 Meanwhile, state security forces are continuing to deploy mass violence and excessive force against their own people. 7 Criminal violence perpetrated by drug cartels, gangs, and mafia groups is skyrocketing, especially in Latin American and the Caribbean, causing global homicides to creep up again. Almost nine out of ten violent deaths across the world today occur inside countries and cities that are not at war in the traditional sense. These situations can only be improved with better quality governance, rather than traditional peace agreements and peacekeepers. Some of them are experiencing endemic violence that exceed death rates in warfare. 6 Many societies ostensibly “at peace” are far from peaceful. Sharp reductions in violent crime were also due in part to investments in smarter policing and prevention.īut there is a darker side to the story.

The end of the Cold War gave them a boost, but they were chiefly achieved by concerted investment in policies designed to prevent and mitigate warfare and terrorism. These comparatively recent improvements in peace and security did not occur spontaneously. Rachel Kleinfeld is a senior fellow in the Democracy, Conflict, and Governance Program, where she focuses on issues of rule of law, security, and governance in post-conflict countries, fragile states, and states in transition.

Another word for unnecessary violence