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The Hellish Road to Good Intentions How to Break Political-Criminal Alliances in Contexts of Transition

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The Hellish Road to Good Intentions How to Break Political-Criminal Alliances in Contexts of Transition United Nations University Centre for Policy Research Crime-Conflict Nexus Series: No 7 April 2017 The Hellish Road to Good Intentions How to Break Political-Criminal Alliances in Contexts of Transition Dr. Vanda Felbab-Brown Senior Fellow, The Brookings Institution This material has been funded by UK aid from the UK government; however the views expressed do not necessarily reflect the UK government’s official policies. © 2017 United Nations University. All Rights Reserved. ISBN 978-92-808-9038-9 The Hellish Road to Good Intentions How to Break Political-Criminal Alliances in Contexts of Transition 2 INTRODUCTION My analysis of how conflict and criminality have evolved and interacted in both countries from the 1990s through Large-scale illicit economies and organized crime the current period shows that although illicit economies have received increasing attention from governments and organized crime pose many threats to states and and international organizations since the end of the societies, they can also reinforce regime survival; and Cold War. The end of the Cold War brought a permissive laissez faire policies toward the illicit economies and strategic environment that allowed many states to focus criminal groups, and can in some circumstances mitigate on a broader menu of interests in their foreign policy conflict. Inappropriate measures toward illegal economies agendas, such as the fight against drug trafficking and and organized crime, with wrong sequencing, prioritization, production. The post-Cold War era also exposed the and emphasis—such as suppressing labor-intensive fragility and institutional underdevelopment of many illicit economies which are providing plentiful jobs to of these states, a deficiency perhaps exacerbated otherwise impoverished populations; or cracking down by globalization. At the same time, criminal and on transactional crimes instead of predatory crimes – can belligerent actors with significant power previously compound conflict dynamics, complicate transitions from obscured by the shadows of Cold War politics were war to peace, and weaken state-building efforts. spotlighted by the international community, especially when their activities were associated with intense The need to differentiate labor-intensive and non-labor- violence or corruption. intensive illicit economies and transactional crimes from predatory crimes is a central theme of this analysis. The focus on organized crime, illicit economies, and Transactional crimes violate laws and procedures and the multiple threats they pose to states and societies supply black markets for prohibited or semi-prohibited only intensified after 9-11 when it became obvious that products for which there is a demand. Illegal drug belligerent groups, such as the Taliban in Afghanistan and cultivation and drug trafficking are examples. Transactional Pakistan as well as the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria, crimes are sometimes erroneously called “victimless derive multiple benefits—including extensive financial crimes” in that the buyers and sellers are working together, profits—from participating in illicit economies such which makes them harder to thwart than predatory crimes. as the drug trade. In addition to expanding the resources Predatory crimes, such as rape, robberies, or extortion, of terrorist and belligerent groups, the persistence and tend to have particular identifiable victims. But there growth of illegal economies have complicated post- is no economic “demand” for predatory crimes (other conflict stabilization and reconstruction efforts in countries than those ordered by powerbrokers and unscrupulous that have emerged from civil wars, such as Cambodia and economic actors to intimidate their rivals). As the word Haiti.1 Increasingly, the United Nations Security Council “predatory” implies, predatory crimes involve predation, too has highlighted organized crime as an issue requiring victimization, and abuse. the coordinated focus of various United Nations bodies and of the Secretary General.2 The international community in its anti-crime suppression efforts often focuses on transactional crimes like illegal drug The evolved standard understanding is that illicit cultivation and trafficking for a variety of reasons, including economies and organized crime fuel conflict, increase the their transnational aspect and international visibility. Yet fragility of states, and undermine democratization. Thus, in the absence of legal livelihoods being provided, such the reduction of conflict, the buildup of state resilience, as, for the poppy drug farmers in Afghanistan and Burma, and the promotion of democratization—especially the suppression of the illegal activity often complicates in countries in the process of regime transition or post- conflict mitigation policies. This is particularly the case conflict transition—require the suppression of illicit in the context of labor-intensive illicit economies. Under economies and organized crime. This monograph shows such circumstances, the sponsorship of illicit economies the limitations of this conventional wisdom in both its provides armed actors, such as insurgent groups, analytical components and its prescriptions, and highlights with political capital.3 how a sharpened analysis can give rise to policies with better prospects for reducing the role of illicit economies Meanwhile, predatory criminality, less visible abroad and and crime in post-conflict and regime-change situations. at least in the short-term localized in its impacts, tends to delegitimize governments and political systems that Drawing from fieldwork in Afghanistan and Myanmar, cannot control it. Especially in post-conflict or regime detailed in the accompanying two case studies, this transition settings, it often discredits the new political order capstone paper highlights the key findings regarding and can fuel conflict dynamics. It can thus also critically the dynamics and interrelationships of illicit economies jeopardize international state-building and reconstruction and organized crime in conflict, post-conflict-transitions, assistance efforts. Yet the international community has paid and regime transitions and lays out overarching policy far less attention to combatting predatory criminality in post- implications that carry beyond the two particular cases. conflict countries and in some cases, such as in Afghanistan, The Hellish Road to Good Intentions How to Break Political-Criminal Alliances in Contexts of Transition 3 severely magnified its deleterious effects by embracing how Myanmar’s military permitted democratization is its and empowering powerbrokers deeply implicated in such ability to retain not just a formal veto power of policies predatory criminality. it dislikes but also privileged access to the spoils of the country’s illicit economies. In both Afghanistan and Myanmar, conflict and illicit econo- mies, such as drug trafficking and illegal logging and min- The analysis of the two cases also shows that organized crime ing as well as land grabbing and predatory criminality, have and illicit economies cannot be understood as essentially crucially shaped conflict dynamics and political transitions. an infection from outside that weakens and sickens a political Despite the conventional wisdom that efforts to eradicate system. Often, organized crime and illicit economies are the labor-intensive drug cultivation enhance conflict mitiga- mutually constitutive with political processes organic to the tion, the opposite has been the case, even as the drug system, even if deleterious from the perspective of account- trade has provided financing to the countries’ insurgencies. ability and rule of law. They do not merely undermine the state; the state uses them for its purposes. Illicit economies In the case of Myanmar, ceasefire deals of the 1990s were and crime can also be tools of foreign governments, directly based on state strategies of coopting the insurgent both serving their internal goals and intersecting with groups through allowing the armed groups to participate regional geopolitics. in illegal economies. In both Afghanistan and Myanmar, the post-conflict transitions have also turned out to be deeply Accordingly, acting against illicit economies and against unsatisfactory and problematical, weakening state-building predatory criminality also need to be understood as pro- efforts and democratization because predatory criminality foundly political efforts. In many circumstances, including also exploded; even access to the spoils of illicit economies in the cases of Afghanistan and Myanmar, they are thus not became more exclusionary. Thus in both cases, violent merely technical interventions and assistance to strengthen conflict has significantly escalated over the past decade institutions and civil society; they are projects in reorganizing and a half. And even in Myanmar, where the military junta local political arrangements. Their effectiveness is thus also ultimately permitted democratization and an elected a function of relative balances of power and the long-term government of its chief opponent to take formal, if highly wherewithal and capacities of the would-be reformers, restricted, power, violent conflict is now more intense than internal or external. it has been during the past three decades. The analysis and policy recommendations presented Afghanistan is a case of one of the most intense and long- in this capstone paper are based on my recurrent fieldwork lasting international counterinsurgency
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