by Virginia Gamba
Head, Small Arms Programme, Institute for Security Studies

Published in African Security Review Vol 6 No 5, 1997

INTRODUCTION

This article will look at new threats to security and the ability of nation-states to counter these threats. It will then concentrate on the threat posed by transnational criminal organisations to governance processes.

NEW THREATS TO SECURITY

In 1989, with the end of the Cold War, the international community perceived that it was entering a new phase, a 'brave new world'. The post-Cold War agenda opened up two possibilities:

Countries could now turn 'inwards' and set their own houses in order (exhaustion at the end of the Cold War). In the best cases, this led to an overwhelming wish to look inwards: to ethnocentrism, nationalism, and the revision of defence budgets and defence priorities. In the worst cases, it led to the re-emergence of ethnic, political and religious divisions and conflict.



No country wanted to take the lead in the emerging new world order: because no one country was left with the same level of real and perceived power as it had during the Cold War. This led to a renewed look at international organisations and at collective security processes.

The absence of the potential for global conflict led to renewed interest in keeping regional conflict under control and thus created new interest in internal security processes, failed states and civil war.

The biggest problem for decision-makers at the end of this period was to reassess the nature of security threats. Would they be hard issues (military threats to security in the traditional sense) or would they look at the softer and more likely issues of security (non-military threats to security)? The answer was vital to most countries, since it would guide their policies and budgets, as well as their international interactions in the near future. Although this applied primarily to countries in the North, for developing countries a similar process occurred after democratisation, leading also to shifts in defence and security allocations.

Eight years later, the answers are not yet clear and policies to deter security threats have not been standardised. But some general lines have emerged which are pushing the discussion of security well beyond traditional agendas. The topics under discussion can be divided into three broad categories:

Military type threats to security: these range from classical intervention (as seen in the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq in 1991), to insurgency wars (as seen in the military operations leading to the change of government in Zaire in 1997).



Non-military threats to long term security: these are the hardest issues to catalogue, since they deal with the consequences of given situations. Thus problems related to energy, water, health, economics, development, and environmental issues are or can become security threats to countries and to regions.



Any threat to the capacity of nation-states to govern themselves, and therefore to react to military and non-military threats to security in the long term, are – in themselves – a security problem. Among this last item one could include the emergence of non-state actors in the international context, corruption, lack of effective governance processes (including challenges to democratisation), crime and violence (including transnational organised crime, and the increase in availability of illegal and cheap arms and ammunition), poverty and socio-economic challenges (including the existence of competitive black markets), and massive humanitarian crises leading to a large exodus of people either within a country or across borders (which often stretches the capacity of governments to deal with the situation and also fuels resentment and competition with local inhabitants and migrants).

Although these three threats to security seem disparate they really are connected: the effects of one being felt in the other two.

Thus, for example, a civil war in one country can lead to a mass exodus of people to another, which, in turn, can fuel increases in violence and crime (mostly with small arms as the tools of violence). This in turn, pressurises governments to increase spending on their security forces (taking funds which should be earmarked for socio-economic development and growth). This also opens the door to insecurity, private security, lack of faith in government, and/or increases in corruption. The situation can set the scene for worse evils, such as the illegal operation of non-state actors, for example those transnational criminal organisations that operate under black market conditions and that trade and barter everything from drugs to light weapons to counterfeit goods. These issues all challenge the economic well-being of the nation and make governance very difficult to manage.

The way to cope with these threats can either be national, regional or international. Given the dynamics of globalisation prevalent today – in economics, security, technology, business, etc. – there is a trend to consider all these threats as international in character, since even a civil war in one country can influence the daily management of neighbouring states. This has led the international community to take on issues such as the regional and global responsibility of nations to secure individual human security, to restore order in failed states, or to manage post-conflict reconstruction processes. Since no country is powerful enough to undertake this alone, and there is no mandate that grants such power to any one international actor, there has been renewed interest in making regional and international organisations operative in this sense. This meant that existing institutions, which had served as more passive structures for discussion and facilitation before, were now pressed to become active and operational not only to facilitate dialogue, but also to implement changes and obtain results. The era of preventive diplomacy had begun.

This thrust led to an increased interest in the widening of peacekeeping concepts, both in scope (regional as well as international) and in depth (peacekeeping versus peace enforcement). Inevitably, organisations had to undergo intense restructuring to be able to manage these new tasks. This process is still under way.

The linkages between the kinds of threats to the community and the need to operate jointly in preventing and resolving problems, have opened a door to new patterns of co-operation, consultation and assistance between countries, whether at economic or military level. But, this has not provided relief to the more prevalent situation today: the ability of countries to govern themselves in the face of massive increases in crime and internal instability. The role of defence forces has been downgraded, that of security forces upgraded, and yet, there does not seem to be an end to the problems. Clearly, new ideas and structures for the maintenance of order, the upgrading of the justice system, and the provision of effective security must be devised that take both short term and long term threats to internal security into account and that consider the fact that internal instability directly relates to regional security, affecting both the economics and the security of neighbouring states.

At a time when integration and co-operation have become regional imperatives all over the world, we must ensure that this can happen without the security of individuals or communities deteriorating. Enhanced regional action for both development and security will have to take the emerging security threats into account for governance purposes, whether they are traditional, non-military or destabilising. For this reason, it is necessary to flesh out the new security agenda, and to look at the national, subregional, regional, and international mechanisms that must be enhanced to implement this agenda efficiently and safely.

THE RISE OF TRANSNATIONAL CRIMINAL ORGANISATIONS²

There are two major issues in today's international context which exacerbate the security of nation-states: transition and participation. In other words, what is the status of the new world order after the Cold War, and who are the principal actors?

The decade of the nineties is characterised by transition. This applies to both industrialised countries and less developed ones. In the North, for example, former integrated units (such as the former Soviet Union) and integrated 'states' (such as the former Yugoslavia) deconstruct themselves to form different and disparate identities. In some cases the transition is conducted in relative peace, in others it spawns wars. In the South, the erasing of the Cold War divide and the fall of extreme ideologies have propitiated the continuation of politics by other means: at times allowing for repressive military solutions to flourish, such as in the case of the former Zaire and Congo-Brazzaville; at times deciding that long-standing disputes should be settled peacefully, as in the resolution of the conflict in Mozambique and Cambodia as a consequence of the intervention of the United Nations.

Aside from these transitions in specific countries and regions, all nation-states, to a lesser or greater extent, are experiencing political transitions (as in the case of South America and Southern Africa) and economic transitions (as in the case of South East Asia, China, Central America and Eastern Europe). Only a few regions remain constant in their dynamics, most notably the Middle East, Europe, and North America; but even they must react to changes in others. It is, therefore, not surprising that the age of transitions has led to an interest in the issue of governance: whether national, multinational, or global.

Renewed interest has emerged in rendering the mechanisms for action effective in a co-operative mode. As a result, the reform of the United Nations, and the institutionalising of active ad hoc communities of nations into subregional entities with common development and security objectives, has begun at the macro-level. At the micro-level, states are grappling with the needs for effective governance, on the one hand, and the pressure for fast socio-economic reform, on the other.

Another item that has changed on the modern agenda is that of participation. The state is no longer the one determining entity that makes things happen. Non-state actors are proliferating and their impact is far-reaching, whether positively as in the case of global civil society, or negatively as in the case of transnational criminal organisations. Although there is some recognition of these new actors in world dynamics, this is usually kept in positive mode. That is, global partnerships are being formed with the objective to serve a common need or procure a common object. However, there is no such emerging partnership to combat common threats, though these threats may also be global in character. Of the latter, none are more pervasive than the emergence of transnational criminal organisations and the new found dynamics with which black markets operate.

CRIME: AN OLD THREAT WITH NEW POTENTIAL

As Williams indicates, "criminal organisations add turbulence to domestic politics, and challenge the normal functioning of government and law. They are also linked in complex ways to the growth of the black market."³ Many would dispute that these are the only threats to global security in the future, and indeed, there are many challenges to peace and security today that are both military and non-military in character, but that do not touch on either of the above. But even if transnational criminal organisations and the new competitiveness of black markets are not the only future threats to global security, they are certainly two of the most pervasive. This happens because of the far-reaching destabilising effects they create. There is, for example, no proportionality in the way these threats affect governments and societies: the environment in which these threats operate and where the greatest amount of damage can be caused, is that of transitional systems. And transition, as indicated above, is the mark of the decade.

Since criminal activities and parallel economies thrive in the disorder prevalent in times of transition, it follows that illegal actors, elements, and procedures are in prime condition today. The response of the international community to the development of this threat has been slow and ineffective. But, it is this threat that has the greatest potential for disaster, as it directly or indirectly influences all parties to the international system.

From the security point of view, these illegal organisations pose a direct challenge to the judiciary and law enforcement capacity of all states. Indirectly, they generate a corrupting influence, eroding the effective functioning and the integrity of state institutions. But, in states in transition, these indirect threats include stopping the establishment of a legitimate state apparatus which is essential for responsible governance.⁴ According to Williams, transnational criminal organisations are "the HIV virus of the modern state, breaking down; the immune system, and allowing the spread of infection into law enforcement agencies and other state institutions."⁵

From an economic point of view, the challenge is even worse. The problem with the economics of transnational criminal organisations is that the influx of money they generate can easily be confused with quick gains for society. Leaders are sometimes tempted to downplay the long term effects of this problem, because they think that it is an issue that can be controlled down the line. This is a mistake. Although it is true that illicit trafficking can be a major source of earnings and employment in countries with limited export earnings, the negative long term effects of these operations far outstrip the advantages of 'letting them be'.

This unusual situation is easily explicable. The rise of these illicit operations occurs amidst conditions of poverty or as an accompaniment to social upheaval, economic dislocation or political disruption. For example, in Russia, the "pool of laundered money in the economy provided an important cushion in early transition as industry tried to move from a command to a market economy."⁶ However, although criminal capital has many advantages over legitimate capital, it often drives out legitimate entrepreneurs, as Williams indicates. Moreover, considerable illegal money in the economy renders the task of economic management problematic. Thus, transnational criminal organisations are ultimately predatory, because they repress the emergence of a strong and sustainable economic base in emerging countries.⁷

The impact of this threat on societies is considerable, since illegal trafficking means the movement of illegal goods and this, in itself, adds to human insecurity. For example, drug trafficking for profit generates violence against individuals that steal to feed drug habits and become violent as a consequence. The same can be said of guns and other types of small arms: arms provide power to the user, who gets increasingly accustomed to achieve his aims through the use of violence.⁸ At times, two illegal commodities, such as arms and drugs, are linked when street gangs, who operate to sell drugs or other illegal goods in specific areas, must defend their operations in typical gang-warfare style and need the weapons to do so. At times, competitive drive is confused with power and assertion, and leads to the use of force as is evident in the infamous taxi-wars in South Africa where guns figure as instruments of deterrence in a business that should be considered as 'legitimate': the transport of passengers. In all of these variations, it is not only the user who gets hurt, it is the innocent bystander, either because they become victims of violence themselves or because they must pay the social price of insecurity in higher taxes to pay for lost productivity and increased policing, or in the need to pay for their own private security when the state cannot provide it.

Finally, illegal trafficking does not stop at the trading of objects: the facility to exploit the more vulnerable members of society, such as women and children, is always there, leading to the ultimate commodity trading: that of human beings. The gross violation of human rights and the total disregard for the essential dignity of man are direct threats to human security. In the economics front, these illegal operations threaten the integrity of financial and commercial institutions, because they try to maintain existing systems, in order to exploit their multiple points of access, the capacity for rapid and anonymous money transfers, and the lack of transparency. Once a trafficking network is functioning effectively, product diversification is easy. Not all countries might see weapons as the more destabilising commodity: illegal trade in mineral resources, gems, rare species, humans, counterfeit goods and drugs can all be processed through the same channels. The infiltration of the banking system, on the one hand, and the corruption of computerised information systems, on the other, are particularly pervasive problems that directly challenge the capacity of societies to govern themselves.

Today's context of rising transnational criminal organisations, supported by competitive black markets, provides an immediate threat to societies because of the level of insecurity and violence it brings to individuals, and because it challenges the establishment and consolidation of accountable and responsible government structures. Since the international arena consists of national actors, it follows that the stronger and more secure the national actor, the stronger the international community. Conversely, the weaker the national actor, the weaker the regional and international community will become, and the greater the need for the establishment of multinational processes for crisis management and conflict resolution. For all of these reasons, the context in which transnational criminal organisations operate must ultimately be seen as a direct challenge to the capacity states have firstly to govern themselves, and secondly to participate in multinational governance initiatives.

ENDNOTES

Edited version of a paper read at the ISS First International Conference on Regional Security, ESKOM, South Africa, 1 July 1997.



Based on V Gamba, Conclusions, in Society under Siege: Crime, Violence and Illegal Weapons, ISS, Halfway House, (forthcoming 1997) pp. 169-182.



See P Williams, Transnational Criminal Organisations, in Society Under Siege, ibid., pp. 11-41.



Ibid., p. 36.



Ibid.



Ibid.



Ibid., pp. 35-37.



Ibid., p. 37.