Information in Counterrevolution: State Torture and the Armed Left in Southern South America in the 1970sPaul Katz, Columbia UniversityDissertation Fellowship, 2019 My dissertation examines the use of torture by the specialized urban intelligence operations units that reshaped the increasingly violent clash between two political projects—one revolutionary and evidently outmatched, the other counterrevolutionary and increasingly unconstrained—in southern South America in the 1970s. As the structure through which the bodies of thousands of revolutionary militants, and of many other real and perceived regime opponents, met the violence of the security state, these units proliferated across a region roiled by new forms of urban insurgency, torture-based intelligence operations, and strategies to oppose state violence that reverberated across the world. Across these years, I argue, systematic interrogatory torture functioned as a technology of social and bodily control, a political construct to be condemned, and a window onto the forms of violence advanced by actors on the Right and the Left. While attentive to dynamics that extend across southern South America, the dissertation looks primarily to the principal urban centers of the two largest countries in the region: Buenos Aires, Argentina, and São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It centers on the years between the creation of the region’s first specialized urban intelligence operations unit, São Paulo’s Operação Bandeirante, in 1969, and the destruction of the last-ditch Montonero Counteroffensive by Argentine intelligence operatives a decade later. Across these years, I argue, systematic interrogatory torture functioned as a technology of social and bodily control, a political construct to be condemned, and a window onto the forms of violence advanced by actors on the Right and the Left. Deployed and denounced in the course of an epoch-defining clash between Right and Left, it was above all, one Brazilian guerrilla fighter wrote in a June 1970 essay to his comrades, the Right’s “most efficient weapon to combat us.” Torture was used for purposes that extended far beyond the procurement of information, of course, functioning as a punishment, a deterrent, and an expurgatory fantasy of total control, and its victims reached far outside the armed Left to touch many thousands unconnected to political violence. Yet whatever its other functions, consequences, and interpretations, throughout the 1970s, torture was consistently employed in the context of information analysis and intelligence operations. It functioned as a means to uncover hidden revolutionary networks, to inculcate fear and perform fantasies of domination and control, to bolster socioeconomic hierarchies, and to cause vast psychological and physical damage to those deemed the enemy. At the same time, resisting torture granted the revolutionaries who prepared for it a means to claim a measure of power, and drawing international attention to it could impose something of a cost on its perpetrators. Predominant at the time, these openly political framings of torture have largely fallen out of public and scholarly debate, which is now conducted primarily in terms of accountability, human rights, and individual and collective trauma. My dissertation operates in a distinct register, using historical analysis to return the violence of southern South America’s 1970s to the counterrevolutionary context in which much of it was practiced and condemned. Drawing on dozens of archival collections from ten countries, I reconstruct the now-forgotten meanings of torture that defined this formative juncture, demonstrating the potential of history to reinvigorate a policy debate centered for too long on the question, “Does torture work?” Instead, I ask readers to consider the work that torture and its denunciation have performed at a critical moment in the past in order to generate new strategies to counteract it today.
Fear, Violence, and Restraint: Dynamics of Historical Change in the Tunisian RevolutionJean-Baptiste Gallopin, Yale UniversityDissertation Fellowship, 2018 Why did Tunisia alone peacefully transition from authoritarian rule in the wake of the Arab Spring? This question addresses the broader sociological puzzle of variation in revolutionary outcomes. Drawing from rich archival and interview data, I pursue a microanalysis of three pivotal moments in the Tunisian case. The dissertation reveals endogenous forms of causality that cast doubt on the explanatory value of dominant structural accounts, which emphasize the decisional impact of positional interests, dispositions, and an objective balance of power. In contrast, situational logic trumps motivational or contextual factors inherited from the long run, because actors facing the confusion and instability characteristic of revolutionary and postrevolutionary situations make their behavior conditional on one another. Hence the aggregate outcome of revolutions is sensitive to small events, and thus probably unpredictable. But we can explain individual and collective behavior by developing systematic propositions about the processes by which actors understand their situation and adjust to one another in these exceptional conditions. The first chapter investigates what drives the stance of armed forces facing an uprising. Soldiers and policemen make or break revolutions. Yet we know little about why they betray a dictator or stay loyal in the face of mass protests. I investigate the dynamics of the mutiny that overthrew Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali on January 14, 2011, turning the Tunisian uprising into a regional wave of unrest. I trace the likelihood of rebellion to the moment when reserve forces faced the imminent prospect of using large-scale lethal violence against civilians. The moment represents a critical decision, manifested in collective doubt and uncertainty. This makes professional armed forces susceptible to cascades, which are driven by expectations rather than preferences, positional interests, or institutional rules. Hence the stance of the institution as a whole is highly sensitive to small events that shape officers’ beliefs regarding their colleagues’ likely behavior. The mutiny of a handful of officers can tilt the institution as a whole. Flows of information prove to be decisive. Hence accounting for the variation in outcomes of mass uprisings requires shifting the explanatory focus toward endogenous, locally proximate causes. The argument has implications for the study of revolutions, authoritarian breakdown, civil-military relations, and nonviolence. The dissertation reveals endogenous forms of causality that cast doubt on the explanatory value of dominant structural accounts, which emphasize the decisional impact of positional interests, dispositions, and an objective balance of power. The second chapter draws from a study of the prelude to Tunisia’s 2011 “roadmap” to investigate the emergence of political pacts after the revolutionary collapse of a personalist regime. Such pacts feature prominently in dominant accounts of transitions from authoritarian rule, but how they come about is poorly understood. I argue that prevailing strategic evaluation hypotheses illuminate negotiators’ motivations, but fail to theorize how actors form a convergent view of their respective strengths, which is necessary to avoid conflict. In postbreakdown moments, public events—particularly mobilization events—provide the primary yardstick actors use to evaluate the balance of power. Well-attended street mobilization creates common knowledge about the capacity of the group and can focalize its stance, which allows it to overcome collective action problems, strengthens its bargaining position, and provides cues to the solution of the bargaining problem. A mobilization contest unambiguously favoring one side encourages the weaker side to concede, facilitating agreement. The argument has important implications for bargaining, collective action, and political transitions. The third chapter analyzes the Tunisian political crises of 2013 to explain group formation and contentious mobilization in reaction to violence. Processes of contentious escalation engage the definition of what constitutes the relevant actors: individuals mobilizing together broaden their relevant frame for action to a group with whom they identify. This point problematizes general accounts of mobilization that take groups for granted and anchors a line of inquiry focused on shifts in group boundaries as a prelude to action. I argue that public, symbolic acts of violence reinforce group boundaries associated with the acts’ symbolism while weakening those made irrelevant because the violent acts communicate the perpetrators’ intent to target a group and generate negative emotions among those who identify with the victims. Anger reinforces relevant cleavages, diminishes tolerance for ambiguity—fostering a logic of “with us or against us”—and provides a motivational basis for mobilization as a defensive display of solidarity. When well attended, mobilization fosters a sense of confidence and a perception of opportunity among contenders, facilitating further action. The argument locates the emergence of coalitions of contention in the coevolution of patterns of symbolic events, interpretation, and action. In doing so, it theorizes the effects of public violence, mediated by anger. It has broad implications for the study of social movements, community conflict, polarization, and descent into civil war.
The 1947 Taiwanese Rebellion: Last Battle of the Sino-Japanese War?Victor Louzon, Yale UniversityDissertation Fellowship, 2015 The thesis focuses on the “February 28 Incident” (or “228 Incident”), a 1947 Taiwanese revolt against the Chinese Kuomintang (KMT) authorities who had taken over the island in 1945, after fifty years of Japanese colonization. The KMT governorate led by Chen Yi quickly alienated the population by its inefficiency, corruption, and exclusion of Taiwanese people from most positions of power. It also, in the context of ongoing civil war on the mainland, proved unable to provide residents with the stability and standard of living that had prevailed under Japan. The rebellion spread across the island in a few days following a police blunder, before being quickly and very brutally repressed by reinforcements arriving from the mainland. The event is at the heart of contemporary Taiwanese memory struggles about the legitimacy of Chinese sovereignty over the island. My main object is to explore political violence, its repertoires, meaning, and origins. I devote equal attention to the Taiwanese insurgency, which can only be understood in light of Japanese colonization, and to the repression carried out by KMT forces, which bears the mark of state- and nation-building in early twentieth-century China. Since the 228 Incident has been extensively memorialized in Taiwan, the thesis begins with a history of the successive narratives of the event, which closely follow the course of Taiwanese political history. The imposition of an anti-Communist narrative by the KMT state during the Cold War was followed by a liberation of speech during the democratization of Taiwan. The movement for the rehabilitation of the victims gradually won its case. Over the past twenty years, with the entrenchment of pro-independence political forces and the rise of Chinese irredentism, the 228 Incident has been used as a cautionary tale against any reunification. On the Chinese nationalist side, the anti-Communist narrative of the incident gave way to an anti-Japanese one, identifying Taiwan’s colonial past as the source of the crisis. Taiwan has had a long tradition of uprisings against the state, since the late seventeenth-century Qing conquest. This subversive violence was embedded in an endemic competitive violence exacerbated by the fact that Taiwan was a frontier society. State-building efforts at the end of the nineteenth century led to new forms of protest. Armed struggle against Japanese colonization after 1895 built on this experience of resistance against state penetration, with the additional element of ethnic opposition. From 1915 onwards in the Han territories, the repertoires of protest were largely pacified, before the authoritarian turn of the 1930s and then World War II put an end to any autonomous political life. The event is at the heart of contemporary Taiwanese memory struggles about the legitimacy of Chinese sovereignty over the island. The 1947 rebellion was markedly different from past uprisings. It started in the cities; affected the whole island as a coherent space; massively involved educated youth (including girls, although in a supporting role); and made intensive use of modern means of communication and transport. The 228 Incident was deeply shaped by colonial modernity, and was dual in its social components. On the one hand, former colonial elites stepped in to replace paralyzed local authorities, forming “Resolution Committees” that put forward demands for local and provincial autonomy through mostly peaceful means. On the other hand, these committees tried, usually to little avail, to control numerous groups of young, more violent, rebels. The Taiwanese Communists sometimes managed to coordinate some of these groups, but were unable to impose their political agenda. The repertoire of actions and symbols these young rebels tapped into was recent: it originated in the mobilization of society by the Japanese government-general during World War II. This mobilization had resulted in the militarization of Taiwanese society through the recruitment of soldiers, the creation of youth organizations, and the dissemination of basic military education. Wartime colonialism proved both more coercive and more inclusive than peacetime colonialism, opening up new avenues of upward social mobility (material and symbolic) for Taiwanese youth from modest backgrounds. This coincided with an accelerated cultural Japanization. Militarized Taiwanese youth saw their social standing suddenly lowered after 1945 but were not completely demobilized, since their skills proved useful in the troubled postwar social conditions. When the revolt broke out, these youth spontaneously remobilized the networks, know-how, and imaginary developed during the war. Their ideology was not clearly defined. Loyalty to Japan was largely absent, and explicit political statements scarce. To some extent, the actions of armed groups spoke for themselves. They attacked mainlanders (civilians, police, and soldiers) on the streets, most of the time without homicidal intent, although dozens died; the goal was usually to intimidate or imprison mainlanders with the hope that they would relinquish positions of power, or even leave the island. Through the usurpation of police functions, the rebels regained possession of the public space and expressed their conviction that they were more capable of enforcing order than the “Chinese.” The rebels of 1947 nurtured a self-image as “civilized” people as opposed to mainland Chinese people, who were often presented, through Japanese colonial categories, as “backward.” The Chinese perception of the Taiwanese uprising owes a lot to these references to Japanese militarism. KMT authorities identified immediate causes of the revolt (the economic crisis, the ambitions of Taiwanese notables, a largely imaginary Communist plot) and deeper causes, which were invariably linked to the deleterious influence of Japan. The island was perceived through the lens of the violent yet symbiotic fifty-year relationship between Japanese imperialism and Chinese nation building, of which the Sino-Japanese War was the acme (a period that coincided exactly with the era of Japanese control over Taiwan). After 1945, the Chinese governorate on the island tried to emulate the Japanese government-general, which was considered efficient, while trying to erase cultural marks of the colonial era. The Incident signalled the failure of this attempt and was thoroughly humiliating for the authorities in Taipei. Seen from the national capital of Nanjing, it was not a strategic threat, but it was an international embarrassment. The restoration of Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan, promised by the Allies in 1943, was one of the symbols of the fragile and contested victory of 1945. The embarrassment was aggravated when some Taiwanese notables requested the intervention of the United States. KMT propaganda considerably exaggerated the violence of the rebels against civilians, explicitly presented as a resurgence of Japanese atrocities in China. The bulk of the suppression was carried out by mainland troops who knew nothing about Taiwan. Chen Yi’s government, following the Japanese example, relied on the police and not the army, which had largely been sent back to the mainland in 1946. This police, whose lower ranks were entirely occupied by islanders, collapsed at the first shock. Chen Yi thus had to stall and make concessions that emboldened the rebels before reinforcements arrived. The military personnel in charge of the repression had two main components. On the one hand, politicized, highly nationalistic officers from the Whampoa Academy; on the other, Sichuanese troops with much less ideological training but an intensely traumatic and brutalizing experience of combat against Japan, who had been kept battle-ready to fight the Communists after 1945. These two groups were highly receptive to the framing of the pacification of Taiwan as an extension of the anti-Japanese struggle. The disproportionate violence of the repression had two aspects. On the one hand, military intelligence assassinated or imprisoned rebellious elites, some of whom had not participated in the Committees, targeting in particular those individuals deemed to be the most compromised by the Japanese. This operation was framed as a second postcolonial purge, the first having been fairly limited. On the other hand, the army engaged in indiscriminate killings that were primarily aimed at young men, especially if they showed outward signs of Japaneseness. This unleashing of violence was not ordered but enabled by the authorities, who turned a blind eye and legitimized it by portraying the rebellion as an act of war. The suppression went along with a summary rebuilding of state authority that used counterinsurgency methods tested against the Communists in the 1930s. This was accompanied by a propaganda campaign designed to persuade the Taiwanese that they belonged to the Chinese nation and partook in its victory over “fascist” Japan. The 228 Incident crushed all resistance against the Chinese state in Taiwan. With the KMT’s withdrawal to the island in 1949, its priority shifted from the eradication of the colonial legacy to the anti-Communist struggle. Positive references to the island’s Japanese past were nevertheless banned, as the nationalist dictatorship established Taiwan as a conservatory of Chinese culture. Those references only resurfaced with the liberalization of the regime and the emergence of “Taiwanese identity” as a central concern of political debate.
Territorial Masquerades: Violence, Paramilitaries, and Frontier State Formation in ColombiaTeofilo Ballvé, University of California, BerkeleyDissertation Fellowship, 2014 This project challenged the notion that the cause of Urabá, Colombia’s violent history and unruly contemporary condition is the “absence of the state.” The absence of the state is a standard explanation—across public, policy, and academic circles—of why Colombia’s frontier regions are so wracked by violence. Although Ballvé takes this locally oft-repeated claim seriously, he demonstrates that Urabá is more than a simple case of Hobbesian political disorder. Ballvé argues that Urabá, rather than existing in statelessness, has actually been an intense and persistent site of state-building projects. Through an exploration of war, paramilitary organizations, grassroots support and resistance, and drug-related violence, Ballvé argues that Urabá, rather than existing in statelessness, has actually been an intense and persistent site of state-building projects. Indeed, these projects have thrust together an unlikely gathering of guerilla groups, drug-trafficking paramilitaries, military strategists, technocratic planners, local politicians, and development experts, each seeking to give concrete coherence to the inherently unwieldy abstraction of “the state” in a space in which it supposedly does not exist. By untangling this odd mix, Ballvé reveals how Colombia’s violent conflicts have produced surprisingly coherent and resilient, if not at all benevolent, regimes of power and profit.
Inviting Intervention: Statebuilding by Delegating SecurityAila Matanock, University of California, BerkeleyResearch Grant, 2023 My Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation–funded project examines delegation agreements as a form of cooperative statebuilding. Delegation agreements are arrangements where host states invite foreign actors to temporarily assume authority over security governance, including the implementation of reforms in security institutions. This project fundamentally explores the circumstances under which such agreements arise and the agreements’ implications for long-term security outcomes. The core of this project has three dimensions: developing a typology of all invited interventions, with a particular focus on delegation agreements that provide for reform of security institutions; building a theoretical framework to understand the adoption of these agreements as well as how their design shapes security outcomes over time; and collecting and analyzing multiple types of data to test the empirical implications of delegation agreements. This project fundamentally explores the circumstances under which [delegation] agreements arise and the agreements’ implications for long-term security outcomes. The funding from The HFG Foundation facilitated work on a book manuscript that developed the typology and theoretical framework, as well as the first systematic dataset on delegation agreements, which codes cross-national data on all invited interventions in security institutions in Sub-Saharan Africa from 1980 to 2015. The manuscript posits that delegation agreements—the most intrusive form of invited intervention because they provide for reform of state security institutions—are mainly driven by domestic leaders facing internal crises where tying their own hands is useful for enacting hard changes to stabilize security institutions. Foreign sovereign entities are willing partners in these deals because of their concerns about transnational threats. The evidence, including the patterns in the new cross-national dataset, supports these empirical implications. This project not only enhances our understanding of delegation agreements and shared sovereignty more broadly, but it also provides insights for policymakers considering how to reform security institutions, including by highlighting some of the challenges and limitations of this method of statebuilding.
Forging Informal Citizenship in the Shadow of the State: Armed Nonstate Actors and Migrant Incorporation in the Colombian and Mexican BorderlandsCharles Larratt Smith, University of Texas at El PasoResearch Grant, 2023 The main goals of this research project, “Forging Informal Citizenship in the Shadow of the State: Armed Nonstate Actors and Migrant Incorporation in the Colombian and Mexican Borderlands,” are to improve our understanding of the role played by armed nonstate actors (ANSAs) in regulating and incorporating large inflows of foreign migrants in volatile borderlands under their control, and to assess to what extent existing state policies increase or decrease migrants’ exposure to these violent actors and potential victimization. Specifically, this project seeks to explore these dynamics in two countries with a wide variety of ANSAs that have in recent years experienced unprecedented incoming migration flows: Colombia and Mexico. The generosity of The Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation’s Distinguished Scholar Award has financed extensive fieldwork in various locations in these two countries that has generated over 150 interviews with members of the migrant population and other individuals who attend to this vulnerable demographic. The presence of state authorities in places where migrants congregate, whether in transit or establishing quasi-permanent settlements, does not necessarily produce a higher level of security for the migrants or their property. Presently, there are a few preliminary findings from this project. First, the presence of state authorities in places where migrants congregate, whether in transit or establishing quasi-permanent settlements, does not necessarily produce a higher level of security for the migrants or their property. In contrast, state policies that grant greater powers to the military and law enforcement to regulate migration processes often lead to increased violent predation and victimization of the migrant population instead of enhanced protection for this vulnerable demographic. Additionally, migrants in both countries are at risk of being victimized by “bad faith” actors; however, these risks are clearly institutionalized in Mexico as a result of its restrictive immigration policies. In contrast, Colombia’s more “open” immigration policies do not amplify opportunities for the victimization of the migrant population. Rather, violent predation against migrants there is the product of the country’s limited state capacity and highly competitive criminal markets.
Towards a Constructivist Grounded Theory: Understanding the Transnational Production of Anti-immigrant Sentiments in AfricaSurulola Eke, Queens UniversityResearch Grant, 2023 This project studied the rising rate of anti-immigrant sentiments in African countries. It was inspired by the realization that the attitudes of citizens and governments were increasingly becoming antagonistic toward immigrants in major migrant destinations in Africa such as South Africa, Kenya, and Ghana, and at a time when anti-immigrant sentiments were also rising in Europe and North America. As in other places, there are domestic reasons for growing anti-immigrant sentiments in these African countries. In Ghana, for instance, the media and government claim that Nigerian, Ivorian, and other West African immigrants overstay their visas or establish businesses without obtaining the right residency and business permits. Similarly, in Kenya, the terrorist attack by Al Shabaab at the Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi stirred up animosity toward residents of Somali descent. Relatedly, South African media are awash with reports of illegal immigrants working in mines and taking up strategic trading spots to the detriment of citizens. While these events, practices, and tendencies can shape attitudes, a prominent theory in international studies known as constructivism teaches us that the way we view things is influenced by a competition of ideas in relation to that thing, not simply by what we can see or observe. In the results of the survey conducted, exposure to rhetoric on immigrants in other countries predicts people’s opposition to immigrants in their own country. Therefore—and considering the facts that we are in a digital age in which different distant “worlds” and societies are connected, and that migration is a global phenomenon—this project aimed to examine whether and how the migration norms resulting from a global competition of ideas influence anti-immigrant sentiments in major migrant destinations in Africa. From speaking purposively with everyday people on the streets of Accra and Kumasi, Ghana, Nairobi and Mombasa, Kenya, and Johannesburg and Durban, South Africa; deliberately seeking the experiences and views of postsecondary-educated individuals and journalists; and then developing and administering surveys, the project produced nuanced understandings of growing antiimmigrant sentiments across these cities. The three-phase research found that, consistent with the assumption of the theory of constructivism, there is an ongoing competition of ideas on immigration in African countries with large immigrant populations. These competing ideas—pro-immigrant (neoliberal) on the one hand, and anti-immigrant (nationalist) on the other—are playing out in how people interpret the economic gain or loss of immigration, the necessity or luxury of humanitarianism, and the physical and cultural threat, or lack thereof, posed by immigrants. Most significantly, the study finds that, whereas the influence of the pro-immigrant neoliberal migration norm is weakening, the nationalist anti-immigrant norm is strengthening because there is no global community of pro-migration advocates. Conversely, antimigration sentiment is supported and promoted by a robust global community of nationalists deliberately seeking to influence attitudes in places far and near. This conclusion is reinforced by the fact that anti-immigrant sentiments across the case studies are greater in places where migration levels increased at the same time as the influence of the global community of nationalists. Additionally, in the results of the survey conducted, exposure to rhetoric on immigrants in other countries predicts people’s opposition to immigrants in their own country.
Murder by Structure: How Street Gangs Built the Great American CityAndrew Papachristos, Northwestern UniversityResearch Grant, 2021–2022 Why does violence erupt on the same streets year after year, decade after decade, and not on other streets just a few blocks away? Virtually every city in the United States—whether considered “safe” or “dangerous”—shows the same pattern of violence stubbornly concentrated on the same streets and in the same neighborhoods. Because neighborhoods struggling with violence are often portrayed as “violent” and “dangerous,” it is tempting to fall back on hackneyed and racist characterizations of “bad people” and “bad places.” But such explanations are myopic, ignoring history and the intentional natures of cities. Cities are built. From the tallest skyscraper to the sewer system buried beneath the streets, cities are built upon the plans and decisions of those who wield the power to build or destroy. City planners and city makers determine where kids play and where they go to school. They decide who has access to jobs, health care, food, and justice. On their face, crime maps of our cities appear to show a snapshot of people and their problems. But dig a little deeper and these maps are a record of the decisions and actions of city makers. This book examines how the concentration of violence in particular places results not simply from the policies and plans of powerful city makers, but also from struggles that arise as neighborhoods try to improve the lives of their residents. To this end, the book centers the actions of one of the fiercest defenders of neighborhood identity: street gangs. By tracing the evolution and development of street gangs in Chicago, this book reveals how the crime maps we see today are the product of violent turf wars of the past; not just turf wars between gangs, but also battles between gangs, on the one hand, and the state, urban developers, powerful politicos, the police, and poverty, on the other. This is a story of how white gangs wove their own networks into the political and economic fabric of the city and, on their way up and out of gangland, built barriers (physical and social) to keep Black and Latino gangs from following the same paths out of poverty. When Black gangs tried to improve their own lot, they were met with brutal opposition. Gangland became its own prison, with visible and invisible walls surrounding neighborhoods, schools, and job markets. The patterns of violence we see today rest upon networks of violence and relationships built over nearly a century. Understanding and doing something about violence today, then, requires us to not only acknowledge the past but to understand the way it shapes patterns, conflicts, and violence today. On their face, crime maps of our cities appear to show a snapshot of people and their problems. But dig a little deeper and these maps are a record of the decisions and actions of city makers. This book retells the hidden history of how street gangs built the Great American City. It brings into the foreground those parts of our urban history that are often tucked into alleyways and prison cells. Most city histories portray gangs as antagonists—the danger lurking in the shadows, tucked away in “those neighborhoods” and responsible for crime waves and gun violence. This project explores the crucial moments in the development of a city when the actions (and violence) of gangs fundamentally shaped the city itself. The chapters of the book are organized around these key turning points in Chicago’s history, spanning nearly a century. Part I, Gangland, describes the earliest attempts of gangs to use their street organizations as a path up and out of poverty, chronicling the period of white gang formation and eventual dissipation into city power structures. This part concludes by detailing the emergence of hundreds of Black gangs across Chicago without an obvious pathway for upward mobility. Part II, Street Organization and the War on Gangs, describes the evolution of Black gangs in the 1960s from street corner crews to powerful citywide federations known as gang “nations.” These groups, locked out of the paths of social mobility, developed new avenues for making themselves relevant and fought to bring resources, power, and voice to their own neighborhoods—increased organization that was met with fierce resistance from the state in the form of an emerging “War on Gangs.” Part III, Outlaw Capitalism, recounts how incarcerated gang leaders in the 1980s refashioned their groups into more organized entities as the advent of crack cocaine and the “greed is good” mantra of the 80s ushered in a new era during which organized gang nations orchestrated massive drug markets throughout the city. Part IV, Demolished, documents how a brutal and far-reaching “Second War on Gangs”—precipitated by rising levels of violence in the 1990s intermixed with a national panic around the crack epidemic—unfolded on two fronts. The first front, on the streets, was waged by the police, who developed new tactics limiting where gang members could walk, stand, and live. The second front was in the courts and board rooms, with a massive federal prosecution of Chicago’s largest “corporate” gangs, the demolition of high-rise housing projects, and the closing of “underperforming” schools. The Epilogue describes the current situation in which hundreds of small gangs are scattered throughout the city’s gangland, still searching for a way up and out of poverty—the violence of today, much like the violence of the past, unfolding within the walls of gangland as groups struggle to find paths for a better future.
The Impact of Zoonotic Disease Outbreaks on Conflict in AfricaOre Koren, Indiana University Research Grant, 2021–2022 This study investigates the effect of zoonotic disease outbreaks on conflict dynamics in Africa from 1997 to 2019. Zoonotic diseases, which originate in animals and can infect humans, pose significant threats to public health and political stability. This research explores how these outbreaks influence different types of conflict, particularly focusing on state-initiated conflicts, rebel attacks, and social conflicts involving militias. The study used a newly created geolocated dataset tracking twenty-two zoonotic pathogens identified by the World Health Organization (WHO) as significant outbreaks of concern in the region. This dataset was combined with the Armed Conflict Location and Event Dataset (ACLED) to analyze armed and social conflict events across Africa. A gridded analysis approach was used, examining 0.5-degree (~55 km²) cells over 288 months. The analysis incorporated climate and socioeconomic indicators to control for local-level confounders and used multiple estimation procedures to ensure robustness against potential simultaneity concerns. This research explores how these outbreaks influence different types of conflict, particularly focusing on state-initiated conflicts, rebel attacks, and social conflicts involving militias. Key Findings: State-Initiated Conflict: Zoonotic disease outbreaks are associated with a significant reduction in state-initiated conflicts, with a decrease ranging from 5% to 120%. Social Conflicts: Outbreaks are linked to a notable increase in social conflicts driven by identity militias, with an increase ranging from 30% to 55%. Rebel Attacks and Political Militias: The relationship between zoonotic outbreaks on the one hand, and rebel attacks and political militia conflicts on the other, is ambiguous, with no statistically significant impact observed. The study first relies on linear regression models to identify the associations between zoonotic disease outbreaks and four types of conflict. Additional sensitivity analyses, including accounting for environmental stressors and conflict history, are used to assess the robustness of the results. For ensuring the results are robust to potential endogeneity and serial correlation, a series of two-way systems general methods of moments (GMM) approach was used. Finally, to obtain causal inference, average treatment effects in the treated/conflict-affected locations (ATT) was estimated based on the epidemiological causal estimation approach. Zoonotic disease outbreaks in Africa are not only public health crises but also catalysts for political instability and conflict. This project, supported by a Distinguished Scholar Award from The Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, provides a template for assessing these impacts and suggests mitigation strategies to enhance political stability and prevent protracted conflicts. As the risk of zoonotic outbreaks increases, these findings underscore the need for comprehensive and coordinated responses to these dual threats, and suggest some measures for achieving these aims.
Targeted Recruitment: Explaining Why Certain Clans Join and Eschew Al-Shebab in SomaliaMohammed Ibrahim Shire, University of PortsmouthResearch Grant, 2021–2022 This research aims to comprehensively understand the dynamics of Al-Shabaab’s recruitment, particularly focusing on the clan-based structure of its membership and the group’s strategic recruitment methods. It reveals a multifaceted picture, where historical, sociopolitical, and cultural factors significantly influence individuals’ decisions to join the militant group. Clans like the Rahanweyn (Digil and Mirifle), despite having stable political and economic conditions, exhibit higher enlistment rates in Al-Shabaab. This pattern challenges the traditional view that economic hardship is the primary driver of recruitment. Instead, the study underscores the importance of historical grievances, clan narratives, and identity politics. The overrepresentation of certain clans, such as the Rahanweyn and Somali Bantu, points to a complex interplay of factors. Historical marginalization and a sense of collective grievance appear to play a critical role in this dynamic. Communities that have been historically marginalized, have had their territories unlawfully confiscated during the civil war, and that are seeking to level the playing field form one group with higher enlistment rates. Notable among these are the Somali Bantu groups and segments of the Digil and Mirifle subclans. A second group with higher enlistment rates are subclans that, while part of politically dominant clans, have been marginalized at the political level and may be seeking to exact revenge on other subclans within the same clan family groups. Notable examples include the Gaaljecel and Marehan clans. A third group are subclans with a historical ideological grounding in Salafism and Wahhabism, such as certain segments within the Majerten, Duduble, and Habar Gidir clans. A final group with higher enlistment rates comes from minority subclans that, while well-respected within the Somali clan and political milieu, lack representation at the national level unless they align with a dominant actor, such as the Sheekhaal clan family. The study suggests that Al-Shabaab’s recruitment strategies are tailored to exploit these historical and cultural narratives, resonating with the specific experiences and perceptions of these clans. This approach allows Al-Shabaab to present itself as not just a militant group but a movement embedded in the historical and sociocultural fabric of Somali society. The absence of other clans in Al-Shabaab’s ranks also speaks volumes. It indicates that factors deterring recruitment are just as nuanced as those promoting it. Clans with a history of relative privilege or those who have not experienced the same level of historical grievance may not find Al-Shabaab’s narrative appealing. This aspect of the research highlights the need for counterterrorism strategies that are sensitive to these varied clan histories and experiences. Furthermore, the research indicates that Al-Shabaab’s ability to adapt its recruitment messages to different clans has been a significant factor in its resilience. By aligning its messaging with the historical grievances and aspirations of specific clans, Al-Shabaab has managed to maintain a steady flow of recruits, despite facing military and political setbacks. The research provides a comprehensive analysis of Al-Shabaab's recruitment strategies, highlighting the complex interplay of ideological, cultural, and pragmatic factors. A second research question focuses on the strategic methods employed by Al- Shabaab in recruiting target groups. This inquiry uncovers a sophisticated, multifaceted approach that Al-Shabaab uses to attract recruits. The group employs a blend of modern digital media strategies and traditional propaganda methods, effectively using tools like social media, video platforms, and print media. This approach allows Al-Shabaab to craft tailored messages that resonate with specific demographic segments, including various clans. One of the key findings is Al-Shabaab’s ability to blend ideological indoctrination with pragmatic incentives in its recruitment strategy. The group’s propaganda is not just focused on ideological or religious appeals but also taps into sociocultural narratives and clan identities. This strategy has proven effective in appealing to a broad spectrum of potential recruits, each with their unique motivations and susceptibilities. Interviews with former Al-Shabaab members and defectors provide crucial insights into these recruitment strategies. Many defectors have reported that their decision to join the group was influenced by a combination of ideological persuasion and tangible benefits, such as financial incentives or promises of social status. This aspect of voluntary recruitment is significant, as it suggests that Al-Shabaab’s influence extends beyond mere coercion or force. The research also delves into Al-Shabaab’s use of targeted messaging. The group’s propaganda materials are designed to resonate with specific clans, using narratives that are familiar and persuasive to these groups. By embedding their recruitment messages within the context of clan grievances, historical narratives, and cultural codes, Al-Shabaab effectively creates a sense of relevance and urgency among its target audiences. Moreover, the study highlights the shortcomings in current counterrecruitment strategies. Traditional approaches often lack the nuance and cultural specificity required to effectively counter the targeted messages of Al-Shabaab. The research suggests that a more tailored approach, which addresses the specific motivations and cultural contexts of different clans and communities, is necessary to disrupt the recruitment cycle effectively. In summary, the research provides a comprehensive analysis of Al-Shabaab’s recruitment strategies, highlighting the complex interplay of ideological, cultural, and pragmatic factors. It reveals how the group tailors its messaging to resonate with specific demographic and clan groups, emphasizing the importance of understanding these nuances for effective counter-terrorism strategies. The findings challenge simplistic views of terrorist recruitment, pointing instead to the roles of historical grievances, clan identity, and cultural narratives. This nuanced understanding is vital for developing targeted interventions that address the root causes of recruitment, contributing to sustainable peace and stability in the region. By acknowledging the diverse motivations and vulnerabilities of potential recruits, policymakers and practitioners can design more culturally informed and multifaceted counterrecruitment strategies.
