Migrants to Canada are routinely prosecuted for relatively minor offences and circulated back into a society torn apart by organized crime. This article summarizes findings from a research project entitled “Deportation, Circular Migration and Organized Crime” with case studies in Honduras and Jamaica. The research examined the impact of criminal deportation on organized crime in 
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Category Archive
Category | The Americas
Deportations are helping make Honduras one of the world’s most violent countries
By: Robert Muggah and Geoff Burt | Wednesday, June 22nd, 2016Publication Summary: Fighting corruption: The International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala
By: Tereza Steinhublova | Monday, March 21st, 2016Corruption poses a major threat to the effective functioning of a country’s justice sector, hindering its ability to uphold the rule of law thereby weakening the state. The case-study report “Crutch to Catalyst: The International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala” published by the International Crisis Group takes a closer look at the International Commission Against
Law Enforcement and Perverse Effects: The Evolution of the Central American Maras
By: Michael Lawrence | Monday, February 29th, 2016Crime and law enforcement are often entwined in a co-evolutionary process by which the actions of one prompt behavioral changes by the other that demand new strategies from the initial actor. While this dynamic is often recognized and anticipated by both law enforcement and criminal groups, it frequently yields perverse effects – unintended (and generally
Haiti and the Democracy-Public Security Interface
By: Stephen Baranyi and Timothy Donais | Wednesday, January 27th, 2016If the ability to hold credible, peaceful elections is a key litmus test of a country’s progress towards democratic consolidation, the latest evidence from Haiti is far from encouraging. The electoral cycle that began in August 2015 – following months of delays and governance by presidential decree – was meant to renew Haiti’s democratic institutions,
Reading List - Security Sector Reform in Haiti
By: Antoine Vandemoortele | Tuesday, January 26th, 2016With Haiti President stepping down without a successor in February 2016, and with security governance and security governance being key issues at both the national and local levels, the SSR Resource Centre created this SSR Country Snapshot to highlight key recent publications published by the Centre for Security Governance.
Urban Gangs Make Comeback as Political Goons in Haiti
By: Moritz Schuberth | Monday, August 3rd, 2015It is commonly perceived that the motivation of Haiti’s urban gangs has changed from political to criminal – falsely so as my research has found. Rather, the function gangs fulfill for their sponsors is constantly shifting between political and criminal, as evidenced by the current re-emergence of political violence ahead of elections later this year.
With Elections Looming, will Haiti’s Urban Gangs Re-emerge as Political Actors?
By: Geoff Burt | Friday, June 26th, 2015As Haiti enters a lengthy and no doubt turbulent period of electoral politics, the country’s long-standing drivers of conflict take on a particular significance. It has been over three years since Haiti last held elections, but by the end of this year more than 6,000 posts will have been contested in presidential, parliamentary and municipal
Backgrounder - The Security Sector Dimension of Colombia’s Peace Talks
By: Stéphanie Le Saux-Farmer | Friday, June 5th, 2015Peace talks between Colombia’s government and the country’s largest rebel group FARC began in November 2012 with the aim of ending a conflict that has left some 220,000 dead. Thus far, agreements have been reached on land reform, guerilla’s political participation, and the illegal drugs trade. Until now, the conflict had seen significant de-escalation since
The development of the National Police, public security and the rule of law in Haiti
By: Stephen Baranyi | Thursday, May 28th, 2015Centre for Security Governance (CSG) Senior Fellow Stephen Baranyi has co-authored a new report, with Yves Sainsiné, on the development of the National Police, public security and the rule of law in Haiti. The full report is available in French here. The English Executive Summary has also been published here on the SSR Resource Centre
America’s Chamberlain? Obama and the Challenge of American Power
By: David Law | Thursday, November 13th, 2014If we are honest about our efforts to prevent serious conflict, our track record is weak, to say the least. We fail to prepare for strategic discontinuities. We embrace deals that rest on sand. We often only seriously begin to address threats to our country’s population and material wealth when we no longer have the
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