Modeling cartel size to inform violence reduction in Mexico

• 成果类型: Editorial Material
• 署名作者: Caulkins, Jonathan P.; Kilmer, Beau; Reuter, Peter
• 署名单位: Carnegie Mellon University; RAND Corporation; Rand Health; University System of Maryland; University of Maryland College Park; University System of Maryland; University of Maryland College Park
• 刊物名称: SCIENCE
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0036-11266
• DOI: 10.1126/science.adj8911
• 发表日期: 2023-09-22
• 页码: 1291-1293
• 关键词: policies

摘要

Immense violence and corruption in Mexico, and their connections to illegal drugs in the United States, are a great problem of our time. Mexico's homicide rate in 2022 was 25 per 100,000, similar to Colombia's and more than triple the US rate. Measuring corruption is notoriously difficult, but some Mexican criminal organizations have a history of intimidating and bribing government officials (1). On page 1312 of this issue, Prieto-Curiel et al. (2) take on two important tasks: estimating how many people are employed by, and flow into and out of, Mexican criminal organizations responsible for much of the violence and corruption, and creating a model that permits what-if analysis of policy interventions. Concluding that increasing incarceration will lead to higher criminal employment and violence, the authors argue that restricting organizations' ability to recruit, such as by offering better alternative employment, is the only way to lower violence in Mexico.