This briefing note – part of a project advancing a new conceptual framework designed to improve our understanding of Russian illicit financial flows (IFFs) as linked to foreign policy (FP) aims – provides an overview of Russia’s economic presence in South Eastern Europe. It first considers its interaction with the post-Yugoslav region as a whole, then zooming into the patterns at play in Serbia and Montenegro. These two countries have had a dramatic change in relations with Russia in 2014, when Montenegro implemented sanctions after the annexation of Crimea, and Serbia did not. This juncture offers a clear opportunity to think about the extent to which IFF from Russia are linked to foreign policy considerations.

Tena Prelec

May 2022

This briefing note shows how Russian foreign policy in Africa facilitates illicit financial flows (IFF) into and out of the continent through two case studies. First, in Sudan, gold-mining ventures, supported by military investments, are being exploited by Russian and Sudanese political elites hit by Wester economic sanctions. Second, in Madagascar, Russian ‘political technologists’ influenced electoral processes by cultivating anti-Western sentiments and supporting Moscow-friendly candidates.

Catherine Owen

May 2022

This paper charts the history of Afghanistan’s interaction with the international drug control system and the complex relationship between national–international policy formation. Drawing on primary documentation from US and British archives, as well as secondary literature and interviews, it tells the story of Afghanistan’s relationship with and impact on evolving global drug regulations from the birth of the League of Nations drug control system through the 1961 UN Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs and up to the present day. The research suggests the need for a more nuanced historical awareness of Afghanistan’s role within multilateral drug control as a way to understand its roles in the creation of the modern licit drug economy and its continued role in the modern illicit drug economy. Further, it demonstrates the need to engage broader society in discussions, to ensure more continuity is built into the system—as relationships built with the old regime in Afghanistan have collapsed.

John Collins & Ian Tennant

May 2022

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) focuses on combatting money laundering. In February 2012, it codified its recommendations, ‘FATF Recommendations 2012’, consisting of a framework of measures and international standards to combat money laundering and terrorist financing. Once a country agrees to follow the recommendations, it has to produce its anti-money laundering (AML) framework that FATF can assess. In this paper, we attempt to answer a simple question: is this working? We look at a group of eight countries in Africa and the Middle East that in the 2012– 2020 period have voluntarily agreed to implement these recommendations and test whether suspected illicit financial flows (IFF), measured through the trade-gap methods, decline after the decision to implement FATF recommendations. Our results point to a reduction of the trade gap characterising tax avoidance through import under-invoicing and/or Trade Based Money Laundering (TBML) through export over-invoicing.

Sami Bensassi & Arisyi Fariza Raz

May 2022

This briefing note summarises Albanians’ attitudes towards corruption and serious organised crime (SOC) based on a nationally representative survey of 3,003 people conducted between 15 January and 27 February 2022. All Albanians over the age of 18 were eligible to participate in the survey. All interviews were conducted at the household level, face to face, and in Albanian. The research identifies key patterns and variations in public opinion in order to inform policymakers and lay the foundation for the further research.

Nic Cheeseman & Caryn Peiffer

May 2022

This research uses decades of lessons and experience gained in irregular warfare (IW) – and in counterinsurgency in particular – to assist assessment and response to organised crime. Whereas recent experience with counterinsurgency in Iraq and Afghanistan presents mostly cautionary tales, tremendous insight can be gained from the scholarship and precedents that emanate from the broader field. Applying IW theory and experience to the problem of organised crime emphasises its indispensable context: how societies work, how governance and economic practice become corrupted, and how states can react, both to suppress the problem of crime but also to address its root causes. In this first phase of the research, lessons for strategy, policy and practice are identified, and plans for follow-on research where a framework for assessment and action previously elaborated for irregular challenges will be adapted for the specific problem of organised crime to assist in analysis and response.

David Ucko & Thomas Marks

May 2022

Organised crime poses one of the greatest threats to national security and development in the 21st century. Despite this, most policy, data collection, and scholarly research focuses on individuals and disorganised violence. Our work addresses several critical gaps in knowledge in the context of Medellín, Colombia’s second largest and most important city.

Christopher Blattman, Benjamin Lessing & Santiago Tobón

May 2022

Organised criminal activities, by their nature, are hard to measure. Administrative data are often missing, problematic, or misleading. Moreover, organised criminal activities are under-reported, and under-reporting rates may be greatest where gangs are strongest. Here we draw on our experience in Colombia, Brazil, and Liberia of collecting systematic data on illicit activities and armed groups, in order to share our learning with other researchers or organisations that fund research in this area, who may find this useful for their own research. We address: first steps before asking questions, common challenges and solutions, and alternative sources.

Christopher Blattman, Benjamin Lessing, Juan Pablo Mesa-Mejía & Santiago Tobón

May 2022

This paper categorises the practices used by Russian Kremlin-connected actors to advance Russian illicit financial flows (IFF) and depicts them, as well as their relationships to one another and to IFF in a novel framework. It argues that conclusively identifying and tracing IFF in authoritarian environments is very difficult due to the politicised nature of authoritarian legal systems and the inevitable data gaps. Our framework seeks to remedy these challenges by mapping malign practices, enacted by Russian actors in collaboration with elite overseas partners to create conditions friendly to Russian IFF, across three vectors: 1) political activities, 2) media activities and 3) political violence. We argue that the deployment of these practices is deeply connected to Russian foreign policy objectives, which are built in part on informal and patronal relationships with domestic elites. Thus, the principal actors in Russian foreign policymaking and -doing are not state institutions but elites, intermediaries, private companies, and organised crime groups.

Catherine Owen, Tena Prelec & Tom Mayne

May 2022

Strategies to counter serious organised crime (SOC) and corruption typically include an awareness-raising or messaging element. The hope is that this will engender both intolerance of corruption and SOC as well as public support for non-corrupt leaders and anti-SOC policies. A growing body of research, however, suggests that raising awareness of ‘social bads’ like organised crime and corruption may risk doing more harm than good. This research therefore aims to examine what effect a range of messaging strategies would have in Albania, a country that struggles with the malign effects of both corruption and SOC. It is therefore imperative to develop effective anti-SOC and anti-corruption strategies. The research tests the effect of different kinds of anti-SOC and anti-corruption messages in Albania, reporting on a nationally representative sample of 3,003 Albanian adults. The research finds similar negative impacts of messaging campaigns, considering whether the best way forward is to design new kinds of messages, or to move away from messaging campaigns in favour of deeper and more sustained forms of engagement. In either case, the path ahead should involve rigorous testing in order to avoid unintended consequences and ensure that investments are well spent.

Nic Cheeseman & Caryn Peiffer

May 2022

This short evidence review paper, written before February 2022, looks at the links between corruption, crime and conflict in eastern Ukraine. As well as explaining the background to the conflict in eastern Ukraine (at the time of writing), the paper also looks at the pre-conflict situation with regard to organised crime and corruption and how organised crime and corruption play a role in, and have been impacted by, the conflict.

Iffat Idris

May 2022

This research reviews existing evidence on the use and impact of targeted sanctions to disrupt organised criminal activity. It focuses on two case studies, Colombia and Libya, in differing regions of the world and with different exposure to organised crime-focused sanctions. The research analyses organised crime-related sanctions data, examines the current state of knowledge relating to the implementation and impact of these sanctions, and draws on the two case studies to identify a number of factors that influence the effectiveness of organised crime-focused sanctions. While the research focuses on other jurisdictions with track records of using sanctions to disrupt organised crime, implications for the UK are also explored, with a view to informing UK policy thinking on the potential establishment of an organised crime-focused sanctions regime.

Cathy Heinlein, Sasha Erskine, Elijah Glantz & Tom Keatinge

May 2022

This briefing note looks at the links between (lack of) political will and serious organised crime (SOC) and corruption. It suggests a new way to better understand political will and why a lack of political will may appear to exist. The lens of political want, political can and political must introduced here, based on Malena’s (2009) work on ‘getting from political won’t to political will’, can help those tasked with developing counter-SOC and anti-corruption strategies and interventions to move beyond seeing political will as a barrier, in order to better develop more politically and technically feasible reforms and approaches.

Heather Marquette

May 2022

This evidence review explores the literature on political will in relation to organised crime, kleptocracy, illicit finance, sanctions, trafficking and COVID-19. Findings demonstrate the importance of political will for effectively tackling SOC, illicit finance and transnational corruption, but also why it is so challenging to find political will, measure it and create demand for it.

Iffat Idris

May 2022