For the past two decades, the northern triangle of Central America (Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras) has been experiencing alarmingly high murder rates. Paradoxically, so it may seem, this spike in homicides occurred once wars and political repression had ended. Research into violence in the isthmus tends to focus on individual countries or particular forms of violence, for example the street gangs. Heidrun Zinecker, an international relations scholar at Leipzig University, takes a comparative approach to the subject. Gewalt im Frieden (‘Violence in Peace’) is an ambitious attempt to understand the causes of violent crime in Central America. Specifically, this extensive study analyses why in a region with historical-structural similarities, three countries (the northern triangle) feature elevated homicide rates and two countries (Costa Rica and Nicaragua) do not. Based on more than 250 semi-structured interviews, conducted mostly between 2005 and 2007, as well as a wide range of primary and secondary sources, the book proposes a theoretical framework and tests it in three empirical chapters. Zinecker argues that a combination of structural and agency factors explain the five nations’ susceptibility to, and reality of, violence. Whereas the existence of democracy and market economy correlate with a low susceptibility to violence in Costa Rica, regime hybridity and rent economy in the other four countries make them vulnerable to violence. Yet, Nicaragua has characteristics that are absent in the northern triangle (notably a democratic security strategy, a professional and community-oriented police, and local political participation) and therefore has much lower homicide levels than its northern neighbours.
Zinecker draws on comparative politics and criminological theories to suggest that political-economic structural factors (high remittance and maquila rates, political exclusion, and defective rule of law) create susceptibility to violence, whereas criminological structural and agency factors (anomie, relative deprivation, and frustration) produce the reality of violence. A structure of social controls, however, can interrupt this circuit. The basic idea of this complex framework is that individuals may turn to violence as a substitute for access to the market and political inclusion. The argument holds in the case of street gangs, whose members achieve respect and status among their peers through the use of symbolic violence. Outside these groups, would individuals who feel deprived not commit monetary offences, rather than violence? In order to clarify these and other doubts, the theoretical framework would need to be tested more widely. On the other hand, Zinecker's variables can explain why people may kill, but not why they do kill. Establishing homicide motives is of course beyond the scope of an academic study, especially when high impunity rates preclude investigations into possible patterns. When and why persons do or do not murder, however, is a question that cannot be ignored, especially when one tries to understand short-term upsurges or drops in homicide numbers. Did El Salvador's murder rate escalate after a collapsed gang truce, because the gangs ratcheted up the violence against the state and the police retaliated, or are other factors at play? Has Guatemala's homicide rate steadily declined since 2009, because improved criminal investigations have reduced the levels of impunity and therefore the incentives to commit crimes?
Perhaps the most fascinating part of the book concerns the security sector (police, judiciary, prisons, and a vigilante civil society) in the northern triangle. Zinecker begins by explaining how the three countries have not only lacked a coherent security policy, but also how the strategies they pursued have impacted fluctuating homicide rates. The author divides these strategies into four phases, ranging from security sector reform, counter reforms, mano dura (‘iron fist’) and militarisation, to gang truces and the continuation of mano dura. The police, weakened by corruption and a resource deficit, see suspects released for lack of evidence. Under pressure to make arrests, officers arrest innocent people and commit abuses. Citizens, perceiving the police as unable to ensure their safety, turn to alternative measures, notably private security and vigilante justice. Not only are social prevention and rehabilitation neglected, but also the state and civil society try to compensate for the control deficit repression and vigilantism, ultimately leading to a ‘control surplus’. For Zinecker, a combination of structural and agency factors explains relentlessly high homicide rates, and specific factors (such as an early institutional vacuum and the implementation of mano dura) contribute to temporal upswings. A key point to emerge from the analysis concerns the stabilising function of violent crime. Drawing on sociologist Peter Waldmann's notion of the anomic state, one where stateness exists in form but not in content, Zinecker contends that poor security sector performance turns violent crime into an outlet for grievances that might otherwise turn into political violence. Elites in the northern triangle are unsupportive of complete democratisation and strengthened security sector capacity, since this might threaten their status and reveal their involvement in corruption, clientelism and organised crime. Violent crime, since it meets the needs of some of the marginalised in society and does not challenge the status quo, is thus in the interest of these elites.
Overall, Gewalt im Frieden entails a critical and thorough analysis of one of Central America's foremost social problems. Zinecker concludes with a list of broad policy recommendations for the sustained reduction of violence, such as the creation of local jobs and more spaces for political participation, or the strengthening of the entire security sector. Given current political realities, however, it is unclear where change, or the pressure for change, might come from. The challenge is not only to find a holistic response to interrelated policy problems, but also to depoliticise institutions and create public policies, not strategies that tend not to outlast the administration that proposes them. Zinecker's work makes an important contribution to the study of violent crime in Central America. Although the book's language will likely limit its audience, it would appeal to scholars of violence, policing, and security sector reform. Future research could build on these findings by exploring the relationship between violent crime and firearms availability or the culture of violence; local violence prevention initiatives; the impact of street gangs on local security initiatives; or the feasibility of community policing in conflictive communities.
