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Exo-criminality of risk: An emerging challenge to the security of states and democratic stability

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DOI:

https://doi.org/10.56221/spt.v4i1.80

Keywords:

RCE, organized crime, transnationalization, criminal adaptability, state security, international cooperation

Abstract

This study examines the emergence of Exo-Criminality of Risk (ECR) as a criminal variant that differs from traditional organized crime by originating from external factors, such as migratory dynamics, social crises and other exogenous pressures, rather than from strategic planning by a criminal leadership. The research highlights that the ECR is characterized by a remarkable adaptability and operational flexibility, allowing its rapid integration into diverse local criminal ecosystems and modifying conventional patterns of criminal affiliation. Based on rigorous fieldwork, ethnographic analysis and academic review, the paper identifies two models of criminal expansion: strategic Transnational Organized Crime (TOC) and ECR, the latter driven by external social and opportunity factors. It also emphasizes the need to adapt state responses through police and judicial strategies and internationally coordinated public policies to effectively counter the threat posed by this emerging phenomenon.

Author Biographies

Pablo Zeballos

He has a degree in Superior Administration of Public Security and is a specialist in intelligence, international terrorism, emerging threats, TOC and dangerous religious groups. He has a professional career of twenty years as an officer in Carabineros de Chile. For more than twelve years, he has worked as a consultant and field researcher, dedicating his efforts to the analysis of changing social and criminal dynamics in Latin America. His comprehensive approach to public security and criminal analysis is reflected in the publication of his book A Virus in the Shadows: The Expansion of Drug Trafficking and Organized Crime (2024). In November 2024, he was summoned by the Ministry of the Interior and Public Security of Chile to join the Advisory Panel of Experts on Security, an ad honorem technical and consultative body made up of nine members. The purpose of this panel is to advise the Ministry of the Interior and Public Security and the Pro Security Cabinet in understanding new criminal phenomena affecting the country.

Douglas Farah

Founder and president of IBI Consultants, LLC, a consulting firm specializing in field research on transnational crime and strategic threats in Latin America. He has worked with the U.S. government (Department of Defense, Department of State), think tanks such as the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and the Atlantic Council, as well as the private sector. Between September 2013 and September 2022, he served as a Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic Studies at the National Defense University, leading a project dedicated to mapping illicit networks in the Western Hemisphere. The results of his research have been presented to academic institutions, intelligence, justice, political and defense directorates throughout the Americas. Prior to founding IBI Consultants in 2005, he worked for two decades as a correspondent for The Washington Post in Central and South America, covering civil wars, the Pablo Escobar phenomenon and the conflict in Colombia. He was also a correspondent in West Africa, reporting on the wars linked to “blood diamonds” and was a member of the investigative team focused on terrorism and other relevant issues. He is the author of numerous academic studies, chapters in several books and two outstanding works: Blood From Stones: The Secret Financial Network of Terror (Broadway, New York, 2004) and Merchant of Death: Money, Guns, Planes and the Man Who Makes War Possible (J. Wiley, New York, 2007; co-authored with Stephen Braun).

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Published

2025-04-28

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Issue

Vol. 4 No. 1 (2025): January to April

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Artículos

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