A P R E L I M I N A R Y S T U D Y O F T H E S O C I O - E C O N O M I CI M P A C T S A N D D E V E L O P M E N T L I N K A G E S O F S M A L LA R M S P R O L I F E R A T I O N , A V A I L A B I L I T Y A N D U S E

“Development Held Hostage”:Assessing the Effects of Small Arms on Human Development

United Nations Development Programme

April 2002

Robert Muggah

Peter Batchelor

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United Nations Development Programme

U N D P

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) helps people in 174 countriesand territories to help themselves, focusing on poverty eradication and democratic gover-nance. In support of these goals UNDP is frequently asked to help create and implementpolicies that are more responsive to the needs of ordinary people, and to help societiesrebuild in the aftermath of war and humanitarian emergencies. UNDP is also an advo-cate for increased development assistance and a more inclusive global economy.

For further information please contact:

United Nations Development ProgrammeUNDPPBureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery (BCPR)One United Nations PlazaNew York, NY 10017USA

Tel: +1 (212) 906 6376Fax: +1 (212) 906 6887

http://www.undp.org/erd/smallarms

New York, April 2002

© United Nations Development Programme

The views expressed in this report are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of the United Nations or the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). The designations employed and the presentation of thematerial in this publication do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the United Nations or the United Nations Development Programme regarding the legal status of any country, territory or area, or itsauthorities or armed groups, or concerning the deliberations of its frontiers or boundaries

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T here is a sense that any discussion of the impacts of small arms involves a discus-sion of the obvious—that small arms in the wrong hands kill many people, create a climate of terror, and contribute to a downward spiral of poverty and misery.

While the basic humanitarian suffering resulting from the use of small arms might beevident, the underlying damage to a society caused by these guns is often less clear.Beyond being used to kill more than 300,000 people a year in conflicts, usually in theworld’s poorest countries, small arms are often the primary instruments that can set backthe development process years or sometimes decades. These illicit weapons often affectwhether people can live in their own homes and communities, whether they can earn alivelihood, whether they will enjoy any legal rights or protection, and whether they willhave access to health and education services.

This report is a study of what the widespread use of small arms costs society. Beyondbasic assumptions, it is an initial attempt to understand the true impacts of the use ofsmall arms on the lives of people, on communities, and on prospects for development.Clearly, there are limitations on what we know due to a lack of reliable statistics andinformation, yet this report provides an extensive look into the far-reaching nature of the problem.

UNDP’s small arms programme, which has worked to collect thousands of small arms inprojects in Afghanistan, Albania and Congo Brazzaville, continues to expand as morecountries request assistance to address small arms problems. To meet this growing need,better information is needed in order to develop good policy, organize and implementeffective projects, and to measure the impacts of such interventions. Understanding the costs of small arms-driven impacts on development will provide the programme with a greater ability to target these interventions and achieve the greatest benefit to themost people.

This report provides the full scope of the problems and circumstances that these programmes must address. The findings of this study reinforces the importance ofUNDP’s continuing commitment to fully understand the issues and identify solutionsthat will help end senseless conflict and violence while helping to promote long-termhuman development.

Julia TaftAssistant Administrator and DirectorBureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery, UNDP

Robert ScharfSmall Arms AdvisorBureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery, UNDP

New York, April 2002

Abbreviations ........................................5

Executive Summary ..........................6

Chapter 1 Introduction ............................................8

Box. 1. Why are small arms a risk to

human development?

Chapter 2Why Armed Violence and Small Arms Matter toDevelopment ........................................10

Figure 1. Indicators of Insecurity in

Nicaragua: 1990-99

Waking up to the Problem ....................12

Box 2. Small Arms Facts

Box 3. An AK-47 for a Chicken?

The Economics of Illicit Small Arms

Conflict, Peace and Development.......13

Chapter 3Measuring the Impacts of SmallArms on Development....................15

Figure 2. A Matrix of the Effects and Indicators of Small ArmsAvailability and Uses

Direct EffectsFirearm Death and Injury ..........................17

Box 4. Small Arms vs. Anti-Personnel

Mines (APMs): Assessing the

Impacts

Box 5. Are 90 per cent of war-related

casualties really civilian?

Box 6. Determining a Risk Rating

for Small Arms?

Costing Firearm Related Death and Injury ......................................20

Box 7. The Costs of Firearm Injury on

Households in South Africa

Indirect Effects ........................................22

Armed Violence and Criminality..........23Figure 3. Homicide Rates in Selected

Latin American cities

Figure 4. Armed Insecurity in Honduras

Figure 5. Personal Security Incidents

in Nicaragua

Forced Displacement ..............................26Figure 6. Kakuma Refugee Camp:

1995-2000

Declining Social Services .....................28

Collapsing Economic Activity...............30Figure 7. FDI and ODA flows in Albania:

1998-1999

Box 8. FDI, ODA and small arms

Investment, Savings and Revenue Collection.................................32

Social Capital ...........................................33Box 9. An Indigenous Response:

The Kuria’s Sungusungu in Kenya

Development Intervention and theCulture of Withdrawal ............................35

Box 10. Security and Oxfam-GB

Chapter 4Conclusion: Confronting the Problem ..........................................37

Supply Side Interventions ...................38Box 11. What can Voluntary Weapons

Collection Achieve?

Demand-Side Interventions .................39

References ..........................................41

Acknowledgements: With thanks to Richard Jolly,Michael Brzoska, Adrian Wilkinson,Eric Filippino, Michael Renner,Patrick McCarthy, Camilla Waszinkand many others for comments onearlier drafts. Also our thanks toUN country field representativeswho provided important sugges-tions and empirical material.

Table of Contents

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AKM Automatic KalashnikovMachine-Gun

APM Anti-Personnel MineBICC Bonn International Center

for ConversionBCPR Bureau for Crisis Prevention

and RecoveryCDC Centre for Disease ControlCGIAR Consultative Group

for International Agricultural Research

CINEP Centro de InvestigacionNacional Popular

CMR Child Mortality RatesDAC Development Assistance

CooperationDALY Disability-adjusted Life YearsDDR Disarmament, Demobilization

and ReintegrationDFID Department for International

DevelopmentDRC Democratic Republic of CongoEC European CommunityFDI Foreign Direct InvestmentGDP Gross Domestic ProductGNP Gross National ProductGPP Gramsh Pilot ProjectHAIN Health Action Information

NetworkHDI Human Development IndexHDR Human Development ReportHPN Humanitarian and

Practice NetworkIADB Inter-American

Development BankIASC Inter-Agency Standing

CommitteeICRC International Committee

of the Red CrossIDP Internally Displaced PersonIFI International Financial

InstitutionsIRC International Rescue

CommitteeIRIN Integrated Regional

Information Network

NGO Non GovernmentalOrganisation

ODA Overseas DevelopmentAssistance

OAS Organisation of American States

OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

OSCE Organisation for Security Co-operation in Europe

PCASED Programme for Coordinationand Assistance for Security and Development

PNUD Programa del Nacion UniesPor el Desarrollo

RGSA Reference Group on Small Arms

RPG Rocket-Propelled GrenadeRPF Rwandese Patriotic FrontSALIGAD Small Arms and Light

Weapons in the Inter-Governmental Authority for Development

SAP Structural AdjustmentProgramme

SAS Small Arms SurveySIDA Swedish International

Development AgencyUNDP United Nations Development

ProgrammeUNGA United Nations

General AssemblyUNHCR United Nations High

Commissioner for RefugeesUNICEF United Nations

Children’s FundUSDOJ United States Department

of JusticeUXO Unexploded Ordnance DeviceYPLL Years of Potential Life LostWFP World Food ProgrammeWGWR Weapons Group for

Weapons ReductionWHO World Health Organisation

5

Abbreviations

A rmed violence carried out primarilywith small arms is a major con-tributing factor that has led to

increasing poverty and human insecurity.Cheap, portable, and readily available, smallarms are the weapons of choice, in gangviolence, organized crime, civil wars orinter-state conflict. Their widespread avail-ability can threaten the welfare and stabilityof communities, states and regions.

Because of their long life span, small arms are continuously recycled from oldconflicts. AK-47s and M-16s used by com-batants during the Vietnam War haveresurfaced as far afield as Nicaragua and ElSalvador more than 30 years later. Highlydurable, they frequently outlast peace-agreements and can be taken up again wellafter the conflict has ended.

The sheer quantity of such weapons in circulation today (at least 550 million) cansupport violent solutions over peacefulones—particularly in the absence of legiti-mate public authority and the rule of law.

Small arms have a direct impact on humandevelopment and kill more than 500,000people each year. Such deaths and injuriesalso impact the public health sector by limiting civilian access to health facilitiesand contributing to the spread of infectiousdisease by restricting vital health interven-tions. In Latin America, for example,firearm deaths and injuries have destroyedmillions of productive “life years” from people, and have reduced the GDP of thecountries in this region by 15-20 per centper annum.

The widespread availability of small armsalso causes indirect impacts on humandevelopment that include:

• Criminal violence—perpetrated withsmall arms has severe implications for thequality of life for civilians, labour produc-tivity, the costs of goods and services andthe value of property, investment andtourism. In Colombia, an estimated 90per cent of the average 20,000 homicidesper year are attributed to handguns. Thewidespread insecurity generated by smallarms availability has led to the costly pri-vatization of security. This global industrywas estimated to be worth nearly US$100billion in the 1990s.

• Collapse of health and education services—Health and education workersare often targeted or attacked in the con-text of arms-related violence, leading tothe collapse of health care and educationfacilities. Furthermore, the access ofpatients to these services is frequentlylimited or constrained due to armed inse-curity. For those who are able to reachessential services, they are often facedwith abandoned clinics or facilities thatare over-stretched. This has significantsecondary impacts on health: in the armsaffected areas of Mindanao, a region inthe Philippines, child mortality ratesexceed 310 per 100,000, whereas thenational average is less than 175 per100,000.

• Displacement of people—The fear andterror generated by small arms availabilityis a critical factor in inducing displace-ment (internal or cross border) andinhibiting or delaying later return orresettlement. There is evidence thatfirearm related insecurity is a significantfactor influencing individual or householddecisions on whether to flee or migrate,as measured by rates and numbers of displacement from areas affected by gunviolence. Almost half of Sierra Leone’s

Executive Summary

6

population has been forced to flee toneighbouring countries as a result of theterror provoked by arms-wielding rebelfactions.

• Declining economic activity—Formaland informal trade, household and com-mercial investment (FDI and ODA), andagricultural production can also rapidlydeteriorate in situations of armed insecu-rity. The presence of arms has negativeimplications for inter-personal transac-tions and can undermine productiveactivities that are essential for livelihoodsand food security.

• Reduced government resources—High levels of armed violence and forceddisplacement can have a negative effecton government revenue (through lowertax collection) and rates of domestic savings. Lower levels of domestic savingsreduce the available resources for invest-ment and can contribute to declines ineconomic activity.

• Damage to the social structure—Highlevels of small arms availability can havenegative implications for a society’s socialcapital in terms of family and communalcohesion, gender relations, and customaryinstitutions that condition social controland may undermine the prospects forhuman development. In Kenya, custom-ary institutions among pastoralists such asbridal dowries, elder’s councils, commonproperty resources and informal exchangemechanisms have been distorted by smallarms availability.

• Withdrawal of development assistance—Small arms availability has generatedinsecurity for development agencies,often resulting in a withdrawal fromregions that are particularly affected. The

frequency of security incidents involvingsmall arms have increased the costs ofdoing development across the board,including transportation, logistics and,perversely, the opportunity costs of notintervening.

Removing small arms from conflict orpotential conflict situations can save livesand promote development. A preventivedevelopment approach is essential for dealing with the impact of small arms availability and use. Such an approachshould focus on both the sources of supplyof these weapons and the reasons why people possess them.

Basically, there are two major approaches tosmall arms reduction, by either attemptingto contain the supply of these weapons, orby reducing the demand. While theseapproaches can be used in combination, it is ultimately necessary to address the rootcauses of armed conflict and social violence.This focus on the demand side is linked tothe preventive development approach,which assumes that without well-balancedand sustainable human development, armedconflict and social violence are more likelyto emerge, and thereby increase the demandfor arms.

There is a growing consensus around theidea that a lack of opportunity and per-ceived injustice and inequality compelssome people to take up arms. As a result,effort to combat the proliferation of smallarms must address the issue of trust among people by building confidence, by forging collaborative networks in the community,and by supporting genuinely participatoryinitiatives and a long-term commitmentbetween stakeholders.

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A rmed conflict and social violence1

carried out primarily with smallarms2 is a contributing factor to

increased poverty and human misery.Poverty and suffering, in turn, threatenhuman security and development. Ifhuman development is about “the progressof human lives and well-being...livingwith substantial freedoms...(and about),enhancing certain capabilities (and) therange of things a person can do and be,”then the impacts of the use of small armsrepresents a formidable obstacle to itsachievement.3

Although most small arms are legallymanufactured, many are diverted intoillicit markets. While this study focusesmainly on the problem of illicit smallarms in the hands of criminals and insur-gent groups, it also considers the impactof poorly regulated legal small arms pos-session and use, whether in the hands ofgovernment security forces or private indi-viduals. This study provides a conceptualframework for examining the issue andidentifies measurable indicators that canhelp assess the impact of small arms onhuman development. Constrained by alack of local statistics, the presence ofcountervailing variables, selection-bias,and the range of situational and con-textual factors that condition the effects of small arms, the study neverthelessendeavours to appraise the context inwhich small arms are used, a vital firststep towards reducing their impacts.

It is clear that development efforts areoften retarded, or even reversed, as a result of the impacts of the availabilityand misuse of small arms. In this contextthe development community is nowbeginning to re-think the complex inter-relationships between armed conflict and

social violence on the one hand and smallarms and development on the other.4

A new wave of empirical studies that document the root causes and the broadsocio-economic costs of internal conflictand social violence on human develop-ment are increasingly demonstrating howarmed violence reduces, and in somecases, retards, development.

Small arms, by themselves, do not causeinternal conflict and development failures,but they often multiply their effects.They play an important role in triggeringand lengthening the lethality, scale, andconsequences of armed conflict and socialviolence (see Box 1). In other words,small arms, whether newly introduced orcirculating from earlier conflicts, consti-tute important risk factors that aggravatepre-existing structural disparities andinequalities—ensuring widespread insecu-rity and inescapable poverty traps amongvulnerable groups. Combined with otherrisk factors such as systemic poverty,social marginalisation, persistent unem-ployment and horizontal inequality5, self-perpetuating cycles of violence are ensuredby the ready availability of such weapons.

Small arms have both direct and indirectimpacts on human development. Directimpacts refer to the immediate physicaleffects of armed violence—deaths andinjuries. The indirect effects of small arms include high levels of criminality,violence-induced displacement, collapsingpublic services, declines in normal economic activity, and the erosion of asociety’s social capital. Increasingly, theseindirect impacts affect development interventions and the relative safety andsecurity of field staff.

1 Social violence here refers tocriminal, domestic and otherforms of internecine outburstsbetween groups and individuals

2 The definition of small arms fol-lows the 1997 UN Report of thePanel of Governmental Experts(A/52/298).

3 See Human Development Report(2000: 19) for a discussion of theconcept of human development.

4 Collier (1999: 2) has noted howthe two phenomena of civil warsand crime and violence are linked:first, the perpetrators are mem-bers of the same target group(essentially young unemployedmen) and second, “there is evi-dence that inadequate attentionto demobilization—following a mil-itary defeat by one party or apeaceful resolution of civil wars—could fuel crime and violence bydisplaced and asset-less demobi-lized fighters”.

5 According to the HumanDevelopment Report (1999),“horizontal inequalities” betweengroups—whether ethnic, religiousor social—are the major cause ofthe current wave of civil conflicts.“Inequalities—and insecurities—matter not only incomes but inpolitical participation (in parlia-ments, cabinets, armies and localgovernments), in economic assets(in land, human capital and com-munal resources) and in socialconditions (in education, housingand employment)”. See also UN WIDER athttp://www.wider.unu.edu.

Introduction

C H A P T E R 1

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Attempts to reduce the supply of weaponsto war-affected countries and regionsthrough sanctions, embargoes and moratoriums, have not been particularlysuccessful. In many cases, disarmamentprogrammes have been undertaken in theabsence of a realistic or coherent politicaland economic framework. Alternatively,small arms collection and destruction programmes have been conceived as aloose “add-on” to peace-negotiations. Inthe aftermath of conflict, peace missionsand demobilisation, disarmament, andreintegration (DDR) programmes havefrequently adopted a narrow perspectiveby concentrating on technical supply-sideissues, such as collection, rather than on

demand issues—why people have weaponsin the first place.

Narrow supply-side approaches that focuson the weapons and on ex-combatants areonly part of the solution. Nor can thebroad range of socio-economic impacts ofsmall arms be dealt with in a frameworkthat focuses exclusively on weapons reduc-tion. Because small arms play a key role in undermining development gains inconflict-affected, post-conflict, and stablesocieties alike, they should be of concernto the development community ratherthan the exclusive preserve of the securityand disarmament community.

The risks and challenges associated withsmall arms availability and misuse are bestaddressed in a comprehensive fashionwithin a preventive framework. Thedevelopment community’s “value-added”is its preventive vision and capacity tosimultaneously respond to both the supplyand demand factors relating to small armsavailability and use. In addition to itslong-term perspective, the developmentcommunity has demonstrated the capacity to design and implement comprehensive, transparent, participatoryand locally-appropriate responses to thesmall arms issue.

9

Box 1. Why are small arms a risk to human development?

Because of their long life span, small armsand light weapons can be used in conflictafter conflict. AK-47s and M-16s used bycombatants during the Vietnam War haveresurfaced as far afield as Nicaragua and ElSalvador more than 30 years later. Becauseof their durability they frequently outlastpeace-agreements and are taken up again inthe post-conflict period. Small arms remain-ing in circulation despite disarmament initia-tives reduce the momentum and sustainabil-ity of post-conflict reconstruction and peace-building efforts. As a result, fragile recoveryperiods often slip backwards into conflictand complex emergencies.

Their easy availability, simple technology andlow cost means that small arms are fre-quently taken-up by untrained civilians,including youth and children. The AKMseries rifle, for example, has only nine mov-ing parts and weighs less than 4.5kg. Theyare easily concealed and are frequentlyused in crime and conflict alike. Since smallarms are characterised by a high degree oflethality, they exacerbate and multiply thecosts of internal conflict and widespreadsocial violence.

S ince the Cold War, the location and tenor of armed conflict haschanged. Of the 30 to 50 conflicts

occurring each year between 1989 and1995, more than 95 per cent took place indeveloping countries.6 Most of these con-flicts were largely internal affairs, ratherthan the proxy wars and independencestruggles of the past, and virtually all ofthese wars were fought primarily withsmall arms.7 With the global media satu-rated by images of local violence, opinionpolls and surveys note that perceptions ofinsecurity, even among societies untouchedby war, have increased, resulting in a gener-alized unease generated by the fear offirearm related social violence or crime.8

Empirical evidence substantiates these concerns—with firearm related homicidesincreasing in the second half of the 1980sand the first half of the 1990s in all regionsof the world except for the Middle East,North Africa and East Asia.9

With the number of internal armed con-flicts peaking in the mid-1990s10, the lim-its and effectiveness of development assis-tance in the context of widespread humaninsecurity and arms availability has beenrepeatedly tested. In Sub-Saharan Africaalone, more than 20 per cent of the conti-nent’s population was directly impacted bycivil wars during the 1990s. Devastatinginternal conflicts in Angola, Burundi,Guinea-Bissau, DRC, Liberia, Rwanda,Sierra Leone, Somalia and Sudan claimedthe lives of millions of innocent civiliansand destroyed the livelihoods of tens ofmillions more across entire sub-regions.

Other parts of the world have also seen arise in the numbers of internally displacedpersons (IDP), increases in armed criminal-ity, and the unravelling of developmentefforts in violence-affected societies.

The opportunity costs of these armed conflicts to the affected countries and thesurrounding region, in terms of foregoneeconomic and social investment, are significant. For example, in a survey of 69 firms conducted for the World Development Report (World Bank, 1997),insecurity was ranked as the number onerisk facing investors. Overall, there has beenrapid consensus that the development para-digm has insufficiently considered theimplications of conflict and social violence.11

Of the 34 lowest ranking countries on the UNDP’s Human Development Index(HDI) in 2000, more than 20 are severelyaffected by conflicts. In Africa, of the 45 countries where UNDP is working,almost half are experiencing civil strifeand at least eleven are convulsed by violent political crisis. Significantly, all 31 countries in the OECD and theremaining 113 countries in the mediumhuman development categories are notaffected by war.12 In reviewing major conflicts occurring since the 1950s, Gurret al (2000: 12) claim that: “societies withlow social development appear to suffermore from societal warfare than moreprosperous ones”.

In large parts of Latin America and theCaribbean, South East Asia, EasternEurope and Africa, social and domesticviolence, measured as a function of fire-arm homicide, robbery and harassment, isreaching epidemic proportions—and isthreatening the long-term development ofregions and otherwise unaffected states.13

Small arms and armed violence have “contagion” effects14—as communities next to others with high levels of violencetend to also experience the same problems(Carneiro, 2000). Criminal syndicates andinformal gangs operating in economies

6 See, for example, the Small ArmsSurvey (2001), Stewart et al(2000) and Sivard (1996).

7 The 1994 Human DevelopmentReport identified 52 major armedconflicts in 42 countries andanother 37 countries that hadpolitical violence.

8 For example, in MendozaArgentina, there is a huge gapbetween the actual number ofcrime victims and the numberthat believed that they were likelyto become victims of crime.According to a survey conductedby the Argentinean Ministry ofJustice, while only 6 per cent ofthe population in the provincehad actually been victims of acrime, more than 80 per cent ofthe population felt that they wereat high risk of becoming victims.Correspondence with MartínAppiolaza, May 2001.

9 Homicide per 100,000 rose fromless than 4 to 7 in Europe andCentral Asia; from more than 2 toapproximately 9 in Sub-SaharanAfrica and from less than 8 to 12 in Latin America and theCaribbean (Collier, 2000). Thesetrends are also directly correlatedwith increases in regional firearm-homicide rates as documented inthe UN International Study onFirearm Regulation (1998). Itmust be remembered, however,that rates depend on the accu-racy of population figures andestimates.

10 Escalating, in part, as a result ofthe growth of newly independent,and frequently unstable, coun-tries, though declining overallbetween 1995 and 2000.

11 Conflict was not discussed sub-stantively in UNDP’s first HumanDevelopment Report (1990) or inthe 1997 edition. In HDR countryreports for Mali, Niger, El Salva-dor, Georgia, Albania, Nicaraguaand Sri Lanka, there is very littleattention devoted to conflict,post-conflict or violence in rela-tion to under-development. Norhave the broad impacts of con-flict and crime been substantivelyaddressed by the World Bank’sPoverty Alleviation Strategy(1998) or in the UNDP’s PovertyReport (2000). There has alsobeen minimal attention to con-flict, instability and humanitarianassistance in the PartnershipStrategy of the OECD—thoughthe OECD’s DAC (1997) encour-aged states to “pursue policiesthat minimise the risks of violent conflict” and is driftingtoward more “results-oriented”interventions.

Why Armed Violence and Small Arms Matter to Development

C H A P T E R 2

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weakened by conflict are trading in com-modities such as diamonds, timber andillegal drugs and also procuring and sell-ing weapons that quickly diffuse into civilsociety. From the local to the global level,small arms are frequently substituted asconvertible currencies.15

The easy availability of small arms hasplayed a role in re-igniting conflicts thatwere considered over, such as in theBalkans, Central America, and Sub-Saharan Africa. Some of these weaponsare looted from vast stockpiles of gunscollected from ex-combatants duringepisodes of civil and political unrest.Overall, small arms are likely to becomemore readily available during periods ofgrowing insecurity, such as when there is a marked decline in public confidence inthe legitimacy of the state and its publicinstitutions (e.g. police).16

In cases where the state monopoly offorce has been weakened, distinctionsbetween war and crime break down.Rising levels of armed criminality andlocalised violence in weak states invariablyleads to an increase in privatised security

rather than the state’s police and paramili-tary.17 The implications of all of thesetrends on public authority, law and order,good governance18 and equitable develop-ment are far-reaching.

Armed conflicts during the 1960s and1970s, a study has argued, were the best predictor of complex humanitarianemergencies and systemic social violencein the 1980s and 1990s.19 Comparisons offirearm homicide rates in a large numberof countries before and after they haveexperienced wars have demonstrated asignificant increase in aggregate rates,regardless of whether their post-conflicteconomies improved or declined.20 AsFigure 1 illustrates, injuries, robbery andharassment in Nicaragua, frequently perpetrated with automatic rifles andgrenades, have increased in the period fol-lowing the cessation of armed conflict.

In post-war El Salvador, Honduras andGuatemala, an abundance of left-oversmall arms, coupled with endemic “cultures of violence,” have provided anoutlet for expressions of discontent overperceived injustices and access to the

12 There are, a few notable exceptions. A sample of thesemight include Chechnya in theRussian Federation, isolatedpockets of Macedonia, Georgia,the Philippines, Indonesia,Colombia and Sri Lanka.

13 In Latin America and theCaribbean alone there were anestimated 102,000 homicides in 1990 (46 per 100,000). In countries such as Colombia, theannual rate of homicide increasedmore than 366 per cent between1983-1993, from 24 to 88 per100,000 (Villaveces et al, 2000).

14 Contagion refers to the tendency of social violence topropagate in space.

15 For example, in Colombia, theexchange of drugs for gunsextends back to the late 1970sand early 1980s. In October2001, an intercepted shipmentof AKM assault rifles from aRussian criminal gang to a south-ern faction of the RevolutionaryArmed Forces of Colombia (FARC)via Peru was valued at $US 50million. See also Cooper (2001)for a discussion of conflict goodsand small arms.

16 In the words of Louise (1995: 4)“Where states are unable to provide a secure environment for their citizens or meet the prerequisite demands of basichuman needs, the proliferation ofweaponry is both a principal con-sequence of, and a key contribu-tor to, weak and ineffective gover-nance”. The cases of Albaniaand Congo-Brazzaville are particu-larly illustrative (Small ArmsSurvey, 2001: 200-201).

17 For a review of the value andscale of the private securityindustry, consult the Small ArmsSurvey (2001b: 219-221).

18 According to Ghai and deAlcantara (1994), good gover-nance is the “the combination ofinstitutions, laws, procedures andnorms” that allow individuals toexpress their concerns andensure that their interests arerealised within a predictable andequitable context. They note thatthe “efficient administration ofpublic resources is an additionalelement in this definition…andthat the entire edifice of goodgovernance ultimately rests upona legitimate use of power: publicauthority must be sanctioned bythe consent of the governed”.

19 Examples might include Angola,the Ethiopia-Eritrea conflict, the re-ignition of war in Southern Sudanin 1983 and the current conflict inDRC. For more on this topic, seeNafziger and Auvinen (1997).

20 See, for example, the Small ArmsSurvey (2001), Muggah (2001a,2001b), Buvunic et al (1998),Meddings (1997) and Archer andGartner (1984).

90

450

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

400

91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99

per

10

0,0

00

Homicide

Injuries

IntimidationViolent Theft

FIgure 1. Indicator of Insecurity in Nicaragua: 1990-99

11

state’s resources. Indeed, rough estimatesindicate that for every 1,000 weapons collected from former combatants in theregion, there are approximately 100,000unaccounted for in circulation.21 CentralAmerica as a whole experiences firearmhomicide rates of between 30 and 50 per100,000. It is not surprising that between1999 and 2000, the purchase of privatesecurity services and small arms inGuatemala’s capital had grown more than50 per cent on rates that were alreadyamong the highest in the world. AsCilliers and Mason (1999) have pointedout, different social groups that cannotafford the services of private security alsofrequently seek to protect themselvesthrough the illegal acquisition of firearms.

The durability of small arms ensures thatonce they are present in a country, theypresent a constant risk—especially in soci-eties where there are large accumulationsof weapons.22 According to the UNDP’sHuman Development Report for Albania(1999: 34), “the large number of weaponsin civilian hands” was a key factor that ledto large-scale violence. In March 1997,following the collapse of pyramid financialschemes, an estimated 20 per cent of thecountry’s military arsenal was looted andby the end of 1997 approximately 1,600civilians had been killed.23 During the crisis, the number of homicides andattempted homicides multiplied by a factor of five between 1996 and 1997.

Waking up to the Problem

The development community has startedto recognise the effects of small arms violence on human development, and adiscourse linking armed conflict anddevelopment has been developed in key

UN reports.24 UNDP’s 1994 HumanDevelopment Report adopted a seminalinterpretation of security that stretchedbeyond the military domain. It acknowl-edged the imperative for multi-facetedand human-centered security in the dailylife of people and the conviction that thesearch for stability lay in developmentrather than arms.25

As the international community’s aware-ness of the nexus between conflict anddevelopment expanded in the latenineties, so too did multilateral thinkingon the issue.26 For example, both theOECD/DAC Guidelines on Conflict, Peaceand Development Co-operation on theThreshold of the 21st Century (1997) andthe 1998 Secretary General’s report on theCauses of Conflict and the Promotion ofDurable Peace and Sustainable Developmentin Africa acknowledged the far-reachingimpacts of armed conflict on development

21 US military aid to the NicaraguanContras during the 1980s, forexample, amounted to approxi-mately $US 70 million annually(Louise, 1995). Although OASand Italian government lead ini-tiatives removed some 142,000guns between 1991 and 1993through a combination of cash,food and micro-enterprise incen-tives, many more weapons arebelieved to be still in circulation.In El Salvador, while some10,200 small arms and lightweapons and 9,200 grenadeswere successfully collected anddestroyed, an estimated360,000 are believed to be inprivate hands. The Ministry ofDefence claims that 1,000 newarms are imported every monthand that there is approximatelyone gun over every 20 people. InGuatemala, the estimated 1,800small arms and light weaponsthat were returned by formerGuatemalan Revolutionary Unit(URNG) combatants representonly a fraction of the 2 millionweapons which continue to circu-late illegally within the country.See Faltas et al (2001), theSmall Arms Survey (2001) andUNIDIR (1997).

22 Such as, for example, was thecase in countries like Guatemala,El Salvador, Somalia, Ethiopia,Croatia and Bosnia affected bymassive military accumulationsduring the Cold War.

23 Including more than 650,000weapons together with 20,000tons of explosives, 1.5 billionrounds of ammunition andartillery shells (BICC/SAS,2000).

24 One of the first UN statementson the subject emerged in thelate eighties, when the WorldCommission on Environment andDevelopment (World Commissionon Environment and Develop-ment, 1987) articulated a visionof “sustainable development”and the potential for environmen-tal degradation to underminepeace and security.

C H A P T E R 2

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Box 2. Small Arms Facts

• Small arms are produced by over 600companies in at least 95 countries.

• There are at least 550 million small armsin circulation today, of which approxi-mately 56 per cent are in legal civilianpossession, 43 per cent are in the arsenals of state security forces, and lessthan one per cent are in the hands of non-state insurgent groups.

• There appears to be a relatively small network of sophisticated brokers with a complex web of intermediaries operatingglobally

• The estimated value of the legal smallarms trade is between $US 4-6 billion.The illicit trade remains difficult to calcu-late, though it is believed to amount to10-20 per cent of the total trade.

Source: Small Arms Survey (2001)

objectives and aid budgets. Implicit inboth of these seminal contributions wasthe idea that prevention should focus onpromoting human security and humandevelopment, and that the two weremutually reinforcing.

Merging the security and developmentagendas ensures, at least theoretically, acommitment to moving beyond minimal-ist strategies of ensuring basic kilo caloricneeds and towards the critical acceptanceof the need to bridge the relief-develop-ment divide. The new outlook implicitlyendorses a commitment to adoptinglong-term development-oriented strate-gies in countries affected by, or emergingfrom systemic armed violence (OECD,1997).

Three common approaches define thecurrent thinking on the relationshipbetween armed conflict and development.The first relates to the expansion of traditional concepts of “security”—a shift from military and state-definednotions of security—to a view that posits“humans”, with their multiple needs andcapacities, at the centre of the picture.A second relates to ‘Security First’—theview that security is a pre-requisite fordevelopment, and that the absence ofequitable and sustainable developmentoften exacerbates social conflict and insecurity. This approach reflects currentthinking on the “root causes” of conflict,such as horizontal inequality, exclusivepolitics, poor governance and weak publicauthority among states—and notes howthese constitute insecurities that can leadto violence. A final approach relates to thefact that small arms undermine develop-ment and contribute to widespreadhuman insecurity and unvirtuous cycles of violence.27

Conflict, Peace andDevelopment

The nature of conflict is itself transforma-tive —it changes the political, economicand social relationships on the ground.For this reason, many of the factors thatsustain present conflicts are not necessar-ily those that originally “caused” them inthe first place. Conflicts that begin aslocalised disputes are frequently politicised

25 The 1997 edition devoted topoverty, however, has been criticised for failing to “give any in-depth consideration tocountries at war” (Stewart et al,2000). The World Bank’s“Poverty Reduction Strategy”,elaborated in 1998, also makeslittle reference to countries atwar, even though countries thathave suffered from internal conflict account for “eight out ofthe ten countries with the high-est infant mortality rates and ofthose with the lowest per capitaincomes”.

26 Both the World Summit on SocialDevelopment (para 27) and theAgenda for Development (para158) in 1995 noted how inequali-ties generate insecurity and theimportance of “medium to long-term social and economicdevelopment” to prevent the (re) occurrence of complex emergencies.

27 UNDP has gained specific opera-tional expertise from working onsmall arms in a number of devel-oping countries. This experienceextends to work on demobilisa-tion and security sector reform in countries as diverse asHonduras and Somalia, to development incentives for armscollection in Niger, Mali andAlbania. UNDP has providedexpert assistance on collectionand disposal of excess weaponsin the Solomon Islands, Nigerand the Republic of Congo. SeeGeorge (2001) for more details.

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Box 3. An AK-47 for a Chicken? The Economics of IllicitSmall Arms

Much is made of the low-cost of small arms.Reports often state that weapons can bebought for as little as a goat, a camel or abag of sorghum. While local demand maydetermine the re-sale value of small armsonce they are in civilian hands, their lowprice often belies an economic reality aboutthe true cost of illicit small arms.

Ultimately, however, many non-state actorsengaged in armed conflict or crime musteventually generate foreign currency to payfor their resupply on the black market. For this reason, every automatic gun andevery round of ammunition fired by a childsoldier represents an economic transactioninvolving commodity exchanges with inter-national markets in those countries wherearms are not manufactured domestically(Lock, 1999: 12).

Such exchanges presuppose the accumula-tion of a corresponding economic surplusand the use of that surplus to illegally importarms. But since the eventual placement ofthe surplus in mostly oversupplied globalmarkets of raw materials requires “illegaltransactions, the marketed surplus fetchesonly heavily discounted prices”. This meansthat the illegal supply of arms is expensive,even if the “retail” price for weaponry is lowas a result of present over-supply. Such illegal transactions are the common denomi-nator of so called war economies.

and appropriated by vested interests sothat they escalate into a higher order ofarmed violence. Armed conflicts sparkedby grievances and social exclusion fre-quently multiply and adopt a new logicthat sustains them over long periods.

Just as conflict can be fed by the exploita-tion of natural resources such as diamondsand oil, so humanitarian and developmentassistance can distort, and even prolongconflicts. Development is never politicallyneutral—the spoils (in this case develop-ment and humanitarian assistance) are frequently divided unequally between the“winners” and “losers” of war. Perversely, theaid architecture and infrastructure has, insome cases, indirectly fuelled the demandfor weapons, though more attention isbeing devoted to the problem.28 For exam-ple, the Secretary General noted in 1998that “relief efforts must be a step towardsdevelopment, and must be delivered in waysthat promote, rather than compromise,long-term development objectives”.29

Poorly targeted development andhumanitarian assistance has often fuelledsocial violence or fed directly into armedconflicts.30 Studies on the impact of foodaid during civil wars in Afghanistan,Mozambique and Sudan, note that evenwhere it prevents starvation in the shortterm, “food aid can prolong suffering overmany years by contributing to the financ-ing of the war and diverting people fromtheir normal economic activities” (Stewartet al, 2000: 195). In some instances,as in Liberia, the former Yugoslavia orChechnya, aid was diverted away from theintended beneficiaries and was redistrib-uted to a small number of vested interests.

In some cases, those benefiting financiallyfrom the influx of aid have an incentive inperpetuating hostilities. Likewise, at theproject level, the administration of reliefand development assistance where smallarms are prevalent has also been known to fuel informal economies—through, forexample, the substitution of rations forarms. Where humanitarian and develop-ment infrastructure is more or less con-solidated, their opportunistic use for the purposes of arms trafficking has also beennoted. For example, the arrival of morethan one million Rwandan and Burundianrefugees into UNHCR camps in Gomafollowing the Rwandan genocide in 1994 involuntarily brought together thedifferent military actors (including theInterahamwe) and the logistic facilitiesprovided by the (then) Zairian govern-ment and the UN. These refugee campsprovided the ideal conditions for the unrestrained proliferation of weapons.

Certainly during conflict or fragile post-conflict situations, multilateral andbilateral assistance needs to be altered inlight of the political economy of the war.At the very least, donor policies shouldensure that ODA is not approved forrepressive governments. Furthermore,structural adjustment programmes should seek to sustain health and foodentitlements for the whole population,while also working to redress horizontalinequality lest civilians turn to weapons toensure their own needs.31

28 For example, the OECD(1997:15) notes that the “social and political tensions areinevitable in the process of socio-economic development”. SeeGrunewald, (2001); Anderson(1999); UNGA (1999); andDuffield (1994).

29 Somewhat contradictorily, theUNDP claimed in 1999 that:“development should andincreasingly does happen duringconflicts”. In 2001, however, theUNDP forcefully stated that:“development will be sustainableonly if strategies that incorporateconcern for their tensions thatcould lead to violence and pro-mote measures to counteractsuch tensions”.

30 Anderson (1999), for example,identifies three ways that donorand agency policies can exacer-bate conflict, including: a top-down focus on aid allocation thatobscures, distorts and underval-ues impacts; over-specification ofbeneficiary groups that reinforcesdivisiveness and; fund-raisingapproaches that over-simplifyconflict.

31 James Wolfensohn, the Presidentof the World Bank has recentlynoted that “security is a criticaldevelopment issue and the Bankneeds to more explicitly recog-nise it and integrate security concerns into policies and pro-grammes, developing an ability torespond”. See the World Bank’sPost-Conflict Unit for more:www.worldbank.org.

C H A P T E R 2

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T his section introduces a preliminaryframework for assessing theimpacts of small arms on develop-

ment (see Figure 2). The framework distinguishes between direct and indirecteffects, and identifies a selection of indica-tors for the different categories of effects.The list of indicators is not exhaustive,and as such represents only a first steptoward quantifying the extent to whichsmall arms, in a variety of settings, consti-tute a risk factor for development.

While the direct and indirect effects ofarmed conflict and social violence areoften inter-linked and difficult to distin-guish, they are treated separately here inorder to demonstrate clearly the differ-ential range of impacts of small arms ondevelopment. In this section, each of theindicators is examined in terms of its use-fulness in helping to quantify the impactof small arms on development. In somecases it is possible to distinguish betweenprimary and secondary indicators. Primaryindicators are normally short-term, quan-tifiable, and directly associated with smallarms availability and misuse. Secondaryindicators are usually long-term, morequalitative and often difficult to identifyexplicitly, and exclusively, with small armsavailability and misuse.

The direct effects of armed conflict and social violence relate to deaths andinjuries, and the associated costs of treatment and care for firearm casualties,measured by disability-adjusted life years(DALYs). The indirect effects relate tothe impact of small arms use on criminal-ity, forced displacement patterns, healthand education services, economic activ-ity and social capital. The indirect effectsalso extend to development interventionand the impacts of armed violence on

field staff, as well as the opportunity costs associated with the declining access ofdevelopment agencies to beneficiary populations. This latter subset of impactshas received growing attention in thehumanitarian literature, and will not bereviewed extensively in this study.

Available firearm-related statistics havesevere limitations. In many countriesaffected by protracted conflict, reliableand continuous information cannot beobtained and in countries emerging fromconflict there are few benchmarks to helpdiscern trends and patterns. Even incountries at peace, information relating tofirearms, homicide and injury are oftenconsidered issues of national security (orare generated by under-resourced surveil-lance facilities) and are frequently unreli-able.32 Even less controversial statistics onhuman development indicators, particu-larly among developing countries, aredeceptive—with under and over-report-ing, deficiencies in monitoring and anabsence of verification measures.33 Oneanalyst remarked that “the figures we usually use in analysing and measuring the severity of a crisis—for income levels,agricultural production, foreign trade…and so forth—are so hopelessly inade-quate that they cannot provide a fullaccount of the actual situation and, insome cases, give the totally wrong impres-sion” (Brown et al, 1992: 200).

Because differences in record-keepingmethodologies on public health and crimestatistics exist between states (and evenwithin states), international comparisonsmust be made cautiously.34 Even whereaccurate baseline statistics do exist, it isfrequently difficult to ascertain with certainty the extent to which small armsavailability and misuse is a significant

32 According to studies carried outby Kaufman et al (1999), many ofthe causes of underreportingacross countries appear to berelated to their respective levelsof development. The level ofdevelopment also appears to becorrelated with the quality of pub-lic institutions. The quality ofsuch institutions in turn appearsto affect the extent of underre-porting of a range of data, includ-ing criminal activity. Predictably,as citizen confidence rises inpublic institutions, so to doesreporting of crimes.

33 Small arms not only have severeimpacts on human development,but also on the actual recordingof these impacts. For example, inthe case of health, insecuritygenerated by small arms disruptssurveillance and monitoring ofdiseases, as well as the organi-sation and delivery of healthcare. Consequently, the popula-tion, particularly children aredying from an increased numberof curable and preventable dis-eases.

34 For example, statistics on crimeare purported to be “notoriouslyweak for reasons that are obvious and well explored”.According to Fajnzylber et al(2000: 282) “one of the reasonscross-country crime studies areuncommon is that it is difficult to compare crime rates acrosscountries…Underreporting iswidespread in countries with low-quality police and judicial systems and poorly educatedpopulations”. Because it is hid-den from public view or becauseof the powerlessness, fear and marginalisation of the victim, much social violence isunreported or misdiagnosed.

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Measuring the Impacts of Small Arms on Development

C H A P T E R 3

Impacts on IndicatorsDevelopment

Direct Firearm related PrimaryDeath and Injury • Number of firearm deaths (e.g. homicide, suicide, accidental rates)

• Number of non-fatal injuries• Monetary value of non-fatal firearm injuries (e.g. DALY and YPLL)• Costs associated with treating firearm deaths and injuries at municipal, district and

national levels• Insurance costs associated with firearm deaths and disabilitySecondary• Incidence of psychosocial trauma• Demographic sectors (age, gender) affected by death and injury

Indirect Armed Criminality Primary• Rates (numbers, frequency) of different types of firearm related crimes—homicide,

aggravated assault, robbery, car-hijacking (urban versus rural)Secondary• Insurance premiums (e.g. household insurance, car insurance)• Private security services (e.g. value of industry, non-productive labour)• Demographic sectors (age, gender) that are most vulnerable• Emigration (by profession)

Forced Displacement Primary• Rates (numbers of people) of forced displacement from arms-affected areas• Rates (number of incidents) of armed insecurity at site of relocationSecondary• Forcible seizure or loss of assets (e.g. homes, livestock)

Social Services Primary(Health and • Number of health and education workers killed or attackedEducation) • Number of clinics and schools closed due to armed violence

Secondary• Vaccination and immunisation coverage• Life expectancy and child mortality• Primary/secondary school enrollment rates• Pupil-teacher ratios

Economic Activity Primary(Trade and • Higher transport costs (risk)Production) • Destruction of physical infrastructure during armed conflict

Secondary• Price of local goods• Local terms of trade• Agricultural productivity• National and subsistence food production (food security)

Investment, Savings Secondaryand Revenue • Trends in local and foreign direct investmentCollection • Trends in revenue collection

• Levels of domestic savings

Social Capital Primary• Numbers of child soldiers• Membership of armed gangs• Incidents (number, type) of armed domestic violence (e.g. rape)• Breakdown in customary authoritySecondary• Repeat criminal activity among minors• Functioning of customary institutions

Development PrimaryIntervention • Security incidents (firearm homicide, armed assault, armed intimidation, evacuation, etc.)

Secondary• Cost of logistics (proportional to ODA)• Cost of security (insurance premiums, contracted security)• Opportunity costs

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C H A P T E R 3 Figure 2. A Matrix of the Effects and Indicators of Small Arms Availability and Use

contributing factor to underdevelopment.Challenges relate to confounding variables(e.g. drought or structural adjustment),establishing causality (e.g. does thedemand and use of small arms contributeto poverty or does poverty contribute tothe demand and use of small arms) andthe presence of a counterfactual (e.g. whatwould have happened in region A if smallarms were not there) or individual-levelfallacy (e.g. the role of additional variablesthat effect individual decision-making).

Direct Effects

Firearm Death and InjuryThe most immediately measurable impactof small arms availability and use is deathand injury. The key primary indicator isfirearm-related death and injury statistics,which are available from hospitals, clinicsand international humanitarian agencies.They allow the monitoring of trends andthe making of determinations based on theprecise impact of small arms in the contextof widespread armed violence. Institutionsdedicated to assessing mortality and injury,however, have been able to generate onlythe most tentative estimations of the global death toll attributed to small arms.Although it is readily established that mil-lions die each year from external causes inconflict, without focused case study materialit is difficult to determine, with precision,the proportion killed directly by guns or asa result of other factors related to insecurity,such as malnutrition, preventable diseasesor food insecurity.

On average, small arms result in thedeaths of 500,000 people each year, ofwhich 200,000 occur in countries, whichare not “at war”.35 This compares to the25,000 deaths that are claimed by anti-

personnel mines (APMs) each year. But,as with APMs, the greater part of thehuman development costs of small armsand armed violence in developing coun-tries results from economic and social collapse rather than casualties (see Box 4).Nevertheless, in countries affected by con-flict and widespread violence, small armsare frequently a leading cause of “external”death and injury (death or injury causedby outside forces such as firearms, ratherthan natural causes).

Existing surveys and epidemiological pro-files of war-related casualties show threetrends. First, there is substantial evidencethat a growing number of civilians, asopposed to combatants, are directly tar-geted and killed by small arms. It is esti-mated that civilians account for between35 to 90 per cent of all casualties—thoughin practice, this depends entirely on situa-tional variables and the types of weaponsused. Perhaps more important, the actual proportion of civilian casualties isrising in parallel with an increase in low intensity conflict and the blurring of thedistinction between internal war andcriminal activity (see Box 5).

Second, most of those civilians doing thekilling36, as well as those killed andinjured, are male youth—though womenand children also suffer disproportionatelyfrom forced recruitment, psychologicaltrauma and sexual violence. According tosome estimates from UNICEF (1996), inthe past decade more than two millionchildren were killed during warfare, fivemillion disabled and 12 million madehomeless. Third, the rates of firearm-related casualties often only marginallydeclined following armed conflict—aresult of the legacy of small arms prolifer-ation among civilians during the war.

35 Though no precise data are avail-able on the world-wide impacts ofweapons on health, the largestcross-national study conducted todate involved 36 high and upper-middle-income countries with atotal population of 1.19 billion(20 per cent of global popula-tion). This study showed thatmore than 88,000 people haddied from firearm injuries in aone-year period in the mid-1990s. Consult the Small ArmsSurvey (2001) and Muggah(2001b) for more details.

36 The WHO estimates that malescommit more than 75 per cent of all firearm homicides.Conversations with Krug,May 2001.

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C H A P T E R 3

Assessing the impacts of small arms differsfrom that of landmines. While “impact assess-ments” have been proposed for assessing thesocio-economic impacts and risks associatedwith landmines and unexploded ordnance(UXO), few studies have been carried out in thecase of firearms. One reason is that smallarms are arguably a more contentious and mul-tifaceted issue. There is also a legitimate sov-ereign claim with respect to their continueduse in ensuring security and defence—whetherfor military, policing or, in some cases, civilianpurposes. APMs, as a result of the hard-foughtcampaign and the Mine Ban Treaty (MBT), aremore clearly defined as a “humanitarian” issuedue to their detrimental and indiscriminateimpacts.

It is appropriate to describe the impacts ofsmall arms as dynamic rather than static. Theyare easily re-used in different contexts, areportable and can be engaged in a variety ofways. For this reason, measuring the internalrates of return (IRR) or assigning the cost-bene-fit of a particular intervention is difficult—assmall arms are easily relocated and/or poorquality weapons can be returned (rather thanhigher quality) in exchange for those incentiveson offer. APMs, however, are embedded in afixed location, single-use, and are arguably lesslikely to be illegally re-used or sold elsewhere.In this sense, there use is relatively static andavoidance can be more easily “learnt”. Whenthey are removed, their threat to human well-being diminishes significantly. By contrast, evenwhen small arms are effectively “collected”(and not destroyed), the threat of violence canpersist unless demand factors driving insecu-rity are targeted.

The impacts of APMs are frequently calculatedwithin a “community perspective” and interven-tions are increasingly premised on “collective”decision making within communities. This isbased on the assumption that risks are moreor less equally shared and experienced by indi-viduals within a community. In contrast, smallarms are used by individuals against other indi-

viduals or communities and they are oftenintertwined with domestic and inter-personaldynamics as well as intra- and inter-communaltensions. Measurements of their impacts andways to reduce their use, must therefore bebased on both individual and collectiveor community approaches, that take into consideration their multiple usage.

APMs predominantly affect people in ruralareas, causing insecurity and, consequently,reduced agricultural outputs, land yield andlabour productivity. Though instances of APMuse and impacts have been recorded in towns(Myanmar) and cities (Chechnya), they arerarely used in urban settings. Small arms, bycontrast, are both a rural and urban phenom-ena and transcend conflict, post-conflict andcriminal environments. Their impacts are multi-faceted and affect countries ravaged by war orat peace.

The economic justification for clearing minesfrom agricultural land depends principally onthe benefits accruing from future agriculturalproduction on that land and on the clearancecost. While it is possible to model the costs ofAPM removal and the cost-benefits of interven-tion (for example, the cost of removal vs. thepotential gains of improved agricultural yield)and therefore prioritise interventions, it is moredifficult in the case of small arms. The eco-nomic justification for reducing the number ofweapons in circulation relate to reducing theincidence of homicide and injury (which consti-tutes a health burden), crime (which consti-tutes a security burden), improving publicsafety and lowering transaction costs andincreasing productivity. The unpredictability ofsmall arms availability, however, makes it rathermore difficult to appraise the costs and bene-fits of intervention.

Source: GICHD, 2000, Sekkennes, 2000; Wilkinson, 2001

Box 4. Small Arms vs. Anti-Personnel Mines (APMs): Assessing the Impacts

Small arms are risk factors for conflict-affected and non-conflict affected soci-eties alike (see Box 6). In 1995, Zambiahad a firearm homicide rate of over 5 per100,000 (10.57 for all homicides), whileBrazil experienced a firearm homicide rateexceeding 25 per 100,000 (29.17 for allhomicides).

Within war torn and peaceful countries,there are pockets of extreme deprivationand insecurity that neighbour more affluent regions. In Kenya, for example,it is estimated that the national firearmhomicide rate hovers between 10-15 per100,000.37 In areas where small arms arewidely available, such as Garrissa in theNorth East and Lokichokkio in theTurkana region, the firearm homicide ratesoars up to 580 per 100,000—and muchhigher among young males. Similarly, incomparison to Colombia’s already extraor-dinarily high firearm homicide rate of 50per 100,000, the Department of Putu-mayo’s homicide rate was 183 per 100,000in 1998.38 Health officials have describedPutumayo as “the most violent place on theplanet” (Departamento Administrativo deSalud de Putumayo, 1999: 3).

There are also severe direct impacts associated with firearm-related injuries.Interpersonal violence, self-inflictedinjuries and war injuries are among thetop five largest contributors to the globalburden of disease among people aged 15-44 (WHO, 2001). The World HealthOrganisation (WHO) and the WorldBank, for example, estimate that injuryand violence contribute almost 15 per centof the burden of disease in the developingworld. However, there is substantial varia-tion in the regional patterns, particularlyof intentional injury: Africa, the MiddleEast, Latin America and the Caribbean,

the former Soviet Republics and Chinawere the regions most severely affected(WHO, 2001). Indeed, the figures wouldcertainly be higher if all firearm victimswere actually accounted for. Many victimsof non-fatal firearm injuries are frequentlyunable to solicit medical attention becauseof pervasive insecurity, or because theirown injuries hamper their mobility.

Reaching a clinic does not ensure success-ful treatment. Most clinics in conflictareas lack even the most basic instrumentsand medicines and are taxed beyond their

37 See, for example, Muggah &Berman (2001).

38 The firearm homicide ratesamong young men in Putumayoexceeds 1900 per 100,000among various towns in theregion (DepartamentoAdministrativo de Salud dePutumayo (1999).

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Box 5. Are 90 per cent of war-related victims really civilian?

The statistic that 90 per cent of all casual-ties in armed conflict are civilian is oftenstated, although there does not appear tobe a rigorous methodology describing howthe figure was actually determined. Thoughadvocacy on small arms and their impactson civilians are of vital importance, suchefforts should be linked to credible and legit-imate data.

The ICRC has developed a database con-taining patient information on 28,000 peo-ple, 18,831 of whom have sustained smallarms-related injuries. The ICRC does notrequest information on combatant status,but rather on the sex and age of patients.An analysis of the first 17,086 victimsreported since 1991 noted that only 35 percent were female, male and aged under 16,or male aged 50 and above (e.g. civilian).

Other studies also indicate that duringarmed conflict, the number of peoplewounded is at least twice the number killed- and often surges to 13 times as high.Where firearms are used against peoplewho are immobilized, in a confined space, orunable to defend themselves the woundedto kill ratio decreases below 1 and is some-times 0 (Coupland and Meddings, 1999).

limit. In insecure areas of the DemocraticRepublic of the Congo, for example, 25per cent of all hospital beds are occupiedby “war-wounded” (IRIN, 2001). Thechronic shortage of hospital facilities andthe limited civilian access to treatmentmeans that the onset of infection greatlyincreases the risk to the patient. Accord-ing to a report produced by Oxfam-GB

(2001b: 29), “bullet wounds, if treatedwithout proper surgical debridement, rap-idly develop into deep festering woundsand bone infections (osteomyelitis). Manyof the wounded admitted…had been inhiding for weeks before being able to seekrefuge and care in the hospital. Otherswere treated in health posts that hadalready been looted or burnt”.

Costing Firearm Related Death and InjuryHealth economics, using cost-benefitanalysis, provides a departure point formeasuring the impact of small arms onhuman development as a result of firearmdeath and injury. Cost-benefit analysis,however, is not especially compelling in the analysis of benefits accruing from risk-reduction strategies in relation to smallarms. While reducing the deaths andinjuries attributed to firearm related assaultcan free up medical resources for otherpublic health priorities, a financial determi-nation cannot be made unless monetaryvalues are ascribed to human life and suffering. Such assessments are frequentlypremised on the “willingness to pay principle”, or economic valuations of (lost)labour productivity. Many find the task ofmeasuring the value of human life and suf-fering both difficult and morally indefensi-ble. Indeed, many of the so-called “costs”of small arms violence are, as the Box 7 atthe right suggests, not quantifiable. But theactual financial burden of firearm fatalitiesand injury are real, and relate to householdexpenditures and associated medical costs,reduced labour capacity and acute shifts inpublic spending.

Though estimates of the economic implications of the direct human costs ofsmall arms are fragmentary in developingcountries39, a number of recent studies in

C H A P T E R 3

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Box 6. Determining a Risk Rating for Small Arms

An important, if neglected issue, relates tothe “types” of weapons, and the relativescale of their impacts. According toWilkinson, in terms of casualties, “everytime a pistol is used there is generally a 1in 4 risk of the target been fatally wounded,whilst every time an RPG 7 is used the “riskrating” rises to 80 per cent”. Determiningthe “risk rating” of particular weapons onfatalities and injuries is one way of measur-ing the direct impacts of small arms. A riskrating is determined by dividing the totalnumber of fatalities or injuries by the totalnumber of weapons used in attacks. Suchratings can be established for both commu-nities and countries. In practical terms, if arisk rating for each recovered weapon ismultiplied by the number of weapons col-lected in a particular disarmament pro-gramme, it gives an indication of the poten-tial number of lives saved by the micro-disar-mament programme.

Potential Lives Saved = Weapons Risk Rating x

Total Weapons Recovered

It is then possible to determine an estimatefor the potential number of lives saved bythe addition of the results for each weapontype. Although still only a crude indicator,the methodology can be developed to estab-lish the financial cost per life saved. Thecosts of lives saved can be arrived at bydividing the total cost of a particular inter-vention programme by the total number oflives potentially saved (as above).

Source: Hughes-Wilson & Wilkinson, 2001

North America provide a basis for analy-sis. In the US there were approximately30,700 deaths from firearms in 1998,of which roughly 17,400 were suicide,12,100 were homicide, 670 from accidentsand 320 undetermined (USDOJ, 2000).The number of non-fatal firearm injurieswas also considerable—over 200,000 per year. According to surveillance pro-grammes, the cost per injury requiringadmission to a trauma centre was over

$US 14,000 per victim—approximately$US 2.8 billion per year. Studies showthat the medical costs of firearm injuriesaccount for 13 per cent of the total cost tosociety (May & Rice, 1993). Yet if oneadds the costs of medical care and the lostproductivity resulting from premature disability and death, firearms injuries andfatalities cost the US health economyapproximately $US 100 billion per year inthe 1990s (Cook & Ludwig, 2000).

39 The Machel report (2000), forexample, notes that “comprehen-sive treatment and rehabilitationfor survivors [of landmines andUXOs] can cost up to $1,000 inpoor developing countries wherethe average GNP per person isless than a few hundred dollarsa year.”

21

In South Africa, the widespread proliferation,availability and misuse of both legal and illicitsmall arms, has had a dramatic impact on levels of violent crime, death and injury. Thereare more than 4.5 million legally registeredfirearms in South Africa, including almost 2.8million revolvers and pistols (Chetty, 2000),with evidence that many are stolen each year.South Africa registers one of the highestfirearm homicide and injury rates in the world.For example, of the 24,875 people murdered in1998, approximately 50 per cent were killedwith firearms. No distinction is made betweenlegal and illicit firearms in the compilation ofcrime statistics. A recent study prepared by theNational Injury and Mortality SurveillanceSystem reported that in 1999, firearms werethe leading cause of fatal and non-fatal injuriesamong civilians between 15 and 64 years old(Butchart, 2000). Experts note that some80,000 bullet wounds requiring hospital treat-ment each year cost the health system theequivalent of $US 5.3 million. Crime rates arealso spiralling. Of the more than 74,860 armedrobberies that were reported in 1998 (Gun FreeSouth Africa, 2000), more than 75 per centwere committed with firearms.

Less well documented are the personal costsof injury to the victims, and the extent to whichthese injuries affect their well-being and socialand economic productivity. The costs are notmerely financial nor are they confined to theincident or reserved to the individual. In 2000,a key-informant survey of firearm victims wasconducted through a collaborative effort of the

Small Arms Survey in Switzerland and theInstitute for Security Studies in South Africa.The following personal account provides valu-able insight into the impacts of injury on twocivilians, one male and the other female:

“The first victim was shot at close range, andstill suffers from pain, headaches. He must fre-quently visit the hospital to drain puss from hiswounds that are not healing on account of dia-betes. The second victim, a woman, was shotthree times at close range—two to the stom-ach and one in the right hand. She has diffi-culty lifting heavy objects with her right hand.Both victims underwent traumatic operations todislodge the bullets and continue to sufferfrom flashbacks, nightmares and psychosocialtrauma” (Small Arms Survey, 2001: 218).

The direct medical costs of the hospital carepale in comparison to the indirect costs of clos-ing down their businesses. Fearing a repeatattack, neither victim returned to work. Both vic-tims claimed that not only their health, but alsotheir economic status had been irrevocablydamaged. Each had been a primary incomeearner. And although the initial paymentsrequired for emergency hospital bills had beencovered through loans and informal credit fromfamily or kinship networks, the victims used asignificant proportion of their personal savingsto pay off debts to meet household expenses.One of the two victims had assets (e.g. house-hold possessions and vehicle) repossessed bythe bank soon after the event.

Source: Small Arms Survey, 2001

Box 7. The Costs of Firearm Injury on Households in South Africa

In the Caribbean, the rate of homicidesand suicides committed with firearmsmore than doubled from approximately sixand seven per 100,000 in the 1980s towell over 10 and 15 per 100,000 in themid-1990s (CAREC, 2001). In LatinAmerica, inter-personal injury is the lead-ing cause of death for people aged 15-44,and according to the Inter-AmericanDevelopment Bank (IDB), accounts forbetween $US 140 and 170 billion in treat-ment and lost productivity a year. Theeconomic costs are particularly severe atthe country level.

In Colombia, a country where an estimated90 per cent of all homicides are committedwith firearms, roughly 20 per cent of alldisability adjusted life years40 (DALYs) lostbetween 1989 and the late 1990s wereattributed to small arms. In 1995 alone,1,450,845 years of potential life were lost41

(YPLL) because of violent deaths—over 60 per cent of which were attributable tohomicide.42 Firearm-related homicideswere the leading cause of death for youngColombian males: 14 males were killed forevery female killed. If criminal violence43

is also included, the impacts of firearmsconstitute an astonishing 25 per cent of thecountry’s GDP. In El Salvador, almost seventy per cent of all “external” deaths of15-19 year-olds were caused by homicidesin the mid-1990s. In 1994, of the 11,056firearm deaths occurring among the popu-lation aged 20-60, homicides accounted forover 83 per cent of the total. Indeed, morethan 178,000 DALYs were lost in 1995 asa result of violent deaths, and the costs ofcriminal violence also amounted to morethan a quarter of GDP (Londono, 1998).Though defined here as direct effects, thelong-term costs of firearm mortality andinjury have a whole range of indirect socio-economic effects.

Indirect Effects

Terror and suffering, as well as the indirect socio-economic impacts of smallarms, are neither discussed nor docu-mented as extensively as death and injury,but the fear engendered by the use ofsmall arms and the rapid breakdown ofinformal norms of trust and co-operationare far-reaching.44 As civilians havebecome strategic targets in many conflictsthrough summary and mass executions,brutal intimidation and criminality, smallarms have come to represent a potent andubiquitous instrument of terror. Smallarms availability and misuse also has ameasurable impact on decisions relating topersonal mobility, social cohesion, politicalparticipation, child-schooling, employ-ment and personal-protection.

The fear of armed violence has promptedcivilians in countries such as Colombia, thePhilippines45 and South Africa to purchasesignificant numbers of weapons for self-defence. According to surveys conducted inBangladesh, the use of small arms has beenidentified in virtually all types of violencethat includes political conflict, drug andarms trading, trafficking in women andchildren, smuggling, prostitution, abduc-tion, rape, extortion, election rigging,mugging, vehicle hijacking, carjacking,highway robbery, shrimp cultivation, illegaloccupation of land, auctioning of woodlots,tender and contracting enforcement, streetviolence, campus violence, attacks on jour-nalists, slum eviction and settlement andpoaching (Sharif, 2001).

These indirect effects are often unnoticedbecause they are “hidden”. For example,armed robbery can lead to a decline infood production, while the ensuing depri-vation can result in domestic violence that

40 The DALY has emerged as ameasure of the burden of diseaseand it reflects the total amount ofhealthy life lost, to all causes,whether from premature mortalityor from some degree of disabilityduring a period of time. In otherwords, it is an indicator of thetime lived with a disability and thetime lost due to premature mor-tality. It is a composite of five vari-ables: (i) years of life lost to pre-mature mortality, (ii) degrees ofincapacity associated with differ-ent conditions, (iii) age weights,(iv) time preference (e.g. discountrates) and (v) the idea of addinghealth across individuals.

41 Years of potential life lost (YPLL)is a measure of premature mor-tality and is derived by summingyears of life lost over all agegroups.

42 See Levitt & Rubio (2000) andLondono (1998).

43 As measured by health impacts(health expenditures due to crimi-nal violence), public costs (publicand private expenditures onpolice, security, judiciary), trans-fers (value of asset transfers,ransoms and bribes), and intangi-bles (amount civilians would bewilling to pay to live without vio-lence) as a percentage of GDP in1997. See Buvinic et al (2000).

44 A study is currently underwaywith the Small Arms Survey andthe Regional Centre for StrategicStudies in Sri Lanka to assess,through participatory assess-ments, the differentiated percep-tions of arms related insecurityamong communities in Pakistan,India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.Findings will be made availableon www.smallarmssurvey.org.

45 As of December 1999, therewere approximately 706,148small arms registered in thePhilippines and an additional349,782 loose or “unregistered”weapons. Loose firearms arebelieved to be used in robberies,assaults on public institutionsand harassment (Dursin, 2000).According to one report, most[MILF fighters] are equipped with 70s-vintage weapons thatflooded Mindanao at the heightof the war for independence.Later-model guns are quietly purchased from Philippine armyunits. The MILF also makes itsown armament: one of the several munitions factories turns out RPG-2 grenade launchers and their warheads”. See www.ploughshares.ca

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is itself reproduced over time. Likewise,firearm related deaths and armed intimi-dation act as a catalyst to forced displace-ment that in turn results in collapsingsocial services. Although the discrete cate-gories of indirect effects are in themselvestheoretical, it is useful to explore each ofthem separately in order to appreciate themagnitude of arms-related insecurity onhuman development.

Armed Violence and Criminality

While it is assumed that there is a causalrelationship between the availability offirearms, their use and the levels of armedcriminality, there are differing, and oftenhotly contested, perspectives on whetherthe easy availability of weapons facilitatesarmed violence.46 One view is that smallarms possession serves as a deterrent,leading to improved personal security and a reduction in interpersonal crime.47

Proponents of this view assume that smallarms possession in controlled circum-stances serves as a deterrent to would-befirearm (ab)users.

The other view is that availability andownership is associated with, among otherthings, a greater incidence of violent death(e.g. homicide, suicide and accidentaldeath), inter-personal violence, intimida-tion and criminality.48 The proponents of this perspective contend that morefirearms equals more violent crime, andthat “changes in gun ownership are signif-icantly and positively related to changes inthe homicide rate—with this relationshipdriven entirely by the impact of gun own-ership on murders in which the gun isused” (Duggan, 2000). In the US, forexample, recent reductions in the propor-tion of households owning a gun are citedto explain at least one-third of the differ-ential decline in gun homicides relative tonon-gun homicides since 1993.49

There is also disagreement over themotives that drive the criminal use of smallarms in developing countries. However,there appears to be a growing consensusthat lack of opportunity, perceived injusticeand inequality compels some people to takeup arms. According to research on crime inLatin America, increases in incomeinequality are directly correlated with

46 A review of the relationshipbetween availability and use, orthe “accessibility thesis”, is carried out in the Small ArmsSurvey (2001: 200-208) andMuggah (2001b).

47 See, for example, Lott & Mustard(2001) and Kletz & Gertz (1995).

48 See the Small Arms Survey(2001) for a review of thedebate, and Cook and Ludwig(2000) for detailed analysis.

49 See, for example, the Economist(2001) that notes that between1980 and 1998 in the USA, thata 10 per cent increase in anaverage state’s rate of gun ownership was associated with a 2 per cent rise in its homiciderate in successive years.

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Figure 3. Homicide Rates in Selected Latin American Cities

increases in crime rates. Studies focusingon poverty and homicide in Brazil also tentatively reinforce this conclusion, as“municipalities with high income tend topresent lower homicide rates than thosewith a higher proportion of populationbelow the poverty line” (Careina, 2000:119). The case for poverty as an explana-tory variable is less clear in Colombia(Levitt & Rubio, 2000). Less controversialamong all constituencies, however, is agree-ment on the impacts of armed criminality.In Latin America and the Caribbean, forexample, criminal violence perpetrated withwidely available small arms has massiveimplications for the quality of life of citizens, the costs of goods and services,the value of productivity and property,investment and tourism.50

The effects of small arms on human devel-opment as a result of armed criminality canbe measured by a number of indicators.Primary indicators would include rates(numbers, frequency) of different types ofarmed criminality such as murder, assault,and robbery. Secondary indicators wouldinclude insurance premiums (by region orarea) due to high levels of crime, the valueof the private security industry, and rates of

emigration amongst professionals due tohigh levels of armed insecurity.

Predictably, due to a wide number of factors discussed above, there are extremedivergences in firearm homicide rates—from 0.01 per 100,000 in Hong Kong tomore than 105 per 100,000 in Cali,Colombia. But in countries as varied asSouth Africa, Cambodia, the Philippinesand Sudan, firearms figure prominently inviolent crime and are the dominantweapon used in attempted murder, armedrobbery and aggravated assault. During1998 in South Africa, firearms, particu-larly handguns, were used in 85 per centof all reported armed robberies, a ratio of 6:1 to other weapons (Chetty, 2000).According to media reports, Cambodia’scapital—Phnom Penh—experiences anarmed robbery rate that is four timeshigher than that of Bangkok, consideredone of the region’s most dangerous cities.The wide availability and use of weaponsin Cambodia’s post-war period has beenattributed to the 300,000 weapons provided by the US and other countriesduring the Vietnam war, and cultures ofviolence that continue to feed demand.Indeed, a survey of over 15,000 house-

50 Public expenditures on securityand justice also increase in relation to other sectors. InColombia, for example, expendi-tures on security and justicehave increased in the lastdecade, from 5 per cent of GDPin 1991 to 8 per cent in 1999.See Fajnzylber et al (2000a;2000b); Pizam & Mansfeld(1999); and Londono (1998).

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Figure 4. Armed Security in Honduras

holds recorded that more than two-thirdsof all respondents claimed to own a gun.51

But aggregate national statistics aredeceptive, providing only a partial under-standing of the complex dynamics ofcriminality and small arms diffusion.When national statistics are comparedagainst particular cities, sub-regions ortypes of incidents, the picture becomesslightly more revealing (see Figures 3-5).

Recent studies from Mindanao, in thePhilippines, have also demonstrated thatmore than 85 per cent of all “external”deaths in 2000 were a consequence of smallarms. This same report claims that 78 percent of all reported violent deaths andinjuries resulting from criminal acts couldbe attributed to military-style automaticweapons and handguns (Kidapawan,2001). Even in Sudan, wracked by aneighteen-year civil war in the South, armedcriminality is facilitated by the abundanceof weapons in the country. The InteriorMinister has repeatedly noted that thespread of weapons outside the control ofregular forces has repeatedly lead to thedeterioration of security in the GreaterDarfur states in Western Sudan. He has

emphasised that the capabilities of thepolice and security apparatus were weak in comparison with groups armed withsophisticated weaponry. A recent govern-ment statement agreed with those findings,adding that “armed robbery, in all its forms,constitutes the greatest danger to securityin the Greater Darfur states after the proliferation of small arms in the hands of citizens as a result of the consequencesof war in neighbouring states, the armstrade and the ease in obtaining weapons”(Al-Ra’y al-Am, 2001).

In countries where state repression andinternal conflict occur in unison, smallarms are often the predominant weaponsused in acts of terror, whether for carryingout summary executions, massacres, armedintimidation, disappearances or kidnap-ping. In Colombia, for example, the use ofsmall arms in acts of crime or political vio-lence has long-term impacts on popularperceptions of security, public and securitysector legitimacy and the participation indemocracy more generally.52 According tothe Colombian Centro de InvestigacionNacional Popular (CINEP), in 1999 therewere over 1,000 massacres, more than 300

51 Correspondence with the WorkingGroup for Weapons Reduction(WGWR) in Cambodia and BillHerod, May, 2001

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Figure 5. Personal Security Incidents in Nicaragua

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reported “forced disappearances” and inexcess of 2,940 cases of hostage taking.During elections and political rallies, therates increase. Similarly, the Commissionon Elections in the Philippines has regu-larly implemented gun bans during electionperiods in order to reduce violence and as apretext for disarmament.

Civilian insecurity in many countries inCentral America, South Asia and Africahas prompted extra-legal responses andthe rapid privatization of security. Froman economic perspective, the use of private security results in unproductiveexpenditures from household (and corpo-rate) savings and fewer resources availablefor local investment.53 While private secu-rity is not in itself necessarily threatening,in the context of weak or failing stateswhere small arms are abundant, privatesecurity begins to become progressivelymore virulent. In countries where internalsecurity is severely undermined by armedviolence, such as Kenya, Indonesia orColombia, governments have purposefullyarmed civilians (e.g. “paramilitaries” or“militias”) in order to quell dissent.54

Such initiatives, however, often producecounter-productive effects and the armsquickly resurface in acts of violent crimeand banditry. The costs of private securityfor businesses, including governmentagencies, in countries such as SouthAfrica, Brazil, Nigeria and the US havereached alarming proportions. In many ofthese countries, the value of the privatesecurity industry often exceeds nationalexpenditure on policing.55

Forced Displacement

Forced displacement destroys families andcommunities, disrupts normal economicactivities, and undermines human develop-ment. The impact of small arms on humandevelopment as a result of forced displace-ment can be measured by primary indica-tors that include the rates (numbers) offorced displacement from arms-affectedareas, and the rates (numbers) of arms-related security incidents at relocation sites.Secondary indicators would include thevalue of assets seized or lost as a result offorced displacement. Reliable data for rates

52 A recent study on homicide andviolence in Brazil, for example,noted that 10 per cent of allhomicides in Rio de Janeiro wereactually committed by policeforces (Carneiro, 2000: 121).Similar findings have beenreported by Moser & Holland(1997: 8) in their participatoryassessment of violence inJamaica: “a serious problem inall communities was relationswith the police…a focus group ofyoung men…ranked police brutal-ity third—equal to, but distinctfrom war and gang violence”.

53 In the 1990s the global privatesecurity industry was estimatedto be worth US$100 billion,and is expected to rise to overUS$400 billion by 2010 (SmallArms Survey, 2001: 220).

54 For a more substantive discus-sion on homeguards and para-militaries in Kenya, Colombia andEast Timor, consult Muggah &Berman (2001).

55 In South Africa the value of theprivate security industry in 1999was worth US$1.6 billion, whichwas roughly the same as thenational police budget. In 1998the private security industry inthe US was worth US$90 billion,compared to US$40 billion worthof spending on public policing(Small Arms Survey, 2001: 220).In Brazil, by contrast, spendingon security is growing at 5 percent per annum and is now esti-mated to exceed US$ 9.5 billionper year. This compares with lessthan US$ 6 billion of publicspending on policing. The 1.5million security guards outnum-ber the police by three to one(Economist, 2001).

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Figure 6. Kakuma Refugee Camp: 1995-2000

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of forced displacement (both refugees andIDPs) as a result of armed insecurity isreadily available from international organi-sations such as the UNHCR and IOM. Bythe end of the 1990s, more than fifty mil-lion people were violently forced to leavetheir homes, either as refugees, or morelikely, internally displaced within their ownborders.56 Millions more fled, eschewingassistance and “official” protection for fearof violent recrimination and social or eco-nomic marginalisation.

Armed conflict and political violence havebeen consistently identified as critical fac-tors that lead to mass displacement. Notonly is armed violence frequently a criticalfactor in prompting internal or cross-border displacement, it also plays a majorrole in inhibiting return or resettlement.Evidence from a variety of conflict areas,as well as from severely crime-affected societies, indicates that small arms relatedinsecurity is a key factor in individual orhousehold decisions to flee or migrate.57 Asa result of the scale of armed intimidation,IDPs have also been known to flee fromareas of high political volatility to regionsvulnerable to floods, drought and urbanviolence. As civilian dispossession hasbecome the aim, rather than the by-productof armed conflict, firearms have been usedto increasingly devastating effect and in vio-lation of international humanitarian law.

In Sierra Leone, a country that only beganreceiving significant quantities of weaponsin the early 1990s, between 25,000-50,000people have been killed and tens of thou-sands maimed as a result of the internalconflict that has been raging since 1991.In this context small arms and ammunitionhave become an essential part of the coercive and symbolic functions of warfarein the country. As in Rwanda, testimonial

evidence documents how armed groupsfrequently accompanied new recruitscharged with massacring civilians withknives and machetes.58 As a result of thesheer scale and lethality of armed violence,between 24 and 40 per cent of the popula-tion have been displaced at any one time—and more than 500,000 refugees havespilled across the country’s borders (WorldBank/ADB, 2000).

There is ample evidence that insecuritypersists for refugees and IDPs (and hostcommunities) during and after relocation.This is largely because, in spite of the bestintentions of humanitarian agencies, theyare resettled in overcrowded conditions,often in inhospitable regions, in conditionsof extreme deprivation. They also are oftenexplicitly targeted by armed factions andbandits. IDPs are particularly vulnerabledue to the absence of security to ensuretheir protection, much less their basicrights.59 According to the Organisation forSecurity Co-operation in Europe (OSCE),for example, insecurity and threat fromarmed violence are currently viewed as thepriority concern of migrant communities inKosovo.60 In response to increasing campmilitarisation, key interventions called forby the UNHCR (1999: 1-2) include “disarming exiled groups who have accessto weapons and curtailing any flow of arms into refugee populated areas…[and]disarming exiled soldiers and other armedelements, and ensuring their effective re-absorption into civilian society”.

The case of Kenya is illustrative. In both of Kenya’s refugee camps (Dadaab andKakuma), located in the border areas ofNorthern Kenya, Sudanese, Ethiopian andCentral African refugees are subjected toarmed violence on a daily basis. Thoughthe camps themselves are believed to be

56 There are approximately 39 million displaced people in theworld today, including 12.8 million refugees/asylum seekers,23 million IDPs and 3.2 millionPalestinian refugees (Muggah &Berman, 2001).

57 For example, multivariate regression analysis has found a positive relationship betweenpolitical armed violence andrefugee flows out of a country(Stanley, 1985).

58 For testimonial references, seeMoser and Mcllwaine (2000),Moser and Holland (1997),Fajnzylber (2000), ICRC (1999)and UNICRI (1997). Also seeFajnzylber, Pablo, DanielLederman and Norman Loazya.2000. 'Crime and Victimization:An Economic Perspective'.Economia Vol 1 (1): 219-278.surveys were administered by theICRC and UNICRI — and includethe ICRC (1999) "People on WarSeries", published out ofGeneva, which focus on some 14countries as well as UNICRI.1997. International Crime VictimSurvey. Turin: UNICRI.

59 See, for example, the UNCommission on Human Rights(2000) and Cohen & Deng(1999).

60 Correspondence with UNDP inKosovo, May 2001. See alsowww.osce.org/kosovo.

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heavily militarised, it appears that refugeesthemselves bear the brunt of the armedinsecurity that results. For example, a significant proportion of women refugeescollecting scarce firewood are raped at gun-point by armed assailants. Livestock hasbeen banned in the camp since 1999 due toarmed incursions between local inhabitantsand refugee pastoralists who traditionallydepend on livestock-rearing. Armed inse-curity has reached such alarming levels thatmore than 150 police reservists have beenenlisted to police the camp (see Figure 6).61

Although beyond the scope of this study,violently displaced people are universallyexposed to acute morbidity with the mostcommon cause of death being diarrhoealdisease, measles, respiratory infection andmalaria—all of which are exasperated bymalnutrition.62 Severe restrictions on themobility of IDPs and refugees, on theirdaily transactions and informal commer-cial activity, leads to decreased food secu-rity and overall morbidity. An escalationin fighting in Afghanistan, for example,has affected nearly half a million peoplein the central highlands region, prompt-ing ongoing displacement to Kabul,Iran and Pakistan. Fear of further conflict combined with poor agriculturalprospects have contributed to the exodus. According to IRIN reports:“It is estimated that 34,000 children aremalnourished in the five most severelyaffected districts of the highlands.” In theMindanao region of the Philippines, inwhich an estimated 100-150,000 peoplehave died since the 1970s, “many civilianswere displaced from their homes andrelocated to evacuation areas—most ofwhich provide poor living conditions.In these centres, many suffer as crampedliving spaces make them vulnerable todiseases like measles and diarrhoea.

Declining Social Services

In many developing countries, basic socialservices such as health care and educationfrequently deteriorate as a result of smallarms related insecurities. This provision ofsocial services, such as health and educa-tion, is an important determinant of acountry’s level of human development.

The indirect effects of small arms onhealth and education services can be measured by a range of indicators. Primaryindicators would include the number ofhealth and education workers killed orattacked with small arms, and the numberof schools or clinics closed due to armedattacks. Secondary indicators wouldinclude the capacity, and coverage of serv-ices (e.g. school enrolment rates) as a resultof incidents of armed violence.

In the context of armed conflict, armedunits searching for vehicles, medical uten-sils, labour, recruits and resources oftendeliberately target social services. Theimpacts of collapsing social services arelong-term—as a missed vaccination oreven one to two year gaps in schooling cancondemn a child to a lifetime of dimin-ished opportunities. In situations of forcedinternal displacement that lasts for years,where such services are frequently absentaltogether, the consequences are dire.

Across East Africa and the Horn, whereseveral million small arms are believed tobe circulating, district and municipal gov-ernments have reduced the distribution ofrelief supplies and health equipment forfear of attack. Immunisation and vaccina-tion efforts have been curtailed63 and pub-lic authorities have been forced to cut vitaloutreach services including veterinary pro-grammes and borehole maintenance and

61 In 1999, the UNHCR elaborateda “ladder of options” in responseto rising insecurity in refugeecamps. These range from socalled “soft options”, includingpreventive measures and co-operation with law enforce-ment (such as programmes inthe United Republic of Tanzania),to “medium options” that focuson deployment of civilian orpolice monitors (including theKosovo Verification Mission in1998) and “hard options” stressing military deployment.

62 See, for example, UNHCR(2000); Levy & Sidel (1997); andCDC (1992).

63 A recent UNICEF (2001) pressrelease claims that: “conflictremains one of the primaryobstacles to the eradication ofpolio”. Ceasefire arrangementsand “Days of Tranquillity” havebeen essential to the successof vaccination efforts in countries such as Afghanistan,Angola, the DRC, Congo-Brazzaville, Liberia, SierraLeone, Somalia and Sudan.

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repair programmes. The erosion of themost basic infrastructure for the ruralpoor suggests that development remainsfar out of reach in situations of rampantsmall arms availability. Evidence from anumber of communities in the Horn ofAfrica suggest that the collapse in socialservices has contributed to heightenedinsecurity and declines in development(SALIGAD, 2000).

There also appears to be a strong correla-tion between areas experiencing high ratesof armed violence and deteriorating publicservices and areas with proportionatelyhigher death rates from non-violentcauses. Extreme variances can occurwithin states, and even between commu-nities and households. A recent IRC(2001) report on violence in the DRCconfirms this association: “while only 10per cent of all deaths, or 14 per cent ofthe excess deaths, were attributed to vio-lence, there is a strong association (acrossboth time and space) between higher violence rates and higher death rates frominfectious disease…In Mboa and Kalemie,it is estimated that 75 per cent of childrenborn during this war have died or will diebefore their second birthday”.

Sierra Leone provides a striking illustra-tion of this trend. With Sub SaharanAfrica’s lowest life expectancy rate at just37 years, it also has the highest child mortality rate (CMR) at 169 per 100,000(World Bank Indicators, 2001). Thetrends are painfully similar from Liberiaand Mozambique to Sudan and Ugandawhere indicators for life expectancy andchild mortality all either worsened duringthe conflict period or improved by lessthan non-war countries in the region. Inareas of these countries still plagued byarmed conflict and a high availability of

weapons in civilian hands the rates esca-late.64 In the arms-affected areas ofMindanao, for example, UNICEF hasreported that the CMR exceeds 310 per100,000 whereas the CMR for the coun-try as a whole is less than 175 per 100,000(HAIN, 2001). While high CMRs can beattributed to a host of variables includingexclusion, inequality and armed conflictmore generally, it is well known that gunviolence and armed confrontations havealso increased in Mindanao during theperiod in question, restricting the mobilityand access of civilians to health services.

Education is a low priority during periodsof conflict and education indicators fre-quently decline as the intensity of armedviolence increases. Though historical,economic and cultural factors affect theextent to which children and youth,whether male or female, attend schools—armed conflict reduces enrolment rates,the extent of participation and completionrates of students and the number of avail-able teachers.65 Studies have demonstratedhow primary, secondary and night schoolenrolment in arms affected regions ofAfghanistan, Colombia, Mozambique,Nicaragua, Sierra Leone, Sudan andUganda declined during periods of intensearmed conflict—only to increase afterarmed violence had “ended”.66 In somecases, education facilities have themselvesattracted armed violence and small arms—such as in Ethiopia and Cambodia—where schools served as recruiting groundsor were deliberately attacked.

In Albania, for example, pre-school enrol-ment rates dropped dramatically followingthe 1997 crisis, from a high of 59 per centin 1990 to between 37 and 39 per cent in1999. Primary and secondary enrolmentrates also plummeted, to an estimated 18

64 See for example Oxfam-GB(2001a), IRC (2001) and Oxfam-GB (2000b).

65 Sri Lanka, however, is a notableexception to the rule. See thework of O’Sullivan (1997) onhousehold entitlements duringwartime.

66 See, for example, Luckham et al(2001) and Stewart et al (2000).

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In parts of theDemocratic Republic ofthe Congo, armed dis-putes have resulted inthe destruction of 211out of total of 228schooling facilitiessince 1999 and wellover 60 per cent of allstudents and teachershave left school.

per cent over the same period (UNDP,2000d). In recent surveys conducted inthe region, one of the principal complaintsamong youth were the high levels ofarmed violence (as well as sexual violence)and the abundance of weapons that madethis possible.67 The situation is even worsein countries still affected by systemicarmed conflict and social violence. In the DRC, the Ministry of Education’sown statistics claim that 30 per cent ofCongolese children between 5-14 werenot in school between 1999-2000. Thefigures in small arms-affected regionswere particularly revealing: in North Kivu,between 1995-1996, more than twice thatnumber (68 per cent) were not in school—and are likely illiterate. The forcedenlistment of boys at gunpoint into variousarmed factions has further reduced thenumber of children in school.68 Accordingto a recent evaluation on small arms carriedout in Djugu, armed disputes have resultedin the destruction of 211 out of a total of228 schooling facilities since 1999 and wellover 60 per cent of all students and teach-ers have left school (from 39,600 to 10,620and 1,771 to 701 respectively).69

In other countries, school facilities havealso suffered as a result of armed insecu-rity. In Kenya, some primary and second-ary schools and health clinics built in theinterior and Northern parts of the country(since independence) have been longabandoned. In spite of incentives toattract teachers and doctors to the area,persistent insecurity in such regions,coupled with traditional cultural and economic biases, corruption and severeshortage of resources have reduced theirnumbers. Repeated armed attacks againstschools, clinics and pastoral communitieshave decreased literacy rates, school enrol-ment and health indicators in affected

regions to the extent that they are amongthe lowest in the country. According to aUNICEF official in Lokichokkio (NWKenya), during a raid by the Toposos onthe Turkanese “a primary school wasattacked with ten primary students killed—they were told to enter a hole in theground and shot on the spot with the holesealed up immediately after”. Such eventshave increased in number and lethalitysince the large-scale diffusion of auto-matic weapons began.

Collapsing Economic Activity

The use of small arms has destructiveconsequences on formal and informaleconomic activity. The threat and use ofsmall arms touches both formal and infor-mal commercial transactions, includingtrading patterns, and household andnational agricultural production. In manysituations, small arms availability can be adirect cause of declining food security. Arecent assessment of the problem of smallarms in Niger shows how weapons avail-ability has had a significant impact oneconomic activity at the local level.70

The impact of small arms on economicactivity can be measured by primary indi-cators that include higher transport costsand the destruction or deterioration ofphysical infrastructure during armed conflict, and secondary indicators thatinclude prices of local goods, local termsof trade, agricultural productivity, and lev-els of food production (and food security).Sustained increases in the prices of localgoods, and declines in levels of agricul-tural productivity and food production asa result of prolonged periods of armedviolence can have disastrous consequencesfor human development.

67 See also Women’s Commissionfor Refugee Women and Children(2001) on Kosovo.

68 See the Coalition to Stop theUse of Child Soldiers. 1999. TheUse of Children as Soldiers inAfrica: A Country Analysis ofChild Recruitment andParticipation in Armed Conflict.Geneva: CSUCS. The other isLes,Robert, Charles Hale, FethiBelyakdoumi, Laura Covey,Roselida Ondeko,MicahelDespines and John Keys. 2001.Mortality in Eastern DemocraticRepublic of Congo. Atlanta: IRCHealth Unit.

69 For more detailed analysis,consult Oxfam-GB (2001b).

70 Consult UNDP/PNUD (2001j) formore details.

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The destruction or deterioration ofphysical infrastructure (e.g. roads, ports,factories) as a result of war and armedconflict can have a dramatic impact oneconomic activity (World Bank, 1998).The direct costs associated with thereconstruction of vital infrastructure (e.g. roads) in a post-conflict era, can alsolimit the available domestic and foreignresources for social services, therebyretarding human development. Manydevelopment actors, such as the WorldBank, are now actively engaged in thefinancing of post-conflict reconstruction,including the rebuilding of physical infra-structure.71

All trade requires enforceable rules (eitherformal or informal) and where such rulesare not legitimately enforced, transactionsfrequently disintegrate into social vio-lence, including criminality. In situationswhere arms are widely available and rulesare breaking down, a climate of insecurityerodes the social capital that is absolutelyvital for sustaining the relationships andcommunication necessary for transactionsto take place. Where trust, risk-poolingand communication among rural house-holds break down, and mobility isrestricted as a result of fear, so called“unvirtuous circles” form where local tradecollapses and individuals, households andcommunities are caught in “low-income”traps. In situations of outright conflict,armed insecurity is often so pervasive andrules are entirely moderated and enforcedby informal mechanisms. In such environ-ments trade is dominated by arms-wield-ing thugs and warlords (Reno, 1998).

Periods of armed violence affect food production, often taking years to recover.In Sierra Leone, the country’s GDP hascollapsed over the past five years largely as

a result of declines in the value-added ofagriculture and industry (World BankIndicators, July 2000). The proportion ofvalue-added contributed by agriculturalproduction to GDP contracted in Angolafrom a height of 23 per cent in 1991 to anaverage of six per cent in the followingeight years. During Mozambique’s civilwar, fought primarily with small arms,agro-industry exports suffered seriousdeclines—with export volumes falling anestimated 34 per cent between 1982-1983(Goudie and Neyapti, 1999).

Among predominantly pastoral groups,the presence of small arms also affects cattle production and basic commercialtransactions. The large-scale theft of live-stock from pastoralists throughout EastAfrica, exacerbated by the abundance of cheap automatic rifles, has severelyaffected production and the terms of tradein the region.72 Due to a combination ofrecurring drought, an increasing numberof deadly raids, and the deterioration ofthe delicate balance required for rangelandmanagement, cattle are now scarcer and ofpoorer quality. Faced with reduced foodsecurity as a result of the armed violence,pastoralists have resorted to environmen-tally unsustainable practices that havegenerated additional tensions over com-mon property.

While the commercialisation and monopo-lisation of trade by vested interests can beseen as one of the root causes of large-scalecattle rustling in East Africa, the virulenceof the armed confrontations is reducingfuture generations of livestock (and pas-toralists) at the subsistence level. As theterms of trade have worsened, pastoralistshave been forced to sell increasing numbersof animals to meet minimum subsistenceneeds.73 According to the World Food

71 See the publication Post ConflictReconstruction: The Role of theWorld Bank for a discussion ofthe role of the World Bank infinancing post-conflict reconstruc-tion projects.

72 The annual value of livestock pro-duction and export in the Horn ofAfrica has been estimated at wellover $US 100 million per year. A recent report on pastoralists inKenya by SALIGAD (2000) notesthat: “47 per cent of peopleinterviewed in Turkana districtsay that they have lost their live-stock due to raids”. As a result,many have replaced the trade inlivestock with the trade inweapons”.

73 See, for example, Hendrickson etal, (1998); UNDP Somalia Report(1998).

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Programme (WFP, 2001), increasing levelsof food insecurity in the Horn of Africahave led to rising levels of “malnutrition-related diseases, such as infectious diar-rhoea, which is among the leading causesof morbidity and mortality among childrenless than five years of age”. According toresearch conducted by Consultative Groupon International Agricultural Research(CGIAR, 1996) armed violence has “put at least 80 million people at risk of hungerand malnutrition”.

Armed blockades and informal road-stops, piracy, raids on convoys and systematic armed robbery can erode theconfidence of buyers and sellers in thereliability of transportation networks andmarkets. At the very least, scarcity con-tributes to a destabilization of prices for arange of goods, and the meagre trade thatcontinues is entirely unpredictable. Notonly does armed insecurity prevent farm-ers from selling their produce in openmarkets, it prevents them from obtainingvital inputs such as fertilizers and seeds.

Armed banditry can severely affect thesupply of cash crops, as public and com-mercial transportation to markets is often

interrupted, and consequently, farmers areforced to abandon commercial harvests.Where this happens repeatedly on a largescale, local investment often declines with broad ripple effects on both foreigninvestor confidence and overseas develop-ment assistance (ODA) (see Box 8).

Investment, Savings andRevenue Collection

Few external investors are willing to investin fixed productive assets in places wheresmall arms are openly brandished. Adiverse array of countries and institutionshas recently declared armed conflict andsocial violence perpetrated with smallarms as one of the most serious obstaclesto investment and tourism. In Colombia,for example, a measurement of investmentfunctions against the firearm homicide orkidnapping rate demonstrates an impactas high as 40 per cent (Parra, 1997).Unless there are serious possibilities for resource extraction (oil, diamonds,timber), foreign investment in regionswhere arms are widely available takes on a“short-termist” perspective—and commer-cial activity aims for quick returns as a

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60

per

100

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FDI (net inflow in $US 100,000)

FDI Percentage Change

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ODA Percentage Change

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Figure 7. FDI and ODA Flows in Albania 1995-99

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risk avoidance strategy.74 In some cases,these extractive industries are often thesource of armed conflict, or are used tosustain armed conflict (Keen, 2001).

According to the World Bank, conflict-ridden countries suffer disproportionatelyfrom negative growth and a massive dete-rioration in FDI. For example, more than50 per cent of FDI that flowed into SubSaharan Africa during the last decade wasconcentrated in a mere eight countries,with only 10 per cent distributed amongthe remaining 40. Overseas aid flows alsodeclined, falling in total volume from $US17.9 billion in 1992 to $US 10.8 billion in1999 (World Bank Indicators, 2001).

Small arms related violence can have adevastating impact on a country’s financialindicators, as measured by trends in localand foreign fixed investment, revenue col-lection and domestic savings. As notedabove, both domestic and foreign invest-ment often declines in the context ofarmed conflict and social violence as

investors take their money elsewhere.Tax payments, which affect the levels ofgovernment revenue and spending, oftenstop or decline during armed conflict,particularly if people and communities areforcibly displaced. Declines in levels of investment and revenue collection,particularly in terms of the allocation ofgovernment spending can have a negativeimpact on human development.

Violence or armed conflict force govern-ments to spend more on defence or lawand order, allowing fewer resources forsocial services (health and education). InSouth Africa, spending on law and orderhas grown at a faster rate than spendingon social services such as housing, healthand education, despite the legacies ofapartheid and the new government’s com-mitment to reconstruction and develop-ment. The 2000/2001 national policebudget is US$1.96 billion, significantlymore than for the national health budgetof US$1.56 billion.75 Lower levels ofspending on social services in turn forcespeople to use their savings to make up for the shortfall in public spending andconsequently, lower levels of domestic saving reduce the amount of investmentresources in a country and can have a significant impact on national economicactivity.

Social Capital

Small arms related violence is felt (andassessed) most profoundly at the householdand individual level, and the use of smallarms by certain groups, such as young men,can have negative effects on gender rela-tions and family and communal cohesion.A range of indicators can be used to meas-ure the impact of small arms on social

74 Though still very much specula-tive, a review of US Foreign DirectInvestment Climate reports,suggests that even where manyarmed conflicts are thriving incountries rich with oil reservesand exploitable primary commodi-ties, FDI from oil, petroleum, min-eral and other resource-extractionfirms increases. In Niger, in themidst of the uranium miningboom and the internal conflictwith the Tuareg, FDI grew morethan 386 per cent between 1993and 1996 from $US 22 million to$US 85 million. Also, between1996 and 1997 in Colombia,capital inflows rose from $US1.8 billion to $US 2.9 billion inspite of serious warning from theChamber of Commerce.

75 Figures from 2001 BudgetReview (Department of Finance,2001).

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Box 8. FDI, ODA and small arms

The impact of small arms on the investmentclimate can be illustrated by the case ofAlbania. Following the collapse of pyramidschemes and the widespread looting ofarms depots in 1997, net inflows of foreigninvestment declined almost 50 per cent inthree years. To put this into monetary terms,FDI contracted from $US 70 million in 1995to $US 45 million in 1998 as a result ofarmed violence and instability. But the storydoes not end there. Aid per capita alsoincreased over the same period—from $US56 to $US 72 per head (see chart).Generally, these trends represent a cost toboth Albanians and the international com-munity—both in terms of opportunity costsin relation to lost investment as well asincreasing ODA.

capital. Primary indicators would includethe numbers of child soldiers, membershipof armed gangs, incidents of armed domes-tic violence (e.g. rape) and the breakdownin customary authority. Secondary indica-tors would include repeat criminal activityamong youth and the collapse of commu-nity and customary institutions.

It is currently estimated that at least300,000 children under 18 are fighting assoldiers with government forces and armedopposition groups in more than 30 countries worldwide (Machel, 2000). Inaddition, in more than 85 countries, hun-dreds of thousands of children have beenrecruited into government armed forces,paramilitaries and a wide variety of non-state armed groups.76 According to theCoalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers‘the widespread availability of modernlightweight weapons (small arms) has alsocontributed to the child soldiers problem,enabling even the smallest children tobecome (an) efficient killers in combat.Child soldiers not only lose their childhoodand opportunities for education and development, they also risk physical injury,psychological trauma and even death.

Combined with a dearth of adequate edu-cation or schooling possibilities, the riskspresented by small arms availability totraumatized children in situations ofextreme deprivation are enormous. InCongo-Brazzaville, for example, youth fac-ing unemployment and uncertainty rapidlyjoined militias and gangs that offered“prestige, access to power and the possibil-ity for plunder” (UNDP/PNUD 2001: 3).According to a recent study of violenceamong youth in Kosovo, concerns aboutsecurity among young people were closelylinked to their psychological and socialapprehensions: “violence has caused a sense

of loss, fear and hopelessness”. They voicedspecial concern with their lack of mobility,recreational space and criticised the wide-spread possession of weapons among youthand adolescents “particularly in Albaniancommunities…[and the] limited efforts byparents, teachers and other authorities toaddress the problem” (Women’s Commis-sion, 2001: 3).77

The scale and lethality of violence madepossible by military-style small arms hascontributed to the breakdown of custom-ary institutions and takes its toll onindigenous systems of organisation andsocial control (such as dowry, land-tenurearrangements, common property and customary law). In addition, faith in localsolutions and traditional approaches toconflict resolution has declined, thoughsome indigenous systems have alsoevolved local responses (see Box 9).

The end of grazing restrictions in EastAfrica, for example, led to a free-for-allover grazing lands and water rights duringthe post-independence period. In parts ofKenya, the resulting insecurity (e.g. high-way banditry and car-hijacking, raidingand stock theft, robbery and looting,intimidation, physical injury and rape andmurder) ranks as one of the principlecauses of suffering and human misery(SALIGAD, 2000). Due in part to theinsecurity now associated with cattleherding, many pastoralists are forced toabandon their traditional livelihoods andshift to informal urban labour markets orface unemployment. Among some com-munities, dowries are conferred by credit(rather than by cows themselves), affect-ing the endowment set of pastoral house-holds. In towns such as Garrissa andWajir in North Eastern Kenya, “councilsof elders” have lost their legitimacy in the

76 Figures from Global Report onChild Soldiers (2001).

77 A project is currently being developed by the UNDP entitled“Support to Human Security inKosovo” to this effect. See UNDP(2001b).

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face of escalating levels of armed violence—and the social fabric of these societies isin an advanced state of decay.

Development Intervention andthe Culture of Withdrawal

The field staff of development agenciesare increasingly finding themselves in theline of fire. The existence of small armscomplicates the task of poverty alleviationat every stage of the project cycle, from

funding, to programme design, implemen-tation to monitoring and evaluation.

To measure the impact of small arms ondevelopment intervention, primary indica-tors include the number and type of secu-rity incidents (armed assault of field staff ).Secondary indicators include the risingcosts of logistics and security as a propor-tion of total development assistance.

To avoid areas where there are rising lev-els of insecurity—particularly the risksposed to government and NGO extensionworkers—planners turn to regions wherethe return on their investment and performance justify continued fundingfrom “results-oriented” donors. Insurancepremium costs have skyrocketed to thepoint where programme administratorsare unable to sanction staff travel or inter-vention. In other cases, programmes arelooted, shut down, abandoned and staffevacuated: “project staff may be at risk,project sites may remain unused by thepopulation…and sites may attract armedattacks” (Colletta & Kostner, 2000). Thus,the unchecked availability of small arms isgenerating a “culture of withdrawal”.

The pace and scale of “security incidents”,such as car-jacking, kidnapping, armedattack, armed robbery and murder affect-ing the UN system has spiralled in recentyears, although this growth can in part beattributed to an increase in activities inwar-affected areas. Between 1992 and2000, more than 185 UN staff were killedin situations of conflict—with a firearmhomicide rate of between 17 and 25 per100,000 (Muggah & Berman, 2001).Referring to the DRC, UN Under-Secretary-General for HumanitarianAffairs, Kenzo Oshima notes that “in suchan environment of massive humanitarian

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Box 9. An Indigenous Response:The Kuria’s Sungusungu in Kenya

Small arms have led to a tragic breakdownin customary and cultural institutions, suchas councils of elders, common propertyresources and grazing rights, religious cere-monies and marriage rites. Children bearingsmall arms are often bestowed status,which can undercut the authority of govern-ment, community, or even family authorities.Yet sometimes, time-tested customs canadapt. For example, in Nyanza Province ofSouthern Kenya, the Kuria people haveinvoked a traditional form of law and order(sungusungu) to effectively control and man-age the impacts of small arms.

In searching for alternative mechanisms tomanage the rising tide of armed violence,the District Administrator and the local com-munity identified a traditional custom called“sungusungu”: a system in which the com-munity identifies criminal offenders and col-lectively determines the level of compensa-tion for the victims. The relative success ofsungusungu, where modern systems of lawenforcement have failed, suggests that theinitiative is potentially a viable response tothe endemic problem of cattle rustling andsmall arms. Furthermore, it offers lessonsfor other similar situations elsewhere in the region.

Source: SALIGAD, 2000

deficit, the major impediment facing thehumanitarian community is the lack ofaccess to vulnerable populations, worsenedby a combination of factors including thecountry’s vast size, poor infrastructure, andrampant insecurity” (IRIN, 2001).

The intensity of insecurity in some regionshas increased to the extent that even secu-rity assessments themselves are perilous.For example in September 2000, securityofficers in Somalia who were conducting asecurity assessment to determine whetherUN agencies could resume humanitarianand development operations after a six-month suspension were attacked by agroup of 30 armed men. All UN pro-grammes were hastily suspended afterunidentified gunmen sprayed gunfire at aEuropean Community plane. During adisarmament ceremony held in Atambua(East Timor) during the very same month,UN invitees were attacked by the militiawho sought to reclaim their weapons, andwere forced to take refuge beneath thefacade (Muggah & Berman, 2001).

The rising costs associated with securitylogistics—transportation, security andinformation infrastructure—ensure that a growing proportion of aid is beingdevoted to unproductive purposes. Forexample, agencies are known to spendbetween five and thirty percent on localprivate security services alone.78 In somecases, they are forced to hire armed guardsfrom the local community lest they triggerstill more violence. Additional costs relateto the barricading of walls and fencingaround compounds and residences, armedconvoys and escorts, high-tech satellitetelecommunications systems, intelligencegathering, emergency evacuation andplanning costs.

78 For more detailed analysis of thecosts of private security on reliefand development agencies, con-sult Muggah & Berman (2001)and Lilly (2000).

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Box 10. Security and Oxfam-GB

In early 2001 a questionnaire entitled“Arms Availability and Humanitarian/Development Impacts” was administered intwenty countries where Oxfam-GB operates.The survey was conducted to raise aware-ness of, and responses to, the threat ofsmall arms. According to the report over90 per cent of all Oxfam-GB staff agreedthat arms availability, whether assaultrifles, handguns, APMs or mortars, con-tributes to insecurity in their day-to-dayoperations. Respondents noted theimpacts of small arms in relation to boththeir development work and their relativecapacity and opportunity to intervene onbehalf of vulnerable groups in the field.

Increasing attention has been devoted tohow the militarisation of “humanitarianintervention” leads to the militarisation ofthe “humanitarian space” available toagencies. Practitioners have studied howincreasing private security, designed osten-sibly to ensure protection of staff and ben-eficiaries, has counter-intuitive effects. Thedebate is emotive—and strikes at theroots of the humanitarian objectives of“impartiality”—as an armed presenceoften escalates tensions between vestedinterests in the field and the NGO pres-ence. Oxfam-GB has made a consciousdecision not to engage armed actorsunless absolutely necessary—and this isreflected in the responses received. Only20 per cent of Oxfam-GB respondentsnoted that they used armed security ateither their office, during transportation ofgoods to and from the field or in their pri-vate residence. Importantly, there appearsto be a common belief that “guns drawgunfire” and should be avoided. More than56 per cent of all respondents did not feel that privatised security significantlycontributes to their security. That said,the very real threat of small arms useremains—and is felt intensely by somestaff in the field.

Source: Muggah, 2001c

Considering the far-reaching andlong-term implications andimpacts of the use of small arms

on human development, it is for affectedcountries and regions to embark on strategies aimed at reducing the preva-lence of small arms in their societies, bysimultaneously addressing the supply andthe demand for these weapons.

The international development commu-nity can play a major role in responding tothe problems associated with the prolifer-ation, availability and misuse of smallarms. Any interventions by the develop-ment community should consider boththe supply and demand side elements ofsmall arms proliferation, availability anduse, and must deal with both legal, andillicit, weapons.

The supply and availability dimension ofthe small arms problem is concerned withexisting supplies of weapons in conflictzones, flows and exports or transfers ofweapons to developing countries. Sincemost small arms start out their lives legally,it is important to focus on the various waysin which these arms are diverted into illicitmarkets. A focus on the supply side islinked to the accessibility thesis, whichassumes that an increase in the stock, oravailability, of small arms in a society canlead to an increase in the potential forarmed conflict and social violence.

Interventions on the supply side couldinclude the conversion of the defenceindustry to civilian production; strengthen-ing of regulatory controls on suppliers,producers, retailers, brokers and transportagents; the introduction of more rigorousexport and import certification (“end-usercertificates”); more resources for customsand excise agencies; improved arrangements

for tracing and marking; stockpile manage-ment and destruction of surplus weapons;and technical assistance programmes fordeveloping countries. However, these supply-side interventions cannot on theirown deal with the factors that prompt people to acquire weapons. Therefore, whatis required is an approach that links reduc-ing supply and availability, with a focus onthe demand side of the problem.

The demand-side dimension of the smallarms problem is concerned with the factors that prompt people to acquire orpossess small arms, either legally or illicitly. This requires an analysis of theroot causes of armed conflict and socialviolence. A focus on the demand side islinked to the preventive developmentapproach, which assumes that withoutwell-balanced and sustainable humandevelopment, armed conflict and socialviolence are more likely to emerge,thereby increasing the demand for arms.

The demand-side approach is concernedwith identifying the economic, politicaland social factors that cause armed con-flict or social violence, and which in turnprompt people to acquire weapons.Interventions on the demand side couldinclude development policies to alleviatepoverty and inequality, and generateemployment and alternative livelihoods(especially for ex-combatants and childsoldiers); security sector reform and thestrengthening of police and customs; goodgovernance and the reform of the judicialsystem; effective demobilisation, disarma-ment and reintegration of ex-combatantsinto civil society; post-conflict reconstruc-tion of physical infrastructure; and publicawareness and education programmesabout the impacts of small arms. Thesedemand-side efforts should highlight the

Conclusion: Confronting the Problem

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fact that demand and supply are inti-mately linked, for fresh supplies of armscan fuel the negative impacts of smallarms availability and use (e.g. forced displacement), and consequently drive-upthe demand for these weapons. It is alsoworth noting that such interventions cannot only reduce the demand for smallarms (for example, by lowering crime),but also at the same time deal with manyof the negative impacts of small arms onhuman development (for example,reduced capacity of social services).

Supply Side Interventions

The development community can, andshould, play a significant role in the following supply side interventions:i) development of production and exportcontrols, including conversion of surplusdefence industrial capacity; ii) the devel-opment and consolidation of legislativeframeworks, iii) capacity building forpolice and customs, to ensure better controls over the production, stockpilingand trade in small arms; and iv) supportfor weapons collection and destructionprogrammes.

Weapons collection efforts should servethe fundamental purpose of improvingsecurity by taking weapons permanentlyout of circulation. Disarmament has tradi-tionally been approached “by command”,a process that is “organised, supervised,public and collective”, with the objectiveof both collecting and destroyingweapons. But because of the limitedattention devoted to small arms at thepolitical level, the articulation of defini-tions, principles, philosophy and amethodology of response at the technicallevel, has been relatively slow.79

79 According to one expert, “onlyone weapons collection pro-gramme to date, has been conducted without any civiliancasualties caused by the han-dling of unsafe and unstableammunition and explosives thatthey were returning…The plan-ning and execution phase ofmany of these operations hasbeen amateurish because of thelack of involvement from Day 1 of appropriately qualified andtrained individuals. As a resultthere has been unnecessary lossof life, which arguably could havebeen avoided by a more profes-sional approach.”

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Box 11. What Can VoluntaryWeapons CollectionAchieve?

Experience tells us that weapons collectionprogrammes suffer from two critical weaknesses: they do not effectively disarmcriminals, nor do they significantly reducethe number of weapons in a specific target area. In El Salvador, for example,between 1996-1999, a “Goods for Gunsprogramme” collected 4,357 firearms,3,180 grenades and more than 100,000rounds of ammunition. While considerable,this amounted to a mere 8 per cent of thenew arms legally imported into the countryduring the same period.

But rather than strictly removing weaponsfrom the hands of abusers, weapons collection programmes provide a usefulawareness-raising function. They aim toinfluence a change in culture and attitudestowards the role of guns in society, by convincing them that guns were contribut-ing more to their insecurity than theirsafety. There are two main contributions ofweapons collection that extend beyond theobjective of removing guns from society.

First, collection programmes can consoli-date relationships between civil societygroups and create a model for collabora-tion in the future. The El Salvadorian initiative combined a number of actors,including the Church, the private sector,NGOs, and the state, to great effect. The participation of business to improvepublic security was one particularly important, and innovative, feature.Second, voluntary weapons collection programmes can effectively support,reinforce, or trigger additional initiativesaimed at improving human security anddevelopment in general. Media attentionand awareness-building programmes areone relevant example in this regard. These awareness or sensitisation effortscan have tremendous symbolic effects onpublic perceptions of arms use.

It is crucial that narrow supply-side disar-mament interventions should be expandedto include a multifaceted approach thataims to change perceptions about thedesirability of possessing weapons.Disarmament programmes, where theyhave occurred, are rarely successful at collecting vast numbers of weapons.While the number of weapons collectedremains important in its own right80, suchdisarmament programmes require a moreexpansive perspective—seeking to buildconfidence, forge collaborative networksin the community and support genuinely participatory initiatives and a long-termcommitment between stakeholders (seeBox 11).81 Disarming is first and foremostabout building trust. When there is trust,it is argued, either the guns will rot awayin the ground where they are hidden, orthey will simply be turned in. Seen fromthis perspective, disarmament represents a vital component of the “reform of thestate security apparatus, of the military,police and judiciary and penal systems,and furthermore, of a broader process of democratisation…an aspect of good governance and development policy”(Mason, 1999).

Demand-Side Interventions

The development community alreadyplays an important role in various demandside interventions, which are aimed atreducing poverty and inequality, and pro-moting sustainable human development.These types of interventions are extremelyimportant for dealing with some of thefactors that prompt the demand for smallarms. In addition, the development com-munity can, and should, also play a criticalrole in other demand side interventionssuch as: i) demobilisation, disarmament

and reintegration of ex-combatants,ii) good governance, iii) security sectorreform and enhanced capacity of lawenforcement agencies, iv) peace-buildingand post-conflict reconstruction; and v) education and public awareness.

Interventions to curb the demand forsmall arms should primarily concentrateon the alleviation of poverty and structuralinequality, thereby helping to reduce someof the factors prompting people to keep oracquire weapons. These interventions areusually part of the core mandate of devel-opment agencies. In the context of armedconflict and social violence, such effortsaddress some of the fundamental rootcauses of conflict, while at the same timebalancing development intervention withthe principle of ‘doing no harm’.

Another key intervention on the demandside involves the demobilisation, dis-armament and reintegration (DDR) ofex-combatants (including child soldiers),and the development of policies to createalternative livelihoods for these ex-com-batants. Seen in this context, DDR pro-grammes should be conceived as efforts tosignificantly reduce the risk of renewedarmed conflict and the possibility of armsbeing re-used by ex-combatants in crimeand banditry.82 In the case of CentralAmerica in the early 1990s, whereweapons are not removed from society inthe aftermath of armed conflict, they areoften re-used in crime, helping to maketoday’s combatants tomorrow’s criminals.DDR efforts, then, should seek to focuson the extent to which weapons-holdersbelieve they need to retain their weapons.Endorsing both positive and negativeincentives and the permanent removal ofweapons from society, ensures this kind oflonger-term vision.

80 See, for example, the evaluationof the Gramsh project byBICC/SAS (2000).

81 Indeed, evidence suggests thatefforts to forcibly disarm commu-nities have the perverse conse-quence of actually intensifyingtheir demand for weapons. Forthis reason, amnesty, collectionand destruction programmes car-ried out in “peacetime” settingsfor the purpose of reducing andpreventing crime are frequentlyvoluntary in nature, using bothcarrots (incentives) and sticks(sanctions). Critical surveys ongun amnesties in the US suggestthat high-risk groups, such asyoung unemployed men, may notbe effectively targeted. They alsonote that as in other amnestyprogrammes the world over,ineffective and poor-qualityweaponry are often turned ininstead of more lethal arms.Such evaluations also questionthe real extent to which such pro-grammes are therefore effective.But measurement of results isoften hampered by the fact thatthey are often implemented atthe community level (either withinor outside a national framework)that may conceal their short-termeffectiveness in reducing rates offirearm violence among smallpopulations. But recognised riskfactors associated with smallarms can be reduced. For exam-ple, merely taking the firearm outof civilian hands is a worthwhileintervention: innumerable studiesshow that the presence of afirearm in the household is posi-tively associated with a high riskof firearm violence.

82 This view is being vigorouslyendorsed in Sierra Leone, whereafter repeated failures, DDR isbeing perceived as one of “themost crucial elements”. TheSpecial Representative of the UN Secretary-General, OluyemiAdeniji has stressed that “it isessential both in the interests ofoverall peace in Sierra Leone andin the interests of the peace andsecurity of individuals that we getthe process right”, IRIN (2001).

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Interventions such as “weapons inexchange for development” have helpedimprove security and well-being, evenwhere the number of arms collectedappears relatively small in comparison toexpenditures on development projects.83

In the view of one evaluation, the value of these projects (as opposed to simpleweapons collection projects) lies “not onlyin encouraging people to disarm, but alsoin their contribution to economic growth,community development and public secu-rity” (BICC, 2000: 7). Such initiatives canharness pre-existing desires on the part ofmany civilians to disarm themselves andby involving the community, can supportdisarmament processes that might alreadybe underway, empower the local peopleand encourage them to cooperate with thelocal authorities to improve conditions intheir communities”. The Gramsh PilotProject (GPP) in Albania creatively com-bined a technical weapons collection pro-gramme with participatory needs assess-ments that focused on small-scale andlabour-intensive development projects.

Reducing demand also depends on gener-ating critical awareness of the impacts ofsmall arms. This requires a capacity tolearn from experience, establish priorities,and generate innovative and integratedstrategies.84 In this regard the develop-ment community can play an importantrole in sensitising communities and policy-makers to the varied risks thatsmall arms pose to human developmentthrough awareness building interventions.For example, the annual publications frommajor development actors (UNDP, WorldBank, OECD) could be better used tohighlight the inter-linkages between smallarms, armed conflict and human develop-ment. The development community couldalso build local capacity to collect andanalyse baseline data on the impact ofsmall arms as part of their existing inter-ventions. Focused country studies couldhighlight the specific impacts of smallarms, and thereby identify the necessaryinterventions for reducing the supply of,and demand for, such weapons.

83 At the time of this writing,the GPP had collected 5,981weapons and 137 tons of ammunition. It had also success-fully built 34 kilometres ofaccess roads and bridges,installed a radio and telephonesystem in Gramsh as well asstreet lighting in the town itself(BICC/SAS, 2000).

84 Community studies are one possible approach to understand-ing the small arms problem incontext. Mainstreaming socio-economic analysis of the impactof small arms into project designand implementation, as well asfeasibility studies and pro-gramme evaluations are another.

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Al-Ra’y al-Am (2001) “Sudan: Minister Warns of Dangers of Small Arms Proliferation and ArmedRobbery”, translated from Arabic in IRIN, May 15.

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