Agents of Insecurity in the Andes

32 Agents of Insecurity in the Andes: Transregional Crime and Strategic Relations

Arlene B. Tickner and Ann C. Mason

32.1 Introduction1

Current processes of globalization are transformingthe worlds social and political geography. Many newsocio-spatial arrangements are discontinuous withstate jurisdictions and increasingly incompatible withthe territorial principle of sovereignty (Inayatullah/Blaney 2004; Mason 2005). This spatial reconfigura-tion is vividly illustrated by the deterritorialization ofsecurity in the post-Cold War era. Security domainsare not only located above, below, and alongside theterritorial state, but they also are intertwined with andsuperimposed upon other such spaces, presenting aglobal security matrix at odds with state-centric epis-temologies (Walker 1993; Agnew 1994; Brenner 1999).This multiplicity of security sites that characterizescontemporary global order encompasses a wide rangeof values, actors, and dynamics that transcend theconventional national security model.

Andean security dynamics typify this global secu-rity paradigm. Security interdependence, regionaloverlay, transnational flows, and the prevalence ofnon-state actors are the defining characteristics of thesecurity landscape in the Andes, making it problem-atic to analyse security exclusively at the national level.Although it is commonly argued that the Colombianconflict is the vortex of regional insecurity, we findthis interpretation to be partial at best (Rabasa/Chalk2001; Millett 2002). Not only does it obviate the ex-tent to which transnational security geographies havesuperseded state-based approaches, but it also fails torecognize how the Colombian conflict is both fuelledby and feeds back into transregional activities.

Of particular relevance in the Pan-Andean securitycontext are processes involving transregional dynam-ics and region-wide networks of actors. The most

acute threats to Andean security are transborder in na-ture, as epitomized by the movement of drugs andarms that crisscross the region irrespective of politicalboundaries, and in many cases spill out of the regionaltogether. Strategic relationships involving both trans-national criminal organizations and armed groups op-erate beyond the control of national governments andmanage these illicit trafficking activities.

This chapter looks at the role played by these non-state agents in constructing the threat dimension ofan Andean-wide security configuration. We use as apoint of departure our transregional framework,which is based on a regional security geography (Tick-ner/Mason 2003; Mason/Tickner 2006). After speci-fying this theoretical approach to security we lay outthe contours of the model (32.2). The chapter pro-ceeds with a discussion of Andean security (32.3),with particular emphasis on the core security problemof the region, namely illicit flows and networks (32.4).We identify those non-state actors that perpetuate thistransregional dynamic, as well as the strategic rela-tions that exist among them (32.5). The text concludeswith an analysis of the contributions of the Andeancase to current debates on security thinking (32.6)

32.2 Transregional Security Approach

Security has been virtually reconceptualized since theend of the Cold War (Matthews 1989; Buzan 1991;Lipschutz 1995; Buzan/Wver/de Wilde 1998). Thisconcept has been broadened to include multiple refer-ents, and non-military processes and threats, both ofwhich illustrate how new security principles transcendconventional categories. Most central to new securitythinking, however, has been the transformation insecuritys spatial and territorial context. The most ele-mentary manifestation of this has been the blurring ofthe internal/external dichotomy that defined previoussecurity studies. Domestic and international domains

1 This paper is part of an ongoing research project onAndean transregional security, financed by the FordFoundation.

450 Arlene B. Tickner and Ann C. Mason

are enmeshed: security risks can be wholly containedat the local level, internal dynamics may becomeregional, transnational or even global threats and glo-bal processes may in turn exacerbate insecurity condi-tions for certain regions, states or subnational groups.The provision of security has also been globalized.Along with the effacement of the internal/externaldivide has also come new thinking on the role of theinternational community in protecting civilian popula-tions and establishing order within state jurisdictions(Walter/Snyder 1999). Security conditions within sov-ereign states are increasingly considered part of trans-national processes and a legitimate concern of abroader global polity.

The deterritorialization of security links up a mul-ticiplicity of state and non-state actors at all levels ofsocio-political activity to form a complex web of inter-acting dynamics. Indeed, in the Andean context, thedefining feature of the security problematic is the ex-istence of region-wide processes that span nation-stateboundaries. At the same time, these processes interactwith a host of political and socio-economic problemswithin the regions individual countries. A transre-gional security approach incorporates both of thesedimensions: problems shared by the areas states andsocieties, and security issues that permeate the re-gional constellation, and transcend individual stateunits (Tickner/Mason 2003).

As in most geographic regions, Bolivia, Colombia,Ecuador, Peru, and Venezuela are bound together inpart by the similarity of the political, socio-economic,and security difficulties they share. Democratic fragil-ity, institutional weakness, poor articulation betweenstate and society, socio-economic exclusion, and mul-tiple forms of violence are common to all states of theregion, even though they may manifest themselvesuniquely in each national context (Gutierrez 2003;Drake/Hershberg 2006; Mason/Tickner 2006).

What most stands out about the current securityclimate, however, is its intermestic and transbordernature. What we denote as transregionalism involvessecurity logics that diffuse the entire region and theprimary agents of which are non-state actors that ei-ther operate at the regional level, or whose activitiesare somehow articulated with regional processes. Inthe Andean context, the most salient transregional se-curity issue is the illicit trade of drugs and arms, andthe networks they produce.

Both the national and regional components oftransregionalism are highly interdependent: sharedproblems are both mutually reinforcing and nurturetransregional processes. Regional level dynamics

themselves overlap and exacerbate each other, at thesame time that they feed back into domestic develop-ments. For example, the tendency toward institutionalweakening and democratic deconsolidation in the An-des has provided fertile ground for burgeoning levels ofcriminality and the formation of illicit transnationalnetworks. These activities both depend on and deepencorruption at all levels of government, leading to fur-ther deterioration of public institutions and practices.In addition to links between the regional and nationallevels, horizontal interactions, both political and crim-inal, also take place among a wide variety of non-stateactors throughout the region.

The centrality of domestic level problems in trans-regional security dynamics warrants a brief overviewof the most critical issues faced by the five Andean na-tions. First, each has a persistently mediocre eco-nomic record. Not only do they share minimal, and insome cases regressive, growth, but they are marked bypersistent poverty, cycles of stagnation, and en-trenched inequality. Crushing poverty is a way of lifein the Andes, with roughly half the population in Bo-livia, Ecuador, Colombia, Peru, and Venezuela livingbelow the poverty line. The regional average of thoseliving in conditions of indigence is approximately 25per cent (CEPAL 2005). The Andean subsystem alsoregisters the highest levels of inequality in Latin Amer-ica (Munck 2003; Portes/Hoffman 2003), as indi-cated by their respective Gini indexes: Bolivia 44.7;Colombia 57.6; Ecuador 43.7; Peru 49.8; and Vene-zuela 49.1 (United Nations 2005). Both poverty andinequality are highly correlated with rising social dis-content and increasing levels of violence and criminal-ity.

Weak administrative and political institutions alsoaggravate insecurity at the regional level. On the onehand, democracy in the Andes has undergone amarked process of deterioration (Mainwaring/Scully1995; Gutirrez 2003). Congressional and partyweakening, and excessive strengthening of the execu-tive branch, have seriously undermined democracysfoundations and efficacy. Elected governments havebeen less than successful at guaranteeing the rule oflaw, and at protecting basic civil rights and freedoms.Democracys credibility has been further eroded bydeeply entrenched official corruption, which is itselfhighly correlated with weak government institutions.Indeed, the Andean countries rank among the mostcorrupt in Latin America and the world, according tothe Transparency International Corruption Percep-tions Index (2005, figure 32.1).2

Agents of Insecurity in the Andes: Transregional Crime and Strategic Relations 451

In addition, Andean countries all receive low marksfor their empirical attributes of statehood: the exer-cise of exclusive authority over territory and popula-tions, the provision of essential public goods, and suf-ficient coercive power to maintain order and extractresources. Vast areas of national territory are devoidof state presence and administrative infrastructure,giving rise to illegality as well as privatized systems ofconflict resolution, security, and justice. Armed insur-gencies, violent social movements, criminal organiza-tions, and common delinquency are part of the land-scape in all Andean countries, and to a large degreebeyond effective government control.

32.3 Andean Security Scenario

Today, the Andean region is commonly viewed as theepicentre of hemispheric instability, attributable totwo primary factors. First, it is reduced to the above-mentioned domestic political, institutional, and socio-

economic factors (Council on Foreign Relations2004; Shifter 2004). Secondly, regional turmoil is as-sociated with the Colombian armed conflict and itsspill over effects. Admittedly, with the exception ofColombias high profile war, there are few acute secu-rity problems in or between the other countries of theregion. Peru and Ecuadors territorial dispute contin-ues to simmer, following the 1995 armed confronta-tion. Colombia and Venezuela also have longstandingborder disagreements that predate the current Co-lombian internal conflict. Likewise, the externalitiesproduced by Colombias internal conflict have led toincreasing tensions with neighbours.

Contrary to this reading, however, we argue thatthere are important region-wide security dynamicsthat have been crowded out by excessive concentra-tion upon the Colombian conflict and by failure totake into account its regional dimension. Many of themost visible risks to Andean security neither originatewithin, nor are confined to, a single national territory.Indeed, the second dimension of our transregionalmodel consists of security processes that, while highlyassociated with internal instability, are more transna-tional than domestic in nature. Drugs and arms, andthe violence and criminality they spawn, crisscross theregion irrespective of national boundaries. At thesame time, the illegal groups that control these activi-ties form transnational alliances both within the re-

Figure 32.1: Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index 2005. May 2005. Source: . Prof. Dr J. Graf Lambsdorff of the Univer-sity of Passau produced the CPI table. See: or: < www.icgg.org>.

2 On a scale from zero (highly corrupt) to ten (highlyclean), in 2005 Peru was classified with a 3.5 corruptionindex, placing it 65th out of 159 on the country rank.Colombia at 4.0 was ranked 55th, Venezuela at 2.3 wasranked 130th; and both Ecuador and Bolivia were classi-fied 2.5, coming both in 117th.


gion and in conjunction with hemispheric and globalorganizations. To the extent that Colombian armedgroups participate in illicit arms and drug traffickingactivities, operate in neighbouring territories andform political relationships with non-Colombian ac-tors, this conflict also takes on an explicitly regionalcomponent. Although Colombias internal conflictclearly generates security externalities, as will be dis-cussed subsequently, the war itself is enmeshed withcomplex regional and global processes. For example,global drug markets provide a major source of fund-ing for the conflicts primary players, and in turn fi-nance the acquisition of illegal arms. These transac-tions occur within complex transnational criminalassociations inside and at the edges of the Andean re-gion, which are also involved in global financial, crim-inal, and even terrorist networks. Indeed, seen fromthis perspective, Colombia's war is more internationalthan normally assumed, actively involving dense trans-border networks composed of an array of global ac-tors (Mason 2003).

32.4 Transnational Criminal Flows and Networks

Transformations in the global political economy havesignificantly altered the spaces in which illegal activi-ties take place. Namely, the high mobility and volumeof goods, people and money, the speed of communi-cation and travel, and the porousness of national bor-ders have facilitated the expansion and consolidationof illicit networks around the world (Van Schendel/Abraham 2006; Williams 1998: 250). Transnationalcriminal organizations related to the drug trade alonehave amassed tremendous amounts of power due tothe lucrative nature of the business. According to the2005 World Drug Report of the United NationsOffice on Drugs and Crime (UNODOC 2005), theglobal narcotics market generates earnings of approx-imately US$ 320 billion per year, and the size of thistrade is larger than the GDP of 88 per cent of theworlds nations. Drug income is used to influence thepolitical and economic system in those countries inwhich transnational organizations operate, primarilyto keep in check initiatives that seek to restrict illegalactivities. Transnational crime particularly targetsthird world states as venues for their operations dueto the fact that weaker countries are not only morevulnerable to corrupting influences but also are lessable to combat organized criminal activities effectively(Lee 1999; Serrano 2000).

Not surprisingly, criminal flows and networks per-vade the Andean region. A major portion of the glo-bal cultivation, processing, and trafficking of cocaine(and to a lesser extent, heroin) is concentrated in theAndes. A traditional crop cultivated and ingested inBolivia and Peru, by the 1980s coca took on a globaldimension as cocaine consumption skyrocketed in theUnited States and Europe (Tokatlian 1995; Clawson/Lee 1996). An informal division of labour emerged inthe Andean region in which Peru and Bolivia providedthe raw material which was then processed and ex-ported by Colombian drug cartels. All countries cameto be involved in the diverse array of activities thatmake up the cocaine chain of production, includingcoca leaf cultivation, coca paste transportation, chem-ical processing, transshipment, distribution, andmoney laundering.

This production structure changed dramatically inthe 1990s as coca cultivation shifted to Colombia, inlarge measure due to successful eradication campaignsand aerial interdiction operations in Peru and Bolivia.Developments in Colombia also played a role in theregional reshuffling of the drug business. The demiseof the Cali and Medelln cartels in the middle of thedecade opened up a power vacuum which was rapidlyfilled not only by micro cartels, but more relevant forour discussion, by Colombian armed actors. The frag-mentation of centralized management had regionalimplications as well, as different criminal actorsthroughout the Andes and the rest of the hemisphereassumed control over key aspects of the trade (Lee2004). With Colombia producing over 80 per cent ofthe cocaine sold on the global market, and Brazil, Ec-uador, Panama, Peru, and Venezuela operating as tran-sit routes for the illegal passage of chemical precur-sors, cocaine and heroin, and currency, the entire re-gion has emerged as a key site of this transnationalnetwork.

Parallel to drug trafficking, the illegal arms tradeconstitutes another dimension of transregional illicitflows in the Andes. Although it has been fuelled pri-marily by insurgent-related activities in Colombia, italso furnishes weapons to common criminal organiza-tions throughout the region, creating complex associ-ations that incorporate a wide variety of agents inhighly interdependent, multi-dimensional relations.The principal transit routes for arms entering the re-gion are Central America, particularly Panama, Vene-zuela, Ecuador, Brazil, and Suriname (Cragin/Hoff-man 2003). Many of these weapons, stockpiles fromthe Cold War, originate in Central America, the ex-So-viet republics, and Eastern Europe. Commercial arms


from the United States and Europe also end up on theblack market and are channelled into the region. Thearms trafficked throughout the Andes include pistols,semi-automatic weapons, sub-machine guns, assault ri-fles, rockets, mortars, grenades, and ground-to-airmissiles.3

The arms trade is highly articulated with drug traf-ficking. In large measure, this is due to the fact thatboth arms and drug dealers make use of the sametransit routes (Cragin/ Hoffman 2003). Increasingly,however, these commodities also form part of an in-tegrated black market, as criminal groups traffic inboth arms and drugs. The enmeshment of drugs andarms networks has been deepened as arms-for-drugsswaps become more commonplace. These complexbarter arrangements are made up of countless re-gional and extra regional participants.

Although Colombia epitomizes this dynamic, Bra-zil also offers a striking example of how drug andarms flows and networks interact. In addition to be-ing a major cocaine distribution and transshipmentarea for drugs sent to Europe, the virtual absence ofthe state in the Amazon has converted this part ofBrazil into a haven for criminal activities. The coun-trys role in the drug traffic chain has also allowed forthe emergence of drug gangs that control the favelasof cities such as Rio de Janeiro and So Paulo (Leeds1996; Bagley 2003). The transposing of drug- andarms-related transactions has allowed favela-basedgroups to increase both the scope of their operationsand their relative power (Leeds 1996; Martins 2005).In addition to aggravating existing levels of violence inthe favelas, drug-related corruption in Brazil has sky-rocketed, while parallel power and security patternshave emerged in areas controlled by criminal organi-zations.

32.5 Non-state Agents of Insecurity in the Andes

Although illicit flows and networks of drugs and armsdraw in a wide array of state and non-state actorsthroughout the Andean region, the Colombian con-flict and its participants are the centre of gravity forthese dynamics. As the principal actors in Colombiasinternal war, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Co-lombia (FARC) and United Self-Defence Forces of Co-lombia (AUC) have also emerged as key agents of

transregional insecurity. Proponents of the spill-overthesis rightly stress that illegal armed activities haveled to a marked deterioration in public order in bor-der zones with neighbouring countries (Millett 2002).However, it is Colombian armed groups involvementin illicit transactions and relationships that is the driv-ing force behind the transregional facet of Andean in-security.

Established in the 1960s as a self-defence organi-zation in response to a period of countrywide vio-lence, the FARC is the most important insurgentmovement in Colombia today. Following a strategy ofmilitary growth and territorial expansion that beganin the 1980s, at present, the group has as many as18,000 members and operates in 4060 per cent ofColombian national territory. The growth of privateright-wing self-defence groups coincided with the ex-pansion of the drug trade in Colombia during the1980s. These private armies, originally financed bythe Medellin and Cali cartels to defend their land-holdings from the guerrillas, evolved into independ-ent organizations with offensive strategies and auton-omous political aspirations. In 1997, the AUC was cre-ated as an umbrella organization to join disparate par-amilitary groups operating throughout Colombia. Thegroup is present in at least 35 per cent of the countryand has approximately 13,500 members4.

In conjunction with a multiplicity of smaller, inde-pendent criminal organizations, both the FARC andthe AUC are central actors in the regions drug andarms trade. The AUCs criminal origins are such thatthey have always been involved in drug-related activi-ties. However, upon stepping into the void left by thedismantling of the Medellin and Cali cartels, paramil-itaries won control over trafficking operations that of-fered a crucial source of income for their rapidly ex-panding movement (Romero 2004). In 1982, theFARC leaderships approval of illegal taxation of thecocaine industry as a legitimate means of financing itsrevolutionary agenda also contributed to the transfor-mation of the political economy of the Colombianconflict (Richani 2002). During the 1990s, the coun-try experienced an explosion in domestic coca pro-duction. Between the mid-1980s and the early 2000s,coca cultivation mushroomed nearly tenfold, anddrug-related activities became a key source of income

3 Confidential authors interview for Andean transre-gional security project, Bogot, August 2005.

4 In July 2003, the government and the paramilitariessigned a settlement whereby the AUC agreed to demo-bilize its forces gradually and lay down its weapons bythe end of 2005. As of December of that year, over 20AUC groups had demobilized.


for both the AUC and the FARC. Initially involved inproduction, processing, transportation, and taxation,the FARC had diversified into trafficking by the early2000s. The AUC, for its part, is estimated to directlymanage 40 per cent of the trafficking business(Romero 2004). Territorial wars between the AUCand the FARC to control regions dominated by cocacultivation and transit routes are a key feature of theColombian conflict, although there are increasing in-cidents of pragmatic, strategic cooperation betweenthem in narcotics operations.5

Dependence upon the drug business as a sourceof income for financing their operations and arms ac-quisitions has inserted both the AUC and the FARCinto a web of criminal networks throughout the An-des and beyond. Although most of the cocaine con-sumed in the United States and Europe originates inColombia, it is nearly always channelled through mul-tiple nodes located within the network. Latin Ameri-can organizations that traffic in drugs and/or armsare located in Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, Brazil, Vene-zuela, Chile, and Mexico.

Brazilian drug lord Luiz Fernando Da Costa (aliasFernandinho) ran a vast crime ring that engaged insystematic cocaine-arms transactions with the 16th

Front of the FARC in southern Colombia. FollowingFernandinhos 2001 capture, new criminal elementsreplaced him. Since the late 1980s, Mexican drug car-tels have maintained alliances with different Colom-bian actors in order to channel drugs into the UnitedStates. In addition to this intermediary role, increas-ingly drug traffickers from Mexico operate in Peru-vian territory and control the Pacific Ocean transitroutes (Sobern 2005: 236237). In Central America,another key transshipment point for drugs leaving theAndean region, drug trafficking organizations that op-erate in Guatemala and the Mara Salvatrucha gang,based mainly in El Salvador, also maintain direct rela-tions with Colombian actors.

Guerrilla and paramilitary operations in un-governed frontier regions and their unhamperedmovement across all of Colombias international bor-ders facilitate such interactions (International CrisisGroup 2003a). In the Venezuelan and Ecuadorian bor-der zones, for example, Colombian armed actorsmaintain routine relationships with local criminal or-ganizations. Likewise, Colombian insurgents movefreely in the Darien region of Panama. This situationprovides a permissive environment for illegal drugs

and arms transactions as well as a variety of othercriminal activities, including kidnapping, extortion,and smuggling.

Corrupt government officials also commonly per-mit and/or participate in these illegal transactions. Al-though official figures are not available, arms, muni-tions, and explosives belonging to the armed forces ofEcuador and Venezuela have been confiscated period-ically from illegal Colombian armed actors. In mid-2002, it was also revealed that a year earlier the AUChad received a shipment of 3,000 AK-47 rifles and 2.5million rounds of ammunition left over from Nicara-guan government stocks. With the assistance of a pri-vate Guatemalan arms dealer, the Nicaraguan Na-tional Police sold the rifles to an Israeli arms dealerwho purportedly represented the Panamanian Na-tional Police. Once the arms ended up in the hands ofthe AUC, it was determined that the Nicaraguan Po-lice had been suspiciously lax in complying with estab-lished international norms regulating arms transac-tions (Schroeder 2004).

Criminal organizations that operate on all fivecontinents are also directly or indirectly involved inillegal trafficking networks based out of the Andes.The mafias in Russia and the former Soviet Republics,Eastern Europe, China, Korea, Japan, Israel, Nigeria,and Italy, among others, are known to maintain apresence in the region, and have direct and indirectrelationships with Andean illegal groups.6 Arms leftover from the Cold War era are routinely traffickedon world markets, with the ex-Soviet Republics beingone of the primary sources of illegal arms that end upin the hands of Colombian non-state actors. Likewise,many of these same criminal organizations trade incocaine that originates in Colombia and is traffickedby regional criminal gangs out of the region.

The now infamous Peruvian-Jordanian arms scan-dal of 2000 vividly illustrates both the global scope ofthese networks, as well as the linkages that illicit flowsbuild between distinct legal and illegal actors(Schroeder 2004; Bagley 2004). This case involvedcorrupt officials from the Jordanian government, Eu-ropean arms traffickers, the Russian mafia and cor-rupt military officials, the FARC, Brazilian drug lordLuiz Fernando Da Costa (alias Fernandinho), andPerus National Intelligence Director Vladimiro Mon-tesinos. In mid-2000 it was discovered that since 1999approximately 10,000 AK-47 rifles had been deliveredto the FARC in Colombia in four separate shipments.

5 Confidential authors interview for Andean transre-gional security project, Bogot, December 2005.

6 Confidential authors interview for Andean transre-gional security project, Bogot, in October 2005.


These weapons were collected in Russia and theUkraine and shipped by air from several geographicsites. In Jordan, utilized for refuelling on both routes,corrupt governmental officials were bribed with co-caine. The weapons entered the Western Hemispherevia Trinidad and Tobago and Suriname, and werethrown by air into southern Colombian territory. Fol-lowing the delivery of the weapons, the planes landedin the vicinity of Iquitos, Peru, to refuel and load upwith cocaine provided by the FARC in exchange forthe arms (Cragin/Hoffman 2003; Bagley 2003;Schroeder 2004). While Fernandinho played a keyrole as intermediary in these transactions (Bagley2003: 124126), Montesinos provided legal cover bypurchasing the arms in the name of the Peruvian mil-itary, and then permitting them to be rerouted to theFARC.

Instrumental criminal relations are perhaps themost obvious type of association maintained amongthe Andean regions illicit non-state actors that bypassstate controls and generate insecurity. However, theagenda of the FARC in particular is such that thisgroup also cultivates relationships with regional andglobal counterparts that are more political than crim-inal in nature. Such efforts have been geared towardsgaining international recognition as well as assuringlogistical support.

The FARC has also sought to acquire and dissem-inate technical expertise and know-how through theseties. For example, Vietnamese military experts and ex-FMLN guerrillas have provided training in Colombiain Special Forces techniques as recently as the late1990s. The arrest of three representatives of the IRAin Colombia in August 2001, two of them experts inurban warfare training and explosives, revealed thatbetween 1998 and that year this group too had trainedFARC members. Subsequent military actions madeexplicit use of this newly gained knowledge. Palestini-ans have also visited FARC bases for the purpose ofproviding technical expertise in bomb design. To a les-ser extent, the FARC are also believed to engage inknowledge-sharing with other likeminded organiza-tions in the region. The Colombian guerrilla move-ment is reported to provide tactical assistance to thePeruvian Sendero Luminoso organization.7 The high-profile 2004 kidnapping of the daughter of ex-Para-guayan president Ral Cubas was also widely believedto have been carried out with FARC training.

In addition to links with non-state agents, theFARC maintains informal relationships with regionalstate actors, particularly in Venezuela and Ecuador. Al-though neither government provides direct materialsupport, members of the military forces and govern-ment officials in each have extra-officially providedsanctuary and freedom of movement within thesecountries (International Crisis Group 2003). In whatturned into a bilateral diplomatic row, in early 2005 ahigh-level FARC leader was discovered to have beenliving openly in Venezuela with governmental compla-cence in spite of an international arrest warrant. TheEcuadorian government, for its part, maintains an un-official laissez-faire policy toward the FARC and itslongstanding presence in Ecuadorian national terri-tory.

32.6 Conclusions

In the Andes, the existence of transregional processeslinking up distinct actors, problems, and spaces in re-lational and interdependent ways suggests to us thepossibility of a new security cartography. Not only isthe Andean security problematic far more than thesum of five domestic situations, but it is also a highlyfluid and changing scenario that is not synchronizedwith a static, territorial map of the region.

The principal transregional security dynamics inthe Andes contradict a standard geographical repre-sentation in two aspects. First, the primary risksposed to regional security transcend national spaces.As discussed previously, while all the countries share aseries of domestic problems, the primordial motor ofAndean security is processes that cannot be reducedto the state level. Arms and drug trafficking, by theirvery nature, are transnational in scope. Although illicitflows may not adhere to the entire region uniformly,the ways in which they traverse and transcend na-tional territories underscore the extent to which alter-native security sites have replaced the traditional stateparadigm.

Second, these dynamics involve a diverse array ofsub-state, transnational, and global actors. While theFARC, the AUC, and other criminal organizations inthe region are the principal agents of insecurity in theAndes, extra regional non-state actors are also in-creasingly a part of the Andean security matrix. Brazil-ian drug lords and the Russian mafia, for example,can be considered important players in the Andeansecurity game in that their activities link up with re-gional processes and actors. Indeed, illicit drug and7 Confidential authors interview for Andean transre-

gional security project, Bogot, December 2005.


arms flows not only involve non-Andean actors, butalso spill out of the region altogether, highlighting thedisconnect between the Andean region in its conven-tional usage and our call for a transregional approachto the areas security problems.

Both features of our transregional security frame-work non-state actors and transnational processes not only establish new parameters for thinking aboutsecurity in this specific region, but may also provideinsights into the use of alternative security cartogra-phies. Remapping geographic spaces according tospecific security interactions, threats, and processes isan interesting heuristic devise for theorists and policy-makers alike. Such exercises would provide importantempirical foundations for illustrating contemporaryconceptualizations of global security.

Perhaps more importantly, the policy implicationsof transregional thinking are potentially significant.Visual imaging of transnational security processesshould impress upon policy-makers the importance ofmultilateral solutions to problems that necessarily ex-tend beyond the state. Notwithstanding the abun-dance of evidence that the most critical security prob-lems in the Andes are region-wide, regional securitycooperation has been in short supply. To date, the re-gions nations have adhered to a narrow, uncoordi-nated public policy agenda in their efforts to combatdrug and arms trafficking, and transnational crime.Not surprisingly, these strategies have been less thansuccessful in making headway against such problems.This disjuncture reflects the contradiction between aglobal political order based upon the territorial stateand security dynamics that are largely deterritorializedin nature. While certain world regions have evolvedtoward a more multilateral scheme in which globalgovernance mechanisms are prevalent, the Andean re-gion continues to adhere to a traditional state-basedstructure which is particularly ill-suited to address thetransnational security threats that pose the greatestrisks to regional stability.

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Agents of Insecurity in the Andes