Browsing by Autor "Benjamin Lessing"

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Gang rule: Understanding and Countering Criminal Governance
(2021) Christopher Blattman; Benjamin Lessing; Santiago Tobón; Gustavo Duncan
Criminal groups govern millions worldwide. Even in strong states, gangs resolve disputes and provide security. Why do these duopolies of coercion emerge? Often, gangs fill vacuums of official power, suggesting that increasing state presence should crowd out criminal governance. We show, however, that state and gang rule are sometimes complements. In particular, gangs could minimize seizures and arrests by keeping neighborhoods orderly and loyal. If true, increasing state presence could increase incentives for gang rule. In Medellín, Colombia, criminal leaders told us they rule to protect drug rents from police. We test gang responses to state presence using a geographic discontinuity. Internal border changes in 1987 assigned blocks to be closer or further from state security for three decades. Gangs exogenously closer to state presence developed more governance over time. They primarily did so in neighborhoods with the greatest potential drug rents. This suggests new strategies for countering criminal governance.
Statebuilding in the City: An Experiment in Civilian Alternatives to Policing
(2022) Christopher Blattman; Gustavo Duncan; Benjamin Lessing; Santiago Tobón
State penetration varies widely within cities, with well-governed areas abutting persistently neglected ones. Governments are seeking ways to improve penetration, local security, and state legitimacy. We experimentally evaluate a 20-month non-police intervention in Medellín, Colombia, that dramatically increased municipal personnel and agency attention to 40 neighborhoods. Despite the intensity, average impacts on security and perceived legitimacy were negligible. Prespecified subgroup analysis reveals important heterogeneity, however. Where state governance began relatively lower, impacts were null to negative, but in initially high-governance sectors, security and state legitimacy significantly improved. These divergent impacts apparently resulted from city staff and agencies systematically underdelivering in low-initial-governance sectors. Bureaucratic capacity and incentives to deliver often depend on baseline state engagement, trust, and accountability. This could result in increasing marginal returns to statebuilding, which in turn would lead to persistent "neglect traps"—political attention and investment where state presence is already robust, reinforcing existing disparities.