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IV. The Impact of Organized Crime on
Governance
Rather than organized crime itself, which is still at a
primitive, not yet highly developed stage in Nepal, it is
the pervasive culture of impunity, corruption, nepotism,
and clientelism that most negatively impacts the lives of
ordinary Nepalis. While organized crime intensifies and
exploits this corruption and the lack of rule of law, in Nepal
political corruption and a deeply entrenched system of
patronage are the primary drivers of the usurpation of
public funds and violence at the local level. Politicization
of formal institutions deeply compromises bureaucratic
and administrative competencies and service delivery,
enabling the penetration of organized crime into state
institutions. In addition to having profound harmful impact
on governance on its own, such culture of corruption and
impunity thus provides fertile ground for the formation
of organized crime and fosters its impunity from effective
prosecution. Corruption, patronage, clientelism, and
the overall patrimonial system in Nepal are thus both
an element of politics and the enabling environment for
organized crime and illicit economies. The danger is that
while formal politics remains paralyzed, informal criminal
governance mechanisms may grow in power.
Many urban and rural residents still believe that they need
to provide payoffs to, and engage in complex negotiations
with powerful actors in their locality, whether powerful
local politicians or armed and criminal gangs, to assure
their safety and secure their elementary and everyday
transactions. Although outright militancy has subsided,
even in the Terai, a pervasive atmosp<strong>here</strong> of fear prevails
and negatively affects human security in much of Nepal.
Both political actors and profit-driven criminal groups
benefit from this atmosp<strong>here</strong> of fear and communal
tension.
Although local constituencies have developed the capacity
to demand goods and projects from local level officials
and national parties, they have not learned or been able
to hold their leaders accountable if they fail to deliver.
Citizens may be finding voice in the political process,
but as promises and demands significantly outstrip
the government capacity to deliver, the legitimacy and
stability of the government and the emergent political
system will likely be significantly undermined.
The relationship between political parties and criminal
groups is robust and perhaps growing, but it is the
political actors who take the lead. During the civil war,
the Maoist insurgents pioneered the use of profits from
illicit economies for effectively challenging the existing
political order. After the end of the civil war, all major
political parties and actors have been using access to
criminal revenues and relationships with criminal groups
to influence the shape of the new political settlement.
The absence of effective campaign financing and asset
declaration regulations does not help. In exchange for
providing immunity from criminal prosecution, political
parties also use criminal groups for demonstrating street
and muscle power, fundraising, obtaining votes, and
acquiring contracts for their clients.
Many different illicit economies are present in Nepal
– from drug production and smuggling to human
trafficking, illegal logging, illegal trade in wildlife, and the
smuggling of legal commodities. Extortion, tax evasion,
and financial scams are also common. Nonetheless,
despite the fact that many of these illicit economies
have existed for decades and are linked to the highest
political levels, the extent (when compared with the
illicit economy’s growth potential in Nepal) is rather
limited. This underdevelopment of organized crime in
Nepal is driven in part by external dynamics. Thus the
limited extent of Nepal’s illicit crop cultivation (the reality,
contrary to many media reports) has less to do with the
effectiveness of domestic law enforcement or the lack of
interest on the part of the population in participating in
such an enterprise, and considerably more to do with the
fact that the global international market is (over)supplied
by other countries.
As noted, the sophistication of organized crime in Nepal is
also still at a rather primitive stage. Criminal groups tend
to be mostly small gangs, rather than highly complex
organizations. They have now<strong>here</strong> near the level of
sophistication and organizational complexity of criminal
groups operating in India or Pakistan, for example. Nor
NYU
CIC
Responding to the Impact of Organized Crime on Developing Countries