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Current threats to urban safety and security13The emergence of ethnic identity as the basis ofethnic conflict and nationalist aspirations in the post-ColdWar years has been widely noted, with the case of the breakupof the former Yugoslavia into several independent statesbeing one of the most bloody, and with the tragic histories ofBosnia and, later, Kosovo. A study of indigenous populationsin 160 countries shows that countries have an average of 5indigenous ethnic groups, varying from an average of 3.2 percountry in the West to 8.2 per country in Africa. Ethnicdiversity is more common in Africa, South Asia andSoutheast Asia (see Chapter 3).Within this larger picture, the cases of nationalistmovements in Chechnya, East Timor, Kurdistan and Georgia,to cite a few, have all emerged with great force, to thesurprise of many people who did not understand thestrength of these ethnic identities and their nationalistobjectives. 30 These dynamics have been closely connectedwith the issue of minority status and conditions. A contemporaryanthropologist writes about ‘the civilization ofclashes’, playing with the title of the well-known book bySamuel Huntington. 31 He notes that there have been morewars in the nation than wars of the nation. 32These wars in the nation have also been closelyrelated to the many cases of state-sponsored violence inmany countries over the past few decades, whether inmilitary dictatorships in Argentina, Chile, El Salvador orGuatemala during the 1970s and 1980s, or in Ethiopia,Rwanda or Burundi during the 1980s and 1990s, or inMyanmar over the last decade. The 2005 case of squatterevictions and demolitions in Harare, Zimbabwe, is a recentinstance where the government continued despite internationalattention and calls for restraint. The ongoing case ofDarfur in western Sudan has been seen as an example ofstate-sponsored violence at a regional level.Studies of crime and violence suggest interestingcontradictions, such as the fact that the poorest members ofsociety are rarely the perpetrators of violence; rather, theperpetrators are frequently individuals and groups who haveenjoyed some prior upward social mobility or economicimprovement and then find themselves blocked from furtherimprovement. These individuals and groups often expresstheir frustrations through violence. This phenomenon wasobserved in the location of riots during the 1960s in the US,where violence occurred in those cities with the mostsuccessful anti-poverty programmes (i.e. Chicago, Detroitand Los Angeles). 33 It also reflects experience in Mumbaiand other cities, where recent poor rural–urban migrantswho are entering the labour force are rarely involved inviolence. 34While these theories and cases offer complementaryand related evidence about the understanding of crime andviolence, they are a backdrop to the daily lived experience ofresidents of Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Mexico City,Johannesburg or Manila, to name a few of the many cities indeveloping countries where growing crime and violence areperceived as a major problem affecting all strata of society.During the late 1990s, the Government of Mexicobegan to publicly discuss urban crime as a problem withmacro-economic consequences. This was an interestingdevelopment because, in relative terms, Mexico had acomparatively low level of loss of GDP due to violence, at 1.3per cent in 1997, compared to other Latin Americancountries such as Colombia and El Salvador, which both lostan estimated 25 per cent. 35 In contrast, the US, with a muchlarger GDP, had estimates of the costs of violence reaching3.3 per cent of GDP. 36 This staggering amount has manyinteresting components, such as the estimated cost of ahomicide in the US valued at US$2 million, while estimateswere US$15,319 in South Africa and US$602,000 inAustralia, respectively, reflecting foregone income. 37Analytically, the WHO has distinguished between direct andindirect costs of violence in its review of 119 studies of theeconomic dimensions of interpersonal violence. Figure 1.3presents these different costs. 38 The financing of these costsis a considerable weight on poor economies. Studies ofJamaica found that 90 per cent of the costs of treatingvictims of violence at the Kingston Public Hospital were paidby the government. 39In this regard, it is interesting to observe differencesbetween cities within countries, such as the reductions incrime and violence achieved in Medellin, Colombia, where astrong mayor and civil society were determined to overcomedrug violence and dominance of ‘drug lords’, 40 compared tocontinued problems in Cali, where the drug cartels continueto exercise effective power. A third Colombian city, Bogotá,the national capital, has dramatically reduced crime andviolence. 41 And yet, although Colombia is globally perceivedas a violent country, more people died in armed violence inthe favelas of Rio de Janeiro (49,913) from 1978 to 2000than in all of Colombia (39,000). 42In Brazil, more than 100 people are killed by gunsevery day, and the gun-related death rate in Rio de Janeiro ismore than double the national average. 43 Organized crimedemonstrated its great power in São Paulo during May andJune 2006 with its well-orchestrated attacks on police,followed by bloody retribution by the police. Press reportson São Paulo following this episode noted some startling data(see Box 1.2). Chapter 3 presents the drug dimensions ofInterpersonal violence– Child abuse and neglect– Intimate partner violence– Elder abuse– Sexual violence– Workplace violence– Youth violence– Other violent crimeThe emergence ofethnic identity asthe basis of ethnicconflict andnationalistaspirations in thepost-Cold War yearshas been widelynotedFigure 1.3Costs and benefits ofinterpersonal violenceSource: WHO, 2004, p6Direct costs and benefits– Costs of legal services– Direct medical costs– Direct perpetrator control costs– Costs of policing– Costs of incarceration– Costs of foster care– Private security contracts– Economic benefits to perpetratorsIndirect costs and benefits– Lost earnings and lost time– Lost investments in human capital– Indirect protection costs– Life insurance costs– Benefits to law enforcement– Productivity– Domestic investment– External investment and tourism– Psychological costs– Other non-monetary costs