Publication

This report explores connections among guns, gangs, and politics in Trinidad and Tobago. Rather than directly and unequivocally pursuing an anti-gun policy, different agencies of Trinidad and Tobago’s government are responding to a range of incentives and conflicts that affect the domestic flow of small arms. By rewarding gun-using gangs with contracts for infrastructure work, federal politicians are undercutting police efforts to minimize the introduction and use of weapons. What thus is unfolding is a trade-off between law and order, on the one hand, and patronage, on the other.