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Murder rates highest in parts of Africa and parts of the America's

I was skimming through the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime website and stumbled upon a study of Homicide rates around the world. This study shows that parts of the Americas and Africa are where most murders take place. I must say that I wasn’t at all surprised by this conclusion. I then suddenly began to think that these countries are often highly populated with poor economies, rising unemployment and low literacy rates. I also noticed a particular country that shows great economic improvements also suffers from high homicide rates.

Unsurprisingly the world’s ‘poorest’ continent (Africa) is where most homicides take place 36% with 31% in the America’s, 27% in Asia and 5% in Europe. Political, Economic, Social and sometimes religious problems are the main causes of the continent's high murder rate. In a slim contrast, economic factors and political instability are the usual culprits that contribute to the rising homicide rates in countries such as Mexico, Venezuela, Columbia and Jamaica. From my own research I know that several countries in Africa and the America’s are relatively peaceful therefore not all of Africa and countries in the America’s significantly contributes to result of this study.

In 2010 almost 500,000 yes half a million murders were committed and these are only the reported ones! Guns contribute to the majority of murders in the America’s 75% compared to 21% in Europe. It seems as if the firearms trade is big business for western countries as I doubt one gun is made in the countries where murder rates are highest.

As we guessed poverty and a lack of opportunities are heavily linked to crime along with under development of countries as a whole. These factors will often to lead to various problems such as unemployment thus resulting in high murder rates. Then again you will see countries making huge strides towards success economically but have 17000 people killed in one year alone (Venezuela) and this is not a civil war?. In Mexico there is a current war on drugs between the state and organised criminals costing thousands of lives a year in the most horrific of ways. Is this purely down to a lack of opportunities? Could it be linked to Mexico’s unemployment rate or are people in these gangs just greedy for quick money? Do their actions mirror the morale of all levels of society? These are questions which come to mind when trying to decipher why certain places are more dangerous than others.

For some reason I wasn’t at all surprised by the results of this study. In fact I believe that many people will just look at stats like these and say ‘look at that’ or ‘what a shame’ as it doesn’t directly affect them, when in fact thousands if not millions of people are being affected by murders which could have been prevented.

According to the study, the rising murder rates are near 'the crisis point'. Just imagine the uproar it would cause if homicide rates in Western Europe start to rise to the levels of Africa or South America? Would it be classified as a civil war? One fascinating fact I found is that the countries with high murder rates such as Mexico, South Africa and Jamaica are very attractive tourist destinations. Go to any travel agent and look at the holiday brochures for these countries and you will see: the beautiful sun, sand and sea, some call it paradise! On the other side of the coin there is poverty, high unemployment and high murder rates which you will definitely not see in those brochures or even when you visit these countries.

The availability of illegal guns is a major factor why the murder rate is so high in particular parts of the world when compared to Western Europe for example. However that reason is nowhere near the effects of poverty and a lack of opportunities and its link to the increasing homicide rates. You will even seen this in places like the USA and the UK where the communities made up of ethnic minorities will have less jobs, more children leaving school without qualifications, a huge drug problem, high teenage pregnancy rates and yes high murder rates often amongst teenagers when compared to the rest of the society.

With regards to solutions I do not believe there is one particular answer to the problem. However I echo the same sentiment that logical thinking people have been saying for many years that more needs to be done stop the flow of guns to so called third world countries and give more importance to education and promote family life. This is easier said than done as the systems governing the world have proved in the past to support political instability in a bid to go and reap the rewards of political and economic volatility in other countries. This system has been working perfectly for hundreds of years so why change it? some might say.

To combat the high homicide rates many governments often choose reaction measures such as heavy policing, using sometimes cruel tactics on civilians as a deterrent to crime. This would often result in criminals becoming callously smarter for example using submarines to transport cocaine to other countries or brazenly shooting up police stations for trying to stop their drug operations. All in a bid to escape poverty, plain greedy for wealth (quick money)or simply because it is something to do! The reality is that people need jobs to provide for their families and themselves plus all the luxuries they see in television adverts and if jobs and other opportunities are not available to help people acquire these things then they will do anything to get what they need (basic survival tactic? an't be there must be better options!). With so many people killing each other it begs the question what happened to our society? Have they gone mad? Where is the love, where are the morales that our parents taught us? I do not have a specific answer but we could start by asking serious questions about the people behind these violent films or movies for glorifying guns so much, maybe its life imitating art. There is a high level of violence in our culture, I suppose it is somewhat in human nature to be violent, however if we are meant to be living in a civilised society then why all this brutality? The answer as you can see is not straightforward.

I also believe if governments of these 'murderous' countries focus more on job creation among the working class then they will start to see improvements. It seems the increase in police and soldiers are doing nothing but adding to the murder statistics! Crime discourages business and hiring soldiers to protect a shopping centre from thieves should not be seen as a long term solution to combat the issue of high homicide rates. There should be other clear cut long-term plans to realistically focus on reducing high homicide rates in these parts of the world. Heavy emphasis should be placed on education and job creation to prepare for when the children leave school they will have an idea or ideas as to what they want to do with their lives.

 

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