Blood Money

I received this book as a digital NetGalley ARC.

Quick Take: Life is tough when you’re a criminal maintaining a complex organization.

I received this book as an ARC, and I’m pretty sure i’m not the target audience, but I found it extremely interesting anyway. Blood Money by Margaret Sankey shows how different criminal groups (terrorists, insurgencies, rebel armies, gangs, etc.) are funded. Running a criminal organization is often a complex task requiring substantial amounts of money. Just like a business, bills, salaries, and other expenses need to be paid. Unlike a business, this money is obtained through ill-gotten means and needs to funnel through multiple sources.

Running an illicit organization is tough work. First you must hire good people either through online chat rooms or target specific people from a graduation list. Second, you must train your uneducated recruits. If your recruits come from a poor background, it’s likely they don’t have a lot of specialized knowledge. If you invest in your hires, they will repay you with decent work. You might run workshops on “specialized skills like explosive, kidnapping, surveillance, or driving…” or on indoctrinating your recruits in the mission. Often these types of groups will also spend money in the community to garner goodwill, more people they can bribe and an increased recruiting pool.

Overall, Sankey gives makes a thorough examination of how illicit organizations make, give and receive money. I would recommend this book to anyone with an interest in international economics or the topic.

Blood Money is an outstanding work of research and writing, tracing the ways in which cartels, gangs, political groups, and other Violent Non-State Actors get the money they use to attack people and buildings, create propaganda, and obstruct justice. Sankey chronicles money hiding and laundering, schemes and practices from the Irish bar's "Derry can" to selling counterfeit goods, and how everyday individuals get caught up in the process. The research is solid and fascinating, and Sankey explains often-complicated deals and arrangements clearly and with panache. The examples she uses are memorable--some for the ineptness of the criminals involved--and help explain terror events and those who create them from all over the world. I'm recommending this to everyone interested in world politics and in making the world better, because understanding what's going on is a first step to doing something about it.