Dark Networks as Organizational Problems: Elements of a Theory¹

Earlier versions of this paper were presented in 2005 at the EGOS conference in Berlin and the 8th Public Management Research Conference at University of Southern California in Los Angeles. We would like to thank Mahabat Baimyrzaeva, Deborah Diamond, Patrick Kenis, Renate Mayntz, Ken Meier, Larry O'Toole, Keith Provan, and those who attended seminars where versions of this paper were presented at Harvard University, the Naval Postgraduate School, Tilburg University, and University of Southern California. The authors would like to acknowledge the help they received from John Tidd, a visiting professor, and Matthew Kennedy, a graduate student, both at the School of Public Administration and Policy, University of Arizona.

ABSTRACT

In this paper, we try to understand and interpret why and how dark networks manage to survive despite massive control efforts by nation states, thus demonstrating a high degree of resilience. We approach this question from an organizational perspective looking at the (organizational) changes dark networks undergo in adapting to attempts to destroy them. We draw on insights based on the analysis of how Al Qaeda changed after the massive control efforts by some of the world's most powerful nation states since their attacks on the U.S. on September 11, 2001. In order to develop more general propositions, we contrast the Al Qaeda case with the development of the organizational structure behind the cocaine trade from Colombia to the United States after it had become the object of massive control efforts by the U.S. during the 1990s. Through the analysis we inductively develop a theoretical framework for the analysis of dark networks. Central to this framework is the assumption that dark networks, which are resilient, manage to rebalance differentiation and integration mechanisms in their internal structure and adjust to the new requirements in their task environment based on the actors, their linkages and resources available in order to persist and maintain some capacity to act. We further identify drivers and facilitators stemming from larger societal and political problems that create the motivation for new people to join dark networks. The analysis shows that control efforts that are directed towards the organizational extinction of dark networks will be likely to fail as long as the central problems behind their existence are not tackled. We conclude by sketching out an agenda for future organizational research on covert and illegal networks and organizations.

Notes

Earlier versions of this paper were presented in 2005 at the EGOS conference in Berlin and the 8th Public Management Research Conference at University of Southern California in Los Angeles. We would like to thank Mahabat Baimyrzaeva, Deborah Diamond, Patrick Kenis, Renate Mayntz, Ken Meier, Larry O'Toole, Keith Provan, and those who attended seminars where versions of this paper were presented at Harvard University, the Naval Postgraduate School, Tilburg University, and University of Southern California. The authors would like to acknowledge the help they received from John Tidd, a visiting professor, and Matthew Kennedy, a graduate student, both at the School of Public Administration and Policy, University of Arizona.

See list compiled by Congressional Research Service (U.S.), dated March 31, 2004; http://www.fas.org/irp/crs/033104.pdf. Since this report was written, there has been a great deal of dispute about the number of terrorist attacks, making it very difficult to compare terrorist incidents in 2004 and 2005 with prior years (Drees 2006; Strobel 2006), although the trend has been upward.

A scale-free network is one where, as the size increases, some nodes will become hubs that will be much better connected than would be expected to occur randomly. It is these hubs that make it much easier to move from one part of the network to another. They are also the points of the network's vulnerability.

The Medellín and Cali cartels were not cartels in the economic sense in that there were other cocaine trafficking networks not in the cartel, but they were the two biggest trafficking networks in Colombia.

In Raab and Milward (2003) we had thought that the key to a dark network's survival was flexibility rather than viewing differentiation and integration as ways of rebalancing capacity and survival in the face of massive attempts at control.

Despite the fact that the concept of integration is seen by some scholars as ill-defined, which can make the operationalization of the concept and the interpretation of results difficult (Provan and Milward 1995, 10, Aldrich 1978), we believe that it will help us interpreting the specific characteristics and development of dark networks.

See “The Failed State Index,” Foreign Policy (2006), for a quantification of the multiple dimensions of state failure.

In Raab and Milward (2003) we believed that a failed state was necessary for dark networks to function. Our view now is that a failed state is a resource among many others and it is a necessary but not sufficient condition for a dark network to exist.

See Ariza (2005) for an excellent description of how dark networks utilize various technologies to control their members.

See Loretta Napoleoni (2003) and Douglas Farah (2004) for detailed descriptions of how Al Qaeda has been financed.

The key is the replacement rate of personnel. Supply is how networks avoid entropy. They must import new human resources to the network to replace losses. If the rate of loss exceeds the replacement rate, the network will degrade. The zeitgeist has a powerful effect on the supply of personnel. If Islamic jihadism looks like a losing bet, the supply of Al Qaeda recruits is likely to decline.

The line between drivers and facilitators of network linkages is in reality difficult to draw. All contribute to network activation and replication; however, drivers are factors that directly motivate action while facilitating factors support this action or make them more likely. Neither is the list of facilitators exhaustive; knowledgeable observers could undoubtedly add a number of other factors to our list.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resilience, retrieved May 29, 2006.

See various papers on the internal control perspective of Islamic terrorist networks applying a principal agent framework in the CTC report “Harmony and Disharmony: Exploit Al-Qa'ida's Organizational Vulnerability” at http://www.ctc.usma.edu/aq.asp.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

H. Brinton Milward

H. Brinton Milward ([email protected]) is the Providence Service Corporation Chair in Public Management at the School of Public Administration and Policy, Eller College of Management, University of Arizona. His research is focused on collaborative networks. One set of projects focuses on terrorism and other illegal networks. Another set focuses on health and human services.

Jörg Raab

Jörg Raab ([email protected]) is assistant professor of policy and organisation studies in the Department of Organisation Studies at Tilburg University, the Netherlands. His current research focuses on the resilience of dark networks and on various methodological and theoretical questions in studying inter-organizational networks.