As the 21st century approaches, the international community continues to grapple with the consequences of major shifts in the security environment. The world we now live in is a paradox: political integration and community fragmentation; expanding transnationalism and rising nationalism; unimaginable wealth and unspeakable poverty, high-tech militarizes and low-tech conflicts, decreasing military spending and expanding use of defense resources. In this complex environment, the United States is debating its global role and security priorities for the 21st century.

The security issues which have come into prominence since the September 11 terrorist attack in the USA provide both the starting point and the focus for this comprehensive survey of contemporary security issues in the Caribbean. This volume assesses the impact of the 9/11 terrorist attack on Caribbean states and examines the institutional and operational terrorism response capacity of security agencies in the region. However, understanding security challenge and change in the Caribbean context requires a broad-based multidimensional approach; terrorism for the small, open and vulnerable nation states of the Caribbean region is a real security issue but even more so, is a range of untraditional threats like crime, drug trafficking, territorial disputes, environmental degradation and the rapid spread of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. How these states adapt policies and practices to adjust to the new regional and global circumstances represent the challenge and the change.

Security challenges pose significant hardship for citizens of Caribbean nations. Public safety is threatened by high rates of crime – especially violent crime – in much of the region, the plague of the illicit drug trade, transnational organized crime, gangs, the current global proliferation of crimes of terrorism and related violent extremism and radicalization. The situation diminishes morale among the youth, their education and their future, and operates as a major push factor. Yet, surprisingly, there has been a scarcity of scholarly work that addresses these conditions. This interdisciplinary volume succinctly responds to the gap in criminological and security studies on the Caribbean by drawing attention to the understudied nexus of crime, violence, and security that is so pervasive in the region, and the ways in which underdevelopment re/creates environments for insecurity. The book is organized in three parts: Part one encompasses conceptualizations of crime, violence and punishment. Part two takes up country cases on crime and security. Part three addresses issues of regional security, both public and private. This timely volume will be valuable reading for scholars, students, practitioners and policy makers who share a critical interest in the scope, impact, and inter-relationality of crime, violence, and in/security in the region.

The world we now live in is a paradox: political integration and community fragmentation; expanding transnationalism and rising nationalism; unimaginable wealth and unspeakable poverty; high-tech militaries and low-tech conflicts; decreasing military spending and expanding use of defense resources. But before we embark on a new Caribbean policy, it would be constructive to reflect on past U.S. "policies" toward the Caribbean. The stakes are high for all in the region. Dr. Griffith's analysis provides an excellent basis for further study and discussion.

Since the end of the Cold War, security concerns in the Caribbean have changed from containment of communism to transnational threats such as drugs, illegal migration and natural disasters. This text analyzes the situation and puts forward a framework for a cooperative regional security system.

Dominguez has drawn together fifteen leading scholars on international relations and comparative politics from Latin America, the Caribbean, and the United States, thus bringing to bear varying national perspectives from several corners of the hemisphere to analyze the intersection between regional security issues and the democracy building process in Latin America.