The War Economies focus area examines how armed groups form durable, symbiotic relationships with illicit actors to create and sustain robust conflict economies. Drawing on original, field-based research, this work analyzes how insurgent organizations embed themselves within black markets, cross-border smuggling networks, and clandestine financial systems to generate power, revenue, and political leverage.

Research in this area focuses on the economic practices of armed groups, including informal taxation, protection rackets, resource extraction, trafficking, and collaboration with criminal networks. Particular attention is paid to how these illicit economic systems blur the boundaries between political violence and organized crime, binding armed actors, traders, and communities into mutually dependent relationships under conditions of war and insecurity.

By foregrounding the political economy of armed groups, this research challenges state-centric and purely military understandings of conflict. It produces empirically grounded insights into how illicit markets shape conflict dynamics, entrench violence, and complicate efforts to disrupt armed networks and dismantle war economies.