Robert Muggah
Co-founder and Research Director at Igarapé Institute (Brazil) and the SecDev Group (Canada)
Igarapé Institute (website), SecDev Group (website)
email: robert [at] igarape [dot] org [dot] br
Co-founder and Research Director at Igarapé Institute (Brazil) and the SecDev Group (Canada)
Igarapé Institute (website), SecDev Group (website)
email: robert [at] igarape [dot] org [dot] br
small arms and light weapons (SALW) | Latin America | global trade data/trends | harm to civilians | arms trafficking
Dr. Robert Muggah specializes in public and international security, smart cities, climate resilience and digital transformation. He is co-founder of the Igarapé Institute - a "think and do" tank working at the intersection of public, digital and climate security across Latin America and Africa. He is also co-founder of the SecDev Group - a digital risk analytics company. From 2000-2010, Robert was a senior research and research director of the Small Arms Survey in Geneva. For more than two decades he has advised national and municipal governments, technology companies and international organizations such as the United Nations, the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank and others on topics ranging from data-driven crime prevention and disarmament, demobilization and reintegration to urban planning in fragile and conflict-affected settings.
Robert is (or has been) a fellow or faculty at the University of Princeton, University of Oxford, the University of San Diego, the University of British Columbia, the Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, and the Graduate Institute in Switzerland. Since 2016 he has advised the World Economic Forum's Council on Cities and the annual flagship publication, the Global Risk Report. He has served on several high level UN panels, including on issues of Youth, Peace and Security, and contributed to several flagship publications of groups like the OECD, UNDP, WHO and the World Bank. He is currently advising a range of start-ups and venture capital firms, on issues ranging from adversarial AI, crowd-sourced intelligence, biodiversity prospecting and Web 3.0.
Robert has authored eight books and hundreds of peer-review journals. His h-index is currently 43 and i10-index 165. His latest book, with Ian Goldin, was released by Penguin/Random House in 2020 and is now available in Chinese, Dutch, German, Japanese, Korean and other languages. Robert is a regular columnist with Foreign Policy and a regular contributor to the The Atlantic, BBC, CBC, CNN, Economist, FastCompany, Financial Times, Folha de Sao Paulo, Globo, Guardian, New York Times, Newsweek and Wired. He has delivered three TED talks, in 2014, 2017 and 2021. He is now working on a new crime thriller series set in the Amazon Basin. Robert received his DPhil from the University of Oxford and his MPhil from the University of Sussex.
Recent Publications:
Dr. Robert Muggah specializes in public and international security, smart cities, climate resilience and digital transformation. He is co-founder of the Igarapé Institute - a "think and do" tank working at the intersection of public, digital and climate security across Latin America and Africa. He is also co-founder of the SecDev Group - a digital risk analytics company. From 2000-2010, Robert was a senior research and research director of the Small Arms Survey in Geneva. For more than two decades he has advised national and municipal governments, technology companies and international organizations such as the United Nations, the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank and others on topics ranging from data-driven crime prevention and disarmament, demobilization and reintegration to urban planning in fragile and conflict-affected settings.
Robert is (or has been) a fellow or faculty at the University of Princeton, University of Oxford, the University of San Diego, the University of British Columbia, the Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro, and the Graduate Institute in Switzerland. Since 2016 he has advised the World Economic Forum's Council on Cities and the annual flagship publication, the Global Risk Report. He has served on several high level UN panels, including on issues of Youth, Peace and Security, and contributed to several flagship publications of groups like the OECD, UNDP, WHO and the World Bank. He is currently advising a range of start-ups and venture capital firms, on issues ranging from adversarial AI, crowd-sourced intelligence, biodiversity prospecting and Web 3.0.
Robert has authored eight books and hundreds of peer-review journals. His h-index is currently 43 and i10-index 165. His latest book, with Ian Goldin, was released by Penguin/Random House in 2020 and is now available in Chinese, Dutch, German, Japanese, Korean and other languages. Robert is a regular columnist with Foreign Policy and a regular contributor to the The Atlantic, BBC, CBC, CNN, Economist, FastCompany, Financial Times, Folha de Sao Paulo, Globo, Guardian, New York Times, Newsweek and Wired. He has delivered three TED talks, in 2014, 2017 and 2021. He is now working on a new crime thriller series set in the Amazon Basin. Robert received his DPhil from the University of Oxford and his MPhil from the University of Sussex.
Recent Publications:
- "AI and the Global South," Igarapé Institute, May 10, 2024.
- "Perspective: The Caribbean's metastasizing gang threat needs coordinated regional responses," Small Wars Journal, April 15, 2024.
- "Perspective: Latin America’s crime surge is fueled by surging cocaine production," Small Wars Journal, May 22, 2023
- "Haiti Is on the Brink of State Failure," Foreign Policy, February 17, 2023.
- "America Is the World’s Gun Store," Foreign Policy, June 24, 2022.*
- "Unregulated U.S. Firearms Are a Global Problem," World Politics Review, June 6, 2022.
- "In the Americas, Homicide Is the Other Killer Epidemic," Foreign Policy, May 20, 2022.*
- "Russian demoralization on the front lines: Chronicles of the war in Ukraine," LinkedIn, March 15, 2022.
- "Five possible scenarios in the Ukraine-Russia war," iPolitics, March 7, 2022.*
- "Yemen’s Parallel War in Cyberspace," Foreign Policy, January 6, 2022.
- "The state of police violence in the Americas," Small Wars Journal, September 13, 2021.*
- "Arming the Americas," The Oxford Handbook of the Sociology of Latin America, 2020, with Katherine Aguirre (emerging expert).
- "To Downsize Bloated, Too-Powerful Police, Look at These Examples," Foreign Policy, July 17, 2020.
- "Calls for Police Reform Are Getting Louder—Here Is How to Do It," Foreign Policy, June 22, 2020.
- "Bolsonaro's end game," openDemocracy, June 2, 2020.
- "We urgently need major cooperation on global security in the COVID-19 era," World Economic Forum, April 23, 2020.
- "We Can Make the Post-Coronavirus World a Much Less Violent Place," Foreign Policy, April 14, 2020.
- Terra Incognito: 100 Maps to Survive the Next 100 Years, Penguin/Random House, 2020.
- "We can halve most forms of violence by 2030. Here's how," World Economic Forum, October 28, 2019.*
"Building the Bridge: SDG 16 // Commentary on Arms Control To Reduce Violence, Prevent Conflict and Advance Sustainable Development," UNIDIR, July 2019. - "Opinion: Relaxing Brazil's Gun Laws Could Make A Murderous Country Even Deadlier," National Public Radio, Jan. 10, 2019.
- "How Toronto can curb gun violence," The Globe and Mail, July 25, 2018.
- "A derrocada violenta da Nicarágua," O Globo, July 25, 2018.
- "How smart tech help cities fight terrorism and crime," World Economic Forum, June 15, 2018.
- "Medindo os custos econômicos da criminalidade no Brasil," O Globo, June 13, 2018.*
- "Brazil Spends Billions on Public Security: Why is Violence Getting Worse?," Americas Quarterly, June 12, 2018.
- "Want to stop gun violence now? Regulate bullets," Los Angeles Times, March 26, 2018.
* indicates additional authors