People
Viridiana Rios
Viridiana Rios
Graduate Student
Organized crime, justice reform and corruption
Biographical Note:
Viridiana Rios is a PhD candidate in Government and a doctoral fellow in Inequality and Criminal Justice at the Harvard Kennedy School. She studies drug trafficking, violence and corruption in Mexico. Her research agenda aims to solve several puzzles about organized crime from our ability to accurately measure drug-related violence, to our understanding of drug cartels' behavior/mobility, and the link between corruption and criminal violence.
She regularly serves as a consultant and security policy adviser to private and public institutions in the US and Mexico, and presents her research in a variety of public forums and media. She currently works as an adviser to Mexico's Minister of Finance.
Bore enrolling at Harvard, Viridiana studied Political Science at ITAM, in Mexico City, and graduated at the top of her class. She has also worked and researched at the Center for US-Mexico Studies (UCSD), the Trans-border Institute (USD), the Counter-terrorism Committee at the United Nations, USAID, Mexico's Security Council, and Ministry of Social Development.
Publications:
| Title | Abstract |
| How to Win the Mexican Drug War | Washington Post, April 12, 2013 |
| The assasination of journalits and mayors in Mexico's Drug War (2012; in Spanish) | Journalists and mayors are being assasinated the most in areas where drug cartels are battling for turf |
| Why did Mexico become so violent? (2012) | Drug-related violence increased because of (a) law enforcement operations, and (b) increased competition between drug cartels. |
| How and where Mexican criminal organizations operate (2012; with Coscia) | An algorithm that uses Google to track Mexican drug cartel and creates Maps of criminal activity |
| Drug Legalization Could Create More Crime | New York Times, May 30, 2012 |
| Drug-related violence in Mexico (2012; with Molzahn and Shirk) | Trends of Mexico's Drug War through 2011; historical estimates of drug-related homicides (pg 22). |
| Drug-related violence in Mexico (2011; with Shirk) | Numbers, trends and events of Mexico's Drug War through 2010 |
| Drug-related violence in Mexico, mid-year report, mid-year report (with Duran-Martinez and Hazard) | Number, trends and events of Mexico's Drug War June 2010 |
| Doing the Math on Mexican Drug Wars | New York Times, January 25th, 2010 |
In Magazines:
| Title | Published at | Abstract |
| Who Started the Mexican Drug War? | Kennedy School Review, 2013. | Traffickers became violent before Mexico started prosecuting them, not because of prosecution. |
| Why Mexico's Zetas Expanded Faster Than Their Rivals (with Dudley) | InsightCrime, April 21, 2013 | An study of Zetas' market strategy. |
| What Google can tell us about drug cartels' modus operandi | Nexos, December 2012 | This is the story of how I tracked drug cartels using Google to discovere that criminals (a) share territories, (b) operate selectively and (c) spread out since 2004. |
| Keys to reducing violence in Mexico | Harvard Review of Latin America, Winter 2012 | Reducing violence requires reforming Mexico's judicial system to develop targeted policies and promote civic engagement. |
| Who becomes a drug dealer and why? (English version here) | Este Pais Online, August 2009 | Income, tastes and outside options determine who becomes a drug dealer in Mexico.Income, tastes and outside options determine who becomes a drug dealer in Mexico. |
| Mexico's media-driven violence (Spanish) | Nexos, January 2011 | Mexico is less violent than we think. Perceptions do not match reality because homicides are done to attract media attention. |
| Assassins on the 'Cheap' | ISN, October 2010 | Hired assassins are willing to work for suppressed wages because murder-for-hire has proven to be a gateway to more lucrative criminal activity. |
Opinion Pieces:
| Title | Published at |
| My Juarez (English version here) | Nexos Online, July 4, 2010 |
| Drug Policy advice for drug traffickers (English version here) | Este Pais Online, June 27, 2010 |
| Who are drug traffickers voting for? (English version here) | Este Pais Online, June 1, 2010 |
| God, please make me a senator (English version here) | Este Pais Online, April 1, 2010 |
| Can we trust the Mexican military in the drug war? (English version here) | Este Pais Online, March 23, 2010 |
| Fewer homicides do not mean more security (English version here) | Este Pais Online, March 4, 2010 |
| More journalist murdered in Mexico that in Iraq (English version here) | Este País Online, February 1, 2010 |
| Poverty and corruption have many ways to kill: Haiti is not a coincidence (English version here) | Este País Online, January 15, 2010 |
My research at the press:
| Fox News: "Harvard student tracks drug cartels" | Foreign Policy: "Tracking Mexico's cartels with Google" |
| LA Times: "Mexico before and after Calderon's drug war" | New Scientists: "Destroying drug cartels the mathematical way" |
| Univision: "Google news ayuda a localizar patrones del narco" | El Universal: "Concentran 29% de los municipios actividad del narco" |
| Times of India: "Google used to track drug cartels" | The Huffington Post: "The drug legalization debate" |
Working papers:
| Title | Abstract |
|
How government structure encourges criminal violence: The causes of Mexico's Drug War (Doctoral Dissertation) |
Mexico's drug war was a war between criminal organizations, ignited by a state that enforced the law in a decentralized political environment. |
| The Role of Government Coordination in Crime Deterrance and Citizen Security (Job Talk Paper) | Mexico's organized crime has become increasingly violent and injurious due to a lack of coordiantion between different levels of governemnt. |
| Using Google to track Mexican criminal organizations (with Coscia) | Our algorithm reads all that has ever been published online and give us a profile of how different criminal organizations operate. |
| Unexpected Consequences of Mexico's Drug War for US National Security: More Mexican Immigrants | About 264,000 Mexicans have migrated out of their communities fearing drug-related violence. Estimates of the total number of immigrants are available here |
| Why are Mexican mayors getting killed by traffickers? Corruption Dynamics in Mexico |
The decentralization of corruption and rising competition between cartels have increased the probability of political violence againts Mexican politicians. |
| To be or not to be a drug trafficker: Modeling occupational choices of criminals | The attractiveness of trafficking as a profession comes from the large variance of salaries within the market even if average salaries are low. |
| The economic impact of Mexico's drug trafficking industry Mexico | A cost-benefit analysis of drug trafficking operations within Mexico until 2006; cash flows, employment generation, the costs of drug abuse, and law enforcement are analyzed. |
Radio Interviews:
Email Address
vrios@fas.harvard.edu
Office Locations
1737 Cambridge Street CGIS-North Cambridge, MA 02138 USA
Courses
Advanced Microeconomic TheoryApplied EconometricsAdvanced Quantitative MethodsAdvanced Quantitative ResearchMathematics for Social ScientistsGeographical Information SystemsSurvey DesignContract TheoryPolitics and EconomicsSocial EconomicsInequality and Social PolicyEconomic DevelopmentComparative PoliticsComparative Politics in LAPolitical Theory
