ABSTRACT
This chapter explores a series of shadow powers, international by definition that – while capable of shaping world economies and policies – remain largely invisible to formal analysis. It describes the heart ethnographic in nature. Ethnographic work on these networks prompts a reassessment of basic theoretical ideas concerning the nexus of legality/illegality, state/non-state and formal/non-formal power relations. Shadow networks, licit or otherwise, are more than sprawling value-neutral international market networks (Appadurai, 1996). Business people who profit from shadow transactions are unlikely to give up shadow sources of power, profit and supply as they develop legitimate enterprises, and in fact, their success may depend on keeping these networks current. The fact that large-scale massacres, wars and trails of dead bodies are found with far less regularity within these shadow networks than in and among the wars of states attests to the fact that the systems do work.
