Using Evil Methods for Good in the Changi Prisoner of War Camp: Illicit Networks Operating against an Illicit Authority

• In Event: Organized Crime at the Intersections of Oppression

Abstract

This paper reconstructs and analyzes the illicit economy of the POWs in the Changi Prison during the Japanese occupation of Singapore in the Second World War. The underground network allowed prisoners to obtain necessary food and medicine to prevent starvation and alleviate the effects of injuries and disease. It was necessary to engage in this behaviour because the Japanese overseers would not adequately support the prisoners. The paper will examine the nature of these operations in the light of organized crime theory and illicit networks. It asks the question whether the prisoners had to replicate every aspect of criminal networks in order to achieve their goal of obtaining unauthorized goods. In particular, it will ask whether they had to use violence and other immoral methods to achieve these goals.

Author

• Mark Lauchs, Queensland University of Technology