Among countries with a large surplus of homicides, we find the United States, countries in Africa, South and Central America, the Caribbean, and countries that belonged to the former Soviet Empire.

Many countries in Latin America also have higher homicide rates than expected. There is an important and growing literature on violence in Latin America identifying numerous different factors responsible for this increase, including social inequality, ineffectiveness of the police and other criminal justice institutions, corruption, organized crime, armed conflicts, and so on (Frühling, Tulchin, & Golding, 2003; World Bank, 2007).

In regard to Africa, the fact that many countries have a large homicide rate is to be expected given their socioeconomic, demographic, and political characteristics. It is also not surprising that the United States has an excessive homicide rate, as it has by far the largest homicide rate of the most developed nations.