The Falkland Islands have one of the highest rates of firearm ownership in the world and one of the lowest homicide rates in the world. Only one homicide has been recorded from approximately 1980 to the present. This makes the homicide rate a bit less than 1 per 100,000 population. Firearms ownership is reported to be about 62 per 100 residents by the Small Arms Survey. There are currently about 3,500 residents of the Falkland Islands. Eight years ago, 1,705 firearms were registered, and 295 firearms were estimated to be possessed outside the legal system.
Over the same period, the UK homicide rate was about 1.3 per 100,000.
The Falkland Islands are a small, first-world, high-income island nation. They handle most of their internal affairs. Internal legislation is subject to a veto from the United Kingdom’s Monarch through the appointed governor.
Firearm laws in the Falkland Islands are somewhat less restrictive than in England. Airguns and ammunition are not considered firearms and do not require a license to own. A license is required to make an airgun.
The Falkland Islands have a land area of 4,700 square miles or about .53 persons per square mile. Alaska, by comparison, has a population density of 1.2 persons per square mile. The Falkland Islands have less than half the population density of Alaska. The Falkland Islands have over 450,000 sheep. Most of the land is used for raising sheep, with 92.4% of the land considered as pasturage. Wild geese are plentiful and tasty.
This correspondent first attempted to find a homicide rate for the Falkland Islands in 2014 while researching homicide rates in English-speaking, New World nations. No UNODC data was available for the Falkland Islands. A recent search revealed enough data to come up with a rate. The homicide rate in the Falkland Islands is very low, somewhat lower than the rate in the United Kingdom. In the United Kingdom, there are only about 4.6 firearms allowed per 100 persons. In the Falkland Islands, with most of the population derived from the UK, the number of firearms are over 62 per 100 persons, or 13 times as common as in the United Kingdom.
The number of firearms available to a population is not correlated to the homicide rate. Cultural factors are highly correlated to homicide rates. Culture tends to be persistent in a population. Cultures can and do change over time, but change tends to be slow. If you follow a population as it moves from place to place, homicide rates within the population tend to be the same.
Switzerland and Finland are other relatively high gun ownership countries with low homicide rates. Japan has low homicide rates. Japanese in the United States, where they have relatively easy access to firearms, have homicide rates lower than Japanese in Japan. From Point Blank by Gary Kleck, p. 189:
.. in Japan, where civilian gun ownership is virtually nonexistent and gun control laws are extremely strict, the homicide rate is 2.3 times as high as it is among Japanese-Americans living where guns are easily available and gun laws are far less restrictive.
Those who wish for a disarmed population attempt to obscure this fact by examining homicide rates committed with a firearm. The number of homicides committed with a firearm is irrelevant. There are many substitute methods for committing homicide. Firearms can be used for defensive purposes as well as for crime.
If homicides with firearms are reduced, but total homicides rise or stay the same, nothing useful has been accomplished, as far as stated goals. If the unstated goal is to reduce the number of privately owned firearms, then the promoters of the goal are using deception. They are lying to promote a hidden agenda.
About Dean Weingarten:
Dean Weingarten has been a peace officer, a military officer, was on the University of Wisconsin Pistol Team for four years, and was first certified to teach firearms safety in 1973. He taught the Arizona concealed carry course for fifteen years until the goal of Constitutional Carry was attained. He has degrees in meteorology and mining engineering, and retired from the Department of Defense after a 30 year career in Army Research, Development, Testing, and Evaluation.
The Falkland Islands are mostly all white citizens. No minority . Switzerland and Finland are the same. However,with millions of illegals coming from Africa and middle east to invade Europe, the number of white people will decrease while the minorities will increase along with criminal activities In Germany, illegals are 6 to 7% of the population, but commit 65% of all crime. The same in France. Now certain groups are demanding that the German citizens speak their language, worship their religion and they demand to run the government as their did in their home countries. Women are attacked and beaten… Read more »
Looks like common sense prevails. 1+1= more guns, less crime. Whoda thunk it.
How can the Falkland Islands be a nation, if the UK has appointed a monarch with veto ability?
Sounds like a colony/territory, to me. Not a nation.