This article examines the relationship between formal tax systems and criminal governance, utilising the Northern Triangle of Central America as a case study to illustrate how gang-controlled territories challenge traditional notions of tax sovereignty and territoriality. By analysing the overlapping fiscal functions of state taxation and the extortion practices of criminal organisations, such as Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) and Mara Barrio 18 (M-18), the article highlights the complexities that arise in regions with dual tax authorities. This exploration aims to broaden the scope of tax scholarship and social science research by encouraging further study into how these non-state actors influence tax compliance, the construction of legal norms, economic behaviour and state fiscal authority, including the potential recognition of criminal governance within formal tax systems.

This article examines the political imbroglios surrounding the tenure of José García de León y Pizarro (1778–84) as visitador and president-regent of the Audiencia or Kingdom of Quito, in order to demonstrate the deep political divisions that emerged in Spain's Atlantic empire over the Bourbon Reforms. García Pizarro's policies strengthened the colonial state and produced a dramatic increase in crown revenues, but they also led to a groundswell of protest from local elites and even provoked the condemnation of his successors. These political struggles in Quito reveal the many competing viewpoints about the reform and renovation of Spanish Empire. The Bourbon Reforms emerged from a series of hotly contested political struggles on both sides of the Atlantic, leading to patchy and even distinctive outcomes in different regions of the empire. This political contestation also helps to explain why no coherent, commonly accepted plan for the reform of Spain's Atlantic empire ever emerged during the century.