NCJ Number
104789
Date Published
1986
Length
258 pages
Annotation
This book presents a theoretical framework for understanding the forces which have molded the modern mafia in southern Italy, tracing its roots in the traditional social and economic systems of southern Italy through the postwar transformation of the mafia and into the development of mafia entrepreneurship in drug trafficking since the 1970's.
Abstract
The mafia's initial manifestations in southern Italy were related to the social conditioning of competition for honor that dominated social relations in certain parts of southern Calabria and western Sicily. There was horizontal socioeconomic conflict between persons and groups in the context of social instability, vertical mobility, and a modern economic structure. There was a marked asymmetry between the mercantile-capitalist economic structure and the traditionalism of the cultural structure. This was the spawning ground of the classical mafia. The cultural revolution of the postwar years ousted the mafia from the center of the social system to its margins, where it has evolved into an entrepreneurial capitalist enterprise based on drug trafficking. The mafia has attained political autonomy through the corruption, intimidation, and murder of public officials. Although mafia principles in the operation of its drug trafficking enterprise are similar to the rational principles of other capitalist enterprises, the mafia operates under primitive predatory impulses, as economic conflicts become interfamilial wars and market competition is characterized by vendettas and bloody struggles. Such anarchy and barbarism spreads and undermines civilized socioeconomic structures. The final chapter discusses the growth of international, large-scale crime, its effects on world consumption of narcotics, and the role of drug profits in the financial system. Name index and chapter footnotes.