ORGANIZED CRIME
Module 1: Discovery of organized crime
The three main points (+explain!)
1. Law enforcement is more than merely enforcing a rule/legal act
o The police see the problems and go to politics to ask for legislation
o Police put pressure on politics → influence policy and legislation
o Ex. Additional competences against OC like waiting for the delivery of the drugs was not possible at
first in Belgium
2. The concept of organized crime is a social construct
o OC is not a crime but a criminal phenomenon → created by police, judicial officers and politicians
(since the ‘90s)
o We now see a list of OC → it’s a label (that unlocks new competences like wire tapping)
o You should not only look at how many people are involved (offenders) cuz what about someone who
makes mass destruction weapons on his own…
3. Enforcement and policies difficult without a clear view on the problem: usefulness of the concept
‘organized’?
o It’s important to research OC in order to make policy cuz otherwise you know it’s a threat but you
don’t really know what you are talking about
o Having a clear concept is important for things like law enforcement and international cooperation
(identify, investigate, prosecute) → Little usefulness without a decent concept but good to be critical
(walk and talk like a duck… is it a duck?)
The history of the concept of OC
When Early 20th century concept
Political vs scientific legitimacy - Political legitimacy
o Upholding the American values, ‘Alien conspiracy’
o Very important to make it stick
- Scientific legitimacy
o What are we talking about
Controversial concept inconsistently - Provision of illegal goods and services (Alcohol – Al Capone (drug lord))
incorporation two notions - Criminal organisation (you build a criminal network to provide the goods –
criminal entrepreneurs, higher investment with higher prices cuz you can’t
buy it everywhere, threat to legal economy → they could influence/impact
politicians, economy, the law)
Temporal mismatch in policy interests - United States → Peaked in the late 1960s and early 1970s
- Europe → Much later (1990s)
What happened after 9/11 Lost some momentum but still high on the agenda – people who were
working on OC, were added to the pool on combatting terrorism
History of the concept
Nature of OC → struggle against the - Living by the rules of the criminal environment instead of the state
state o A competitor to the state that provides alternative routes for people
to embark upon - A welfare state provided by mafias
- Ex: Yakuza was first to aid citizens when earthquakes hit Japan.
o Criminal organization that surpasses the state
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,The American roots
When was it first used - Probably in 1896
(Annual report of the NY Society for o Protected gambling & prostitution
the Prevention of Crime) o Illegal business dealings involving politicians, police officers, lawyers, ..
1920s and 1930s - Development of illegal markets due to the prohibition
- Serious efforts to define and discuss OC by academics and commentators
- No specific reference to separate associations of gangsters (yet)
- Often synonymous with ‘racketeering’: extortion, predatory activities and
provision of illegal goods and services such as illegal gambling, counterfeit
documents and trafficking in drugs and liquor
Trasher → ‘The Gang’ (1927) - Study about gangs in Chicago (first full-scale treatment of organized crime)
- No hard structures
- Links w the upper world (connections between underworld & upperworld
→ we live in one world and use stuff and services from one another)
- Indispensable functions played by specialized persons/groups
- “Gangs are to a large extent isolated from the wider culture of the larger
community by the processes of competition and conflict which have
resulted in the selection of its population.”
Between 1929 and 1931 - Wickersham Commission: first federal government attempt to study OC
- ‘What’ became more important than ‘Who’
o Based on criminal law categories, not on criminals
After WW II - Wickersham approach abandoned
o ‘understanding of OC as a set of criminal entrepreneurial activities w
frequent involvement of legal businesses and state representatives’
o What do the consumer want and what can I offer… All about
capitalism en entrepreneurial ‘skills’
o OC can impact peace or no peace (cuz people can profit from wars)
- ‘Who’ = more important than ‘What’
- From late 1940s onward → Focus on foreign career criminals constituting
well-structured and powerful criminal organisations representing a threat
to the integrity of American society and politics
o Alien/parasitical corporation (OC labelled as a foreign thing; Albanian
mafia, Portugese port workers)
Kefauver Senate Investigation - New organization-based approach (alien conspiracy) clearly enunciated
Committee (1950) o Italian mafia centered view of OC (La Cosa Nostra)
o Linked OC with different groups of people
- Remained the official standpoint for almost three decades!
- Need for increased federal involvement in enforcement of gambling & drug
laws
- Federal Narcotics Bureau established → later DEA
o Moral entrepreneur of organization-based understanding of OC
Joe Valachi (1963) - Member of the Italian mafia (received ‘kiss of death’ in prison)
- Broke the code of silence (omerta)
- Testified before the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations
(Cosa Nostra) out of fear of being murdered
o Ratted everyone out + explained full working of the Cosa Nostra mafia
- Enormous public impact (first time televised → confirmed everything
about all the crazy things the Italians do – leaded to this confession by the
(Godfather movies are based on his police – pressured voor vrijstelling?)
testimonies) - Merger of the two concepts of OC and ‘mafia’ fully accomplished
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,1950s and 1960s - Consolidation of the mafia-centred concept of organised crime (law
enforcement said they don’t see all the things Valachi told them, yes some
cases but not all of them => US RICO Act)
- Focus on NY City, but how ‘true’ and ‘general’ was this picture?
- Proposal to specifically outlaw membership of La Cosa Nostra rejected
- Uneasiness with mafia paradigm demonstrated by many law-enforcement
officials at state and local levels + members of Federal Organised Crime
Strike Forces, established late 1960s and early 1970s
US RICO Act (1970) - Racketeer Influenced and Corrupted Organisations Act
o If you as a person are friendly with a person that has committed an
act of OC, you too will be researched or prosecuted for OC
- Definition of OC in much broader terms than Cosa Nostra only to include
less structured gangs and illicit enterprises
o Also targeting outlaws and motorcycle clubs
However - Myth of powerful and centralized mafia organisation long continued to be
claimed whenever police budgets had to be raised or new legislation had
to be passed
- New legislation → increased power (e.g., wiretapping and eavesdropping,
informants, seizing financial assets, …)
- Public perception dominated by mafia-centred view on OC
The rise of the illegal enterprise paradigm in the 70s
Past 1960s - Idea of alien conspiracy rejected by most American social scientists
o Ideological, Serving personal political interests, Lacking in accuracy
and empirical evidence
- Scientific attention shifted from ‘Who’ back to ‘What’
- Focus on the supply of illegal products and services
o Focus on marketplace → rise of expression ‘illicit’ or ‘illegal enterprise’
o The purpose of organized crime is to financially profit through crime
and mainly responds to public demand for services
▪ Criminals are also entrepreneurs (criminal markets) → we don’t
look at them as entrepreneurs and that’s why we’re failing to grasp
what is needed to find what OC is ex. We focus on Mocro Maffia
(WHO) so we are limiting ourselfs in fully understanding WHAT it is
Beginning 1970s War on drugs
o Instead of Mafia → illegal enterprise → also see RICO Act
o Fighting drugs in the US, while drugs are pouring in from abroad?
o People love hearing ‘war on drugs’ but there is no such thing as war on
drugs in Antwerp… It’s also not a real war cuz no soldiers and stuff
Export of the concept of OC used as an - Increase international cooperation in the fight against drugs & to transfer
instrument to law enforcement techniques to other countries
- ‘The export of criminal justice’ by Ethan Nadelman (1994)
o Convincing other countries to tackle organised crime
- ‘McDonaldisation of organised crime’ by Peter Luspha (1981)
o The standardisation of crime and drugs like McDonalds
o Packaging, taste etc is the same but the ingredients are not…
o Americans came up with the concept but it’s not the same everywhere
- Law enforcement problems concerning drugs:
o Case of François (BE)
▪ He used police funds illegally to spy and have informants (like
RICO) and lost them, to cover this up he started selling drugs
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, Side effect of OC as a synonym for - Side-effect of OC as a synonym for illegal enterprise!
illegal enterprise o Term ‘OC’ used to refer to both
1. Sets of people involved in illegal activities (e.g., Cosa Nostra)
2. The sets of activities in itself
o Thus → Confusion between offender and offence, leading to circular
reasoning
- As from the early 1980s, host of other organised crime entities listed next
to La Cosa Nostra, such as:
o Outlaw motorcycle and prison gangs, Colombian cartels, The Japanese
Yakuza, Eastern European OC groups, …
- Police focuses too much on the perpetrators, and not enough on the
monetary gains and crimes
o “Following the money” for drugs as example
▪ If you follow the people→ You find users and dealers
▪ If you follow the money → You find sponsors and producers
o You need the big guys
1990s and onwards - Organised crime disappeared from US policy agenda during the 1990s
o It did suddenly appear in Europe with the rise of the EU
I.e., Maastricht free movement of people … and crime
- Interest resurged since 2008
o Release ‘Law Enforcement Strategy to Combat International Organised
Crime’ by US Department of Justice
o ‘Organised Crime Council’ reconvened
2020s - Increased policy attention in the US and EU
o Fighting organised crime – EU strategy for 2021-25
o This strategy aims to target action on the main criminal markets and
address corruption and the financial aspects of organised crime. It will
be adopted together with a new strategy on human trafficking.
o Executive Order on Establishing the United States Council on
Transnational Organized Crime, December 15, 2021
- Intertwinement with cyber dimension
Intertwinement with cyber dimension We don’t embrace this ‘black holes’ → it facilitates OC
ex. It doesn’t expand HT but it changes the ways people doing it
Europe
Spain & Italy Only countries where OC is understood in terms of criminal organisations
Until early 1980s - First studies on OC in Europe → No formal mafia organisations
- Italy: mafia constitutes the archetype of OC
Since mid 1970s - Dominant position of illegal enterprise approach
(apart from IT & ES) - Emphasis on illegal market activities unchallenged ever since + OC as a
successful policy term
- Research in Europe: no Mafia in Europe, but professional criminals
Transnational organized crime
Since late 1980s - Transnational nature of OC emphasized → ‘transnational organised crime’
as a fixed expression
o Due to pressure of the US War on Drugs → they wanted every
country to recognise that the drug problem in their country is a
transnational problem → countries need to cooperate
- e.g., Council of Europe, Schengen parties and European Communities →
Focus on ‘cross-border crime’ (no operational competence by Europol!!)
1990s - ‘Transnational organised crime’ fully institutionalized by UN
- Context: implosion of USSR → USA as only superpower on Security Council
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