Assignment:
Review the articles:
1. The Red Mafia: A Legacy of Communism by Annelise Anderson
2. Organized Crime - The Dumbing ofDiscourse by Michael Woodiwiss
3. Criminal groups and transnational illegal markets by GERBEN BRUINSMA
4. The Value of Connections: Evidence Based on the Italian-American Mafia by Giovanni Mastrobuoni
5. Understanding Organized Crime Networks: Evidence Based on Federal Bureau of Narcotics Secret Files on American Mafia by Giovanni Mastrobuoni
It is designed to develop your understanding of organized crime conceptually and with a focus on cross-cultural comparisons between the US, Sicily, and Russia.
Everyone must respond to the first question, and you can choose to do any two of the others.
Write approximately 300 to 500 words in total, between a page and a half and two pages (typed).
EVERYONE RESPOND TO THIS QUESTION :
1. Why mafias develop - What are the three major conditions that help mafias develop according to Anderson?
•Is Russia like 1800s America in terms of the potential for mafia development (Anderson)?
•Compare the structural and other unique American factors that account for the emergence of organized crime and compare it to situation in Russia (Anderson).
•Mafia versus Organized Crime: Which term is more useful in understanding this phenomenon and what are the conceptual limits of each term? (Anderson and Woodiwiss)
•What has been the shifting focus in the emerging understanding of organized crime in US from early work of Thrasher and Moley to the Wickersham Commission? (Woodiwiss)
CHOOSE TWO OF THE FOLLOWING:
2. What is the difference between social network analysis of criminal networks and viewing organized crime as centrally controlled organizations? (Bruinsma & Bernasco)
3. With reference to the origins of organized crime in Russia and Sicily what are the key similarities and differences between the two societies and the American experience of "early stage capitalism?" (Anderson and Woodiwiss)
4. What is the importance of corruption of government/excessive bureaucratic power in Russia and the rise of political machines in US (Woodiwiss and Anderson)