Deconstructing the Mafia: An Historical and Theoretical Study of Organized Crime

What is organized crime? There have been many answers over the decades from scholars, governments, the media, pop culture and criminals themselves. These answers cumulatively created a "Mafia Mystique" that dominated discourse until after the Cold War, when transnational organized crime emerged as a pronounced, if nebulous, threat to global security and stability.

The authors focus both on the American experience that dominated organized crime scholarship in the second half of the 20th century and on the more recent global scene. Case studies show that organized crime is best understood not as a series of famous gangsters and events but as a structure of everyday life formed by numerous political, social, economic and anthropological variables.

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The late Joseph L. Albini was a professor emeritus in the department of sociology at Wayne State University. He lived in Las Vegas, Nevada.

Jeffrey Scott McIllwain is an associate professor in the Criminal Justice and Criminology Program and co-director of the Graduate Program in Homeland Security at San Diego State University. He lives in La Mesa, California.