Personal Perception of Organized Crime
The media and my own understanding of events in the world have always shaped my personal perception of organized crime. We always hear news reports about Mexican drug cartels or terrorist organizations from the Middle East, such as Al-Qaeda. These news reporting led me to imagine big organizations that concentrate on corruption, murder, force, drug and weapon trade, human trafficking and other such measures to achieve their goals. In my mind, their goals usually involve large sums of money. Recently, this perception was also altered by the rise of ISIS and their activities inside and outside of the Middle East. Organized crime, like terrorism, has become intangible in my mind because it is transnational and it affects the entire world because recruits and attacks are happening all around. Upon entering this class, these ideas were running through my mind when I thought about organized crime.
The class readings began introducing other parts of organized crime that are usually overshadowed by the general, media-shaped perception. I was not aware that organized crime in United States started with the Italian Mafia. The video, A Place in the Sun (1976), introduced some history behind the beginnings of the Italian Mafia and first perceptions of organized crime in United States. It apparently started with Italians escaping the slums and seeking asylum in U.S. where they were also treated poorly, which in turn led to the creation of the mob. The rise of Mafia of Italian decent in United States was a perception created by different law enforcement agencies but this was the first introduction to studying organized crime. Academia later challenged the view of Italian Mafia as being the definition of organized crime in United States and the countless research started. Much research is done on organized crime and many characteristics are assigned to it but there is no single worldwide definition for it because it can take on a variety of forms.
Besides the history, the readings also helped in explaining the many categorizations when defining organized crime, which is part of the reason why it is intangible. The first chapter of Stephen Mallory’s book Understanding Organized Crime (2012) explains that organized crime varies in definition between countries and agencies within a country. An agency needs a good amount of resources in order to investigate and label an organized crime grouping. Through an investigation, organized crime can be categorized as: consortium, cartel, syndicate, organization, and a gang (Mallory, 2012, p. 4). But all of these are ultimately complex criminal groups. In order to counter these criminal groups, agencies and sometimes countries work together therefore an accepted definition of organized crime is needed.
Worldwide attempts to define organized crime usually boils down to 10-11 characteristics. Some of them include: corruption, money laundering, business-like structure, use of violence and intimidation, international activity, specialization, continuity, employing discipline and control, conspiracy, etc. (Mallory, 2012, p. 8). There is no single definition of organized crime but these characteristics help inter-country and inter-agency investigations when …
