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The Mafia - Online Term Paper

The Mafia

is viewed by many people as a bunch of gangsters like those that they might see on movies such as Goodfellas, The Godfather, or Donnie Brascoe. In all actuality represents much more than that, it is an entity within itself. The original Sicilian Mafia was just a group of families controlling certain territories in which they each laid claim to. These families were headed by a dominant male and were usually in competition with other families. The members of these families would engage into various "illegal and legal businesses with each other and outsiders" (Fiorienti and Peltzman 38). In the introduction to The Economics of Organized Crime, Fiorentini and Peltzman claim that between ...

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far ranging. ""Arlachhi (1986 44-5) concluded in 1983 "there does not exist a centralized criminal organized called … The cosca mafiosa is a simple organism but a solid one, without formalism or bureaucracy. Within it are neither statutory ordinances, initiation rites nor courts of judgment"" (Fiorienti and Peltzman 38). This is in contrast as to what others recognize as organized crime. In direct retrospect to his earlier writings, Arlacchi claims that, through interviews with Mafia members, there is a more formal organization within and that does have initiations.
The United States Mafia definitely was different than the Sicilian Mafia when trying to generalize them. The American Mafia consisted of only around 24 families whereas the Sicilian Mafia consisted of hundreds of families. These families were much larger than their Sicilian counterparts and that the families were most definitely organized and formal. " A detailed case-study of one of these families and its ...

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The Mafia. (2005, September 25). Retrieved December 23, 2024, from http://www.essayworld.com/essays/The-Mafia/33879

"The Mafia." Essayworld.com. Essayworld.com, 25 Sep. 2005. Web. 23 Dec. 2024. <http://www.essayworld.com/essays/The-Mafia/33879>

"The Mafia." Essayworld.com. September 25, 2005. Accessed December 23, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/The-Mafia/33879.

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PAPER DETAILS

Added: 9/25/2005 10:33:03 AM
Category: English
Type: Free Paper
Words: 1149
Pages: 5

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