Preview

How Did The Mafia Affect The Italian Criminal Society?

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
478 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
How Did The Mafia Affect The Italian Criminal Society?
Since their appearance in the 1800s, the Italian criminal societies known as the Mafia have infiltrated the social and economic fabric of Italy and now impact the world. They are some of the most notorious and widespread of all criminal societies.

There are several groups currently active in the U.S.: the Sicilian Mafia; the Camorra or Neapolitan Mafia; the ’Ndrangheta or Calabrian Mafia; and the Sacra Corona Unita or United Sacred Crown.

We estimate the four groups have approximately 25,000 members total, with 250,000 affiliates worldwide. There are more than 3,000 members and affiliates in the U.S., scattered mostly throughout the major cities in the Northeast, the Midwest, California, and the South. Their largest presence centers around
…show more content…
Over the millennia, Sicilians became more clannish and began to rely on familial ties for safety, protection, justice, and survival.

An underground secret society formed initially as resistance fighters against the invaders and to exact frontier vigilante justice against oppression. A member was known as a “Man Of Honor,” respected and admired because he protected his family and friends and kept silent even unto death.

Sicilians weren’t concerned if the group profited from its actions because it came at the expense of the oppressive authorities. These secret societies eventually grew into the Mafia.

Since the 1900s, thousands of Italian organized crime figures—mostly Sicilian Mafiosi—have come illegally to this country. Many who fled here in the early 1920s helped establish what is known today as La Cosa Nostra or the American Mafia.

Charles “Lucky” Luciano, a Mafioso from Sicily, came to the U.S. during this era and is credited for making the American La Cosa Nostra what it is today. Luciano structured the La Cosa Nostra after the Sicilian Mafia. When Luciano was deported back to Italy in 1946 for operating a prostitution ring, he became a liaison between the Sicilian Mafia and La Cosa

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Powerful Essays

    When looking at American history, it becomes clear that immigrants came into America in waves and were discriminated against, due to the immense size of these immigration waves. During the early 1800’s, Italy had the largest influx of immigrants coming into America at the time. Because of this, many were discriminated against in terms of jobs, housing, and medical care. To protect themselves from the outside world and create more jobs for their relatives immigrating to America; the Italians came together to form the mafia. As explained by Karen Jaehne, "Coppola 's Godfather epic may have had a richer mise en scene and grander ambitions—the depiction of the immigrant, tribal Mafia 's evolution into a multinational corporation as a metaphor for the saga of Americanization” (Citron 423). This means that this film was used to show the fact that even though the immigrants were against impossible odds, they used teamwork and loyalty to still strive to the top. This is the “American dream” adopted by many immigrants, but is risky because of the level of illegal activity. The mafia was used for organized crime creating a new market for revenue that did not exist prior because it was illegal activity. In the film, Vito Corleone is the don of the mafia and is portrayed as a man…

    • 1724 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    After Lucky Luciano went to prison in 1936, Costello became the boss of the Luciano crime family, the most powerful crime family in New York and one of the Five Families of the New York Mafia.…

    • 82 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Of course, the Mafia isn't what it once was: a power structure capable of influencing national politicians and making historic heists at major transportation centers. But the FBI maintains that La Cosa Nostra—the sprawling group originally steered by Sicilian immigrants that we hear about most…

    • 239 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    CJA 384 wk 3

    • 696 Words
    • 3 Pages

    One of the most popular theories with organized crime is the alien conspiracy theory. This theory blames outsiders and their influences for the prevalence of organized crime in U.S. society. Over the years, images of well dressed immigrants with machine guns who live by the code of silence have becoem associated with this theory (Lyman & Potter, 2007, Chapter 1). This theory states that the mafia was born and gained prominence during the 1860s in Sicily, and that those immigrants have since become responsible for the foundations of U.S. organized crime. There are about twenty-five Italian crime families known as…

    • 696 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Organized Crime Models

    • 383 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Organized crime can be broken down into two basic models. One being the bureaucratic model, and the other being the patron-client model. These two models have some things in common with each other, and they also have a few differences. The big similarities is that the bureaucratic model uses a strict set of rules to run their organization by. The patron-client model does not have such a strict set of rules, but instead they have a set of values of traditions. This in turn gives them a similarity because it builds a network where there is a sort of rank structure. Another similarity of these two is that both use criminal acts, and people with skills to be good at criminal acts to obtain money and power.…

    • 383 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Al Capon Research Paper

    • 1192 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Arguably the most notorious mobster in Chicago, Al Capone, AKA “Scarface”, was an Italian immigrant who arrived in Chicago during the start of prohibition in 1920. When he arrived, he was mentored by Johnny…

    • 1192 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    The upbringing of the organization has two facets: create a better environment by helping those in need and the other one is to seize opportunities to gain an advantage over others by strategic force. “The idea of the Mafia is a Robin Hood-like organization in defense of the poor had a long life in Italy. But the sheer brutality of the war against the state puts the validity of the myth in question. There was so much violence and Mafia brutality. That is when the myth of the good Mafia dies. It enters into a period of crisis”(The Star). “Has there ever been a trial during which it has emerged that there is a criminal association called the mafia and that this association has been definitely responsible for or actually committed a crime? Has any document or witness any proof at all which has ever come to light establishing a sure connection between a crime and the so-called mafia? In the absence of such proof, and if we admit that the mafia exists, I’d say it was a secret association for mutual aid, no more and no less than freemasonry. There’s the same amount of proof that the freemasons go in for criminal activity as there is that the mafia exists”(Sciascia…

    • 1293 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Organized crime is groupings of highly centralized enterprises run by criminals for the purpose of engaging in illegal activity, most commonly for monetary profit. Organized crime groups are motivated by money rather than ideology, a characteristic that distinguishes them from organized terrorism. The movie Goodfellas by Martin Scorsese is an example of what organized crime is. Similar to many other mafia movies Goodfellas exaggerates truths and adds finesse to improve the movie.…

    • 831 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Mobsters of the 1920’s During the early 1920's large groups of italian immigrants came to america. They started off as a couple of thousand but as word spread out about jobs more came. A couple thousand later became couple of hundreds of thousands. Most of them derived from Italy; as they did not have a stable economy,they came for a search of a better life. Government was overuleing as well and italians were not pleased with how their country was.…

    • 828 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The typical Italian mafia stereotype has some truth since our mafia was strongly influenced my Italy. During the mid-1800s the Sicilian mafia grew exponentially in Italy, but this quickly came to an end. At the end of the 19th century the Fascist regime of Benito Mussolini attacked the crime organizations of Italy (Mafia in the United States). Sicilian Mafiosi decided to escape to America to continue their illegal ways. In just New York in went from 20,000 in 1880 to 500,000 by 1910 (Mafia in the United States).…

    • 591 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    italian immigratin

    • 1399 Words
    • 6 Pages

    Many people have emigrated from Italy to America over the past few centuries. During the time period of 1880-1920, the largest number of Italians arrived in America as nearly four million Italian immigrants came to the states. Most came from either Sicily or southern Italy and were mostly comprised of lower income people. A majority of the immigrants were known as the "birds of passage". Life was often hard for Italians in America as they were forced into slums and the process of gaining citizenship was difficult. They faced difficult tests, both physically and mentally and many were sent back to Italy for failing. Americans looked down on Italians and they were stereotyped as violent people due to the number of gangs affiliated with the Italian culture. Al Capone was just one of many famous gangsters who reinforced this way of thinking. The Italians brought their heritage and traditions with them, helping to make the United States a cultural melting pot.…

    • 1399 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    References: Lyman, M. D., & Potter, G. W. (2007). Organized crime (4th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson/Prentice Hall. Retrieved May 1, 2012…

    • 1097 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Salvatore Maranzano came out the winner and boasted stating he was the bosses of all bosses, in Italian. Later that same year, Salvatore was murdered by Lucky Luciano, the founder of a central organization named Commission. Commission served as a kind of Mafia organization appointed to organize other Mafia organizations. As time went on, police…

    • 1234 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Organized crime has played a big role in shaping America’s history today. Organized crime, as we know it today is a group of individuals who work together to gain a profit through illegal and often violent methods. This can be traced back to the New York street gangs of the 1800’s. Groups such as the Forty Thieves in New York formed as hundreds of immigrants came together for their own protection and financial gain. These people thought they could only rely on each other and saw organized crime as a way to improve their lives and find protection from other gangs and corrupt police officers. The Forty Thieves were made up of Irish-Americans who lived in slums and worked for low wage. These gangs would get involved in various including politics.…

    • 185 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Italian Mafia

    • 1045 Words
    • 5 Pages

    In the nineteenth century, the Mafia escalated from petty thievery crimes to murder of political figures. Perhaps the first notable murder committed by the Italian Mafia was the murder of Emanuele Notarbartolo, a Sicilian banker. The Mafia was and remains the main suspect, however, no one was convicted. Even so, Benito Mussolini convicted hundreds of suspected Mafia members years after the incident. He also attempted to exterminate the Mafia from Sicily. As a result, the Mafia spread to America because of its desirable facade for immigrants. Many Italians were already living in the country so it was easy for illegal Mafia members to sneak in unnoticed. The Mafia was most active in New York, parts of New Jersey, Philadelphia, Detroit, Chicago, and New England. Another advantage of immigrating to America was the opportunity to commit crime in America during the 1920s. With the passing of the Eighteenth Amendment, people all over the country were making a business of selling alcohol illegally. The Mafia quickly became involved in such activities and more. This “new” Mafia was focused on gaining power and money. To achieve this goal, Mafia families would often coerce other families and even government officials. In extreme cases, the Mafia would be forced to kill. Although the ideals are no longer the same as they were in the 1800s, family has maintained the position of highest importance to the Mafia. (“The Death and Life of the Mafia in Italy.” 3, 4,…

    • 1045 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays