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Title: Russian Organized Crime and Corruption: Putin's Challenge by William H. Webster, Arnaud De Borchgrave, Frank J. Cilluffo ISBN: 0-89206-372-6 Publisher: Center for Strategic and International Studies Pub. Date: 19 June, 2000 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 1 (1 review)
Rating: 1
Summary: Russian Organized Crime and Corruption. Putin's Challenge
Comment: The reason I give the new CSIS study on Russian organized crime merely one star, is that it fails to meet elementary standards of scientific inquiry. The CSIS shows no interest in theoretical issues, nor does it contain a discussion of the methodological problems that are inherent in any study of crime phenomena. Unsurprisingly, the findings of the research are based in large part on press reports, and perhaps also unsurprisingly, only point in one direction: the US face a serious threat from Russian organized crime. Now, press reports and descriptive, non-theoretical work of course can offer information that may be of use in research, and also the CSIS study in this respectmay be of interest. Nevertheless, the reader can only use this kind of information if he or she has the impression that authors handle information sincerely, otherwise one does not know what to believe and what not. In this respect the CSIS report falls short in a big way. This becomes obvious when one looks at how it handles the study by Finckenauer and Waring ('Russian Mafia in America', 1998), a study that does live up to the requirements mentioned above, but that comes to a quite different conclusion than the one the CSIS reaches. I found only one referenceby the CSIS to this work (on p.22: "A recent nationwide survey of police agencies revealed that at least 34 states have some contact with ROC in émigré communities"). The reference suggests that the survey confirms the image of dramatic proliferation of the Russian mafia, while in fact the opposite is the case. Finckenauer and Waring conclude: "Our conclusion - which may be startling to some - is that the Russian organized crime in America widely known as the Russian Mafia is first, not Russian; second, not a mafia; and third, not even organized crime" (1998, p.xiv). If the CSIS has access to information that refutes this indeed remarkable conclusion, it should have presented it. The only impression the reader now gets it that the CSIS simply did not do its job properly. From an institution on the board of which we find many functionaries from the CIA and other government agencies, and which gives advice to policy circles in the US, we should have expected a more convincing handling of the subject - how reasonable or not the advice given may be. Now the reader is left with the impression that Finckenauer and Waring were right when they wrote that "The label Russian mafia offers a convenient hook for understanding but at the same time sensationalizes matters so as to peak interest. It thus serves both law enforcement and media interests"? (1998, p. 250).
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Title: Violent Entrepreneurs: The Use of Force in the Making of Russian Capitalism by Vadim Volkov ISBN: 0801487781 Publisher: Cornell Univ Pr Pub. Date: September, 2002 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: The Russian Mafia: Private Protection in a New Market Economy by Federico Varese ISBN: 019829736X Publisher: Oxford Press Pub. Date: September, 2001 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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Title: Comrade Criminal: Russia's New Mafiya by Stephen Handelman ISBN: 0300063865 Publisher: Yale Univ Pr Pub. Date: April, 1997 List Price(USD): $16.22 |
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Title: Darkness at Dawn: The Rise of the Russian Criminal State by David Satter ISBN: 0300098928 Publisher: Yale Univ Pr Pub. Date: May, 2003 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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Title: Godfather of the Kremlin: The Decline of Russia in the Age of Gangster Capitalism by Paul Klebnikov ISBN: 0156013304 Publisher: Harvest Books Pub. Date: September, 2001 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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