ABSTRACT
Banditry often involves violent acts by common criminals for whom theft is simply a job. Such “ignoble robbers” find few defenders. Such bandits, like the haiduks described by Eric J. Hobsbawm (1981), robbed simply for profit. They robbed the rich more often than the poor, because the rich had more booty. In most cases, gangs formed ties with rural elites, not with humble peasant society. Bandits could aid local elites as hired thugs. Ties to local elites provided political protection and a degree of legitimacy to the bandits.
