ABSTRACT
The emergence of the Russian mafiya, a particularly distinctive, flexible and violent form of organised crime, has been one of the least palatable side-effects of the collapse of the USSR. But it is important to stress that this is a phenomenon rooted in Russian tradition and Soviet practice, not solely a product of the temporary dislocations and uncertainties of the country’s transition from a Soviet state to a free market democracy. It is at once shrouded in myth and mystery and the subject of feverish and often alarmist reporting. For example, when former Russian Interior Minister Kulikov presented a progress report to President Yeltsin on the fight against organised crime, in June 1997, he had been drilled by his aides to avoid the popular term mafiya in favour of the more neutral “organised criminal groupings”, even though his actual report used the term.2 Furthermore, his statistics appeared contradictory, not least in claiming that the fight against the mafiya was being won, even though there were still some 5,000 groupings in the country. In fact, the Russians use a very elastic definition of organised crime, including almost any group of more than three people who committed a premeditated offence. There are probably closer to 350 genuine organised criminal groupings, as Westerners would define them, including perhaps between a dozen
and twenty major cartels. But such confusion over definitions can be important. That Russians, as well as outsiders, persist in using the term mafiya is an interesting starting point in examining this phenomenon. The “original”, Sicilian Mafia is not just an organisation, but also a culture, a way of behaving. To put it another way, it is a culture which depends on articulating its values through a type of organisation.3 Disciplined, hierarchical and patriarchal, it requires its members to conform to certain rules and expectations. These entail “thieves’ honour”, patronage and clientelism, and competition and demonstrable success, which is increasingly defined in terms of wealth and political connections. Transliterated into Cyrillic as mafiya, Russian organised crime is at once reminiscent of but also distinct from its Sicilian counterpart.
