Thesis (Ph.D.)--Michigan State University. School of Criminal Justice, 2008. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed on July 7, 2009) Includes bibliographical references (p. 168-187). Also issued in print.

Thesis (M.Soc.Sc.)--University of Hong Kong, 1988. / Also available in print.

The organised crime industry on a whole generates an estimated gross criminal product of $800 billion USD annually generated from traditional crime industries like money laundering, cigarette and narcotics trafficking and prostitution. As a result of the new, globalised world, organised crime is diversifying its activities, penetrating legal sectors and further corrupting political systems. In general, it has been quick to adjust to the new economic opportunities and new technologies that this global village has to offer, and has been far more efficient in exploiting every available opportunity than its police and justice counterparts in preventing it from doing so. The face of international organised crime has changed to include new, sometimes smaller, often more dangerous actors, and has seen the traditional crime families metamorphose to keep up with the new environment. Diversification, penetration, legitimisation are the new guiding motto. The Sicilian Cosa Nostra has sought alternative ways to generate additional profits whilst reducing the risk factor. In order to branch-out, escape prosecution and yet remain within a pivotal and strategic position, the Cosa Nostra has chosen, amongst other havens, the French Riviera. Today, political and popular mobilisation and interest in combating organised crime is minimal, largely relegated to folklore status, crime annals, and the cinema industry. However, no judicial tool or innovation can have concrete and effective applications if the political will is not predominant and if concerted international co-operation is not enforced. The risk, should this trend continue, is that organised crime will become a dominant and decisive actor in State affairs, may continue to take over unstable micro-states and pervert the democratic process and the rule of law around the world. The threat is not so much to stand by and wait as crime develops further, but how long this lack of reaction can continue before it becomes irreversible.

Made available in DSpace on 2014-06-11T19:29:04Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2007-12-07Bitstream added on 2014-06-13T20:59:03Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 santos_vf_me_assis.pdf: 663507 bytes, checksum: 86402c11b4a071a9b47705452a750f08 (MD5) / Esta pesquisa nasce da experiência de alguns anos de acompanhamento psicossocial a adolescentes que cometeram atos infracionais, cumprindo medida sócio-educativa de internação em uma das unidades da FEBEM, hoje chamada de Fundação CASA. Partindo da perplexidade diante do mundo entre grades e muralhas que o trabalho cotidiano desvela, este estudo vai tomando direção com a lapidação de sentimentos e com a incessante busca de sentido para as relações que o ‘outro’ mundo revela. A organização peculiar do grupo de internos, regida por códigos e regras trazidas das leis do ‘crime organizado’, cuja história e relações com a dinâmica dos adolescentes são traçadas, inclusive em suas peculiaridades institucionais, demanda o questionamento da ‘lei’ que nos fundamenta a viver em sociedade. Diante do trânsito constante entre vítimas e agressores, pacto edípico e pacto social aparecem com toda a contradição evidenciada nas histórias familiares e na cultura institucional criada por esses meninos – homens – vítimas – bandidos. A despeito das considerações do vivido durante esses anos de trabalho, especialmente em 2003, o material de análise é produzido por meio de entrevistas a três adolescentes, cuja investigação fora pautada nas relações do adolescente com sua família, com a lei social e com a lei do crime, fundamentada pela teoria e método psicanalíticos, via leitura do sentimento de pertença familiar exposto por cada um deles. Tendo como objetivo geral analisar a relação entre crime e violência com o sentido de lei introjetado pelo adolescente no decorrer de sua história, da qual faz sua leitura expondo o inconsciente familiar que fundamenta seu sentimento de pertença... / This research is based on the experience of some years of psychosocial accompaniment to adolescents that committed acts of infraction, accomplishing socio-educational measure of internment in the units of internment of former FEBEM, today called CASA Foundation. Considering the perplexity of the world’s view behind bars and walls that the daily work demonstrates, this study will be molded by the feelings and with the incessant sense pursuit of different kinds of relationships that the other world reveals. The peculiar organization of the interns' group, governed by codes and rules brought of the organized crime, whose history and relationship with the adolescents' dynamics are traced, besides in their institutional peculiarities, the questioning of the law that bases the living in society. Facing the constant transit between victims and aggressors, edipic pact and social pact appears controversial and evidenced in their family histories and in the institutional culture created by those boys - men - victims - thieves. In spite of the experience of those years of work, especially in 2003, the material was analyzed and produced through interviews at three adolescents that they were deprived of freedom, whose investigation was ruled in the adolescent's relationships with their family, with the social law and with the law of the crime, based by the theory and method psychoanalytic, through comprehension of the feeling of belongs exposed for the adolescents. Tends as general objective to analyze the relationship among crime and violence with the sense of law introjected for the adolescent in elapsing their familiar history, which makes their interpretation by exposing their family unconscious that bases their feeling of belonging, we analyzed the effect of the execution or breaking... (Complete abstract click electronic access below)

Experimentos têm revelado que redes de neurônios, tanto in vitro como in vivo, mantêm atividade descrita por avalanches e se organizam em um estado crítico no qual essas avalanches são distribuídas de acordo com leis de potência. Mostramos no presente trabalho que um modelo de rede de elementos excitáveis com sinapses dinâ- micas é capaz de exibir criticalidade auto-organizada para ampla região do espaço de parâmetros. Nossos resultados estão de acordo com outros estudos que indicam que a depressão sináptica de curto prazo constitui mecanismo suciente para produzir criticalidade em avalanches neuronais. No entanto, segundo diversos pesquisadores, embora o ajuste de parâmetros seja grosso para que haja criticalidade no modelo, é mais preciso dizer que o sistema não apresenta criticalidade auto-organizada genu ína, mas sim quasi-criticalidade auto-organizada, como os demais modelos não conservativos presentes na literatura. / Experiments have shown that neuronal networks, both in vitro and in vivo, maintain activity described by avalanches and they are organized into a critical state in which these avalanches are distributed according to power laws. We have demonstrated that a model based on a network of excitable elements with dynamical synapses is able to exhibit self-organized criticality for a wide range of the parameter\'s space. Our results are consistent with other studies that suggest short-term synaptic depression is enough to produce criticality in neuronal avalanches. However, according to several researchers, in spite of the tuning to be gross to ensure that there is criticality in the model, it is more accurate do not say that the system presents genuine self-organized criticality, but self-organized quasi-criticality as the other non-conservative models in the literature.

While the limited number of scholars in the field of EU intelligence cooperation tend to have a rather state-centric view and focus on the normative (trust) or the functional (efficieny) dimension of intelligence cooperation, this study contributes to the field by focusing solely on the institutional structure of Europol. The purpose of this study is to examine why the Europol established the European Counter Terrorism Centre and why it is not addressing the interconnectedness between terrorism and organized crime. In order to address these questions, the theoretical framework of historical institutionalism has been applied and the notion of path dependency plays a vital role.  The study rests on a qualitative single case study design and the disciplined configurative-model is used to fulfill the research objective. The researcher traces the process in a historically chronological order and uses pre-existing materials in order to uncover explanatory findings. The study concludes that the theoretical framework of historical institutionalism and the notion of path dependency can explain the research problem and the research questions. The findings prove that Europol is a highly reactive institution in terms of its counter-terrorism arrangements and that historical perceptions play a significant role and inevitable leads the institution onto a path dependent track.

The Prevention of Organised Crime Act brought major changes to the South African criminal law context. Through the Act, major confiscatory provisions were established. The Act does not only target convicted criminals, but also any person who is in possession of tainted property that was used in the commission of offences. Civil forfeiture is the most widely used procedure in forfeiture proceedings. In the dissertation the effectiveness of criminal and civil confiscation is outlined. The historical development of confiscation and forfeiture provisions in South African is discussed with reference to the common law, legislation and international instruments and how international developments have influenced local development. This treatise consist of an overview of the confiscation provisions in the Prevention of Organised Act 121 of 1998 as one of the measures the South African legislature put in place to deal with organised crime. Since the Prevention of Organised Crime Act was passed, the courts have given meaning to what is an instrumentality of an offence and the proceeds of unlawful activities as a measure to counter organised crime. This treatise refers to those cases given the definition of an instrumentality of an offence and the proceeds of unlawful activities. For the purpose of effectively dealing with organised crime, this treatise contains a discussion on the effectiveness of criminal and civil confiscation procedure. The justification for asset forfeiture is outlined.

This study consists of a qualitative analysis on the subject of human trafficking in Canada. It is intended to explore the steps that have been taken to address the Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children, Supplementary Legislation to the Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime (2000c), also known as the Palermo Protocol, and examine Canada’s commitment to changing the international and domestic context in which human trafficking takes place. Through exploration of Canadian legislation, literature and prosecutions presented in Canadian courts between January 2005 and December 2011, this research aims to establish whether Canada has shown a commitment to ending and preventing the problem of human trafficking that is consistent with the Recommended Guidelines published by the office of the United Nations High Commissioner on Human Rights (2002). A nominal coding scheme was used to show in basic terms the level of commitment Canada is showing toward combating the issue of human trafficking, both internationally and domestically. Results indicate that while Canada has met minimum standards by implementing anti-trafficking legislation in 2005 which is consistent with the Palermo Protocol, the country is falling short of commitments to combat human trafficking due to inadequate victim protection measures, lack of standardized data collection procedures and insufficient efforts to combat and prevent the root causes of trafficking.

The thesis contains three main Chapters in which the relationship between organised crime and corruption is studied from different perspectives. Chapter 2 presents a theoretical framework for analyzing the interactions between corruption and organized crime, together with the individual and combined effect of these phenomena on economic performance. We show how organized crime on its own reduces entrepreneurial activity, and how organized crime in conjunction with corruption may reduce such activity to a lesser or greater extent. Chapter 3 presents an empirical investigation into the impact of corruption on economic growth in the presence of organized criminal activities. Using a panel of 19 Italian regions for the period 1983-2009, the analysis reveals that corruption and organized crime have independent negative effects on growth, and that the effect of either is less severe when the other is also present. Chapter 4 presents a further empirical investigation which examines the determinants of organized crime and of common crime in a panel of Italian regions over the period 1983-2003. The analysis shows that both organized and common crimes respond symmetrically to certain drivers, but asymmetrically to others.

Submitted by Caroline Falcao (caroline.rfalcao@ufpe.br) on 2017-06-14T18:34:16Z No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 811 bytes, checksum: e39d27027a6cc9cb039ad269a5db8e34 (MD5) 2012-dissertacao-EduardoSouza.pdf: 3678057 bytes, checksum: 4b236bc15ba64a081eccf66b3670ba04 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-06-14T18:34:16Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 811 bytes, checksum: e39d27027a6cc9cb039ad269a5db8e34 (MD5) 2012-dissertacao-EduardoSouza.pdf: 3678057 bytes, checksum: 4b236bc15ba64a081eccf66b3670ba04 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-02-16 / Uma série de relatos sobre episódios violentos protagonizados por Torcidas Organizadas nos estádios de futebol do Brasil foram registradas durante a década de 1990, promovendo grande repercussão na mídia e opinião pública nacionais, incentivando pesquisadores e teóricos do futebol a centrarem suas análises nas possíveis relações entre violência no futebol e Torcidas Organizadas. Este estudo tem como objetivo analisar as práticas de sociabilidades entre os torcedores organizados dos clubes de futebol de Recife/PE. Além de possibilitar que as causas geradoras da violência nos estádios sejam problematizadas sob perspectivas históricas e sociológicas, a relevância deste trabalho privilegia umaperspectiva antropológica ao propor um “outro olhar” sobre o fenômeno das Torcidas Organizadas. Através desse olhar relativizador, buscamos analisar e compreender as três maiores Torcidas Organizadas da cidade de Recife/PE através de sua organização social, suas práticas de sociabilidades e pelas repercussões causadas na dinâmica atual da forma de torcer nos estádios brasileiros. Ao imergirmos no campo da pesquisa, através das técnicas antropológicas de observação participante, interlocuções e entrevistas com torcedores -além da análise de dados secundários como documentos, estatutos e registros disponibilizados por órgãos públicos responsáveis pela organização do futebol em Pernambuco, possibilitou-nos compreender que esses grupos sociais –as Torcidas Organizadas, ao longo das últimas duas décadas, criaram novas possibilidades de interação, coesão e manutenção grupal. O estudo por fim, revela que as Torcidas Organizadas de futebol podem ser vistas não apenas como meros espectadores do futebol arte, e menos ainda, como potenciais protagonistas da violência urbana; o que oferecemos com nosso relato, é uma perspectiva de entender o fenômeno, não de forma apriorísticae determinista, mas como um campo fértil, rico em possibilidades e aberto a outros estudos, análises e pesquisas antropológicas. / A series of reports about violent episodes played by football Organized Fans at the stadiums in Brazil were recorded during the 90’s Age, promoting great repercussion in the media and national public opinion, encouraging researchers and theorists of football to focus their analysis on possible relationships between violence in football and football Organized Fans.This study aims to analyze the practice of sociabilities between the organized fans of the Recife’s football clubs, at Pernambuco State. In addition to enabling the causes which create violence in the stadiums are established under historical and sociological perspectives, the relevance of this work favours a anthropological perspective to the propose "another look" about the phenomenon of the Organized Fans.Through this relative look, we seek to analyze and understand the three major Organized Fans Recife City through its social organization, their practices of sociabilities and the repercussions on the current dynamics of the support in Brazilian stadiums.When We go deeper into the field of anthropological research, through the techniques of participant observation, dialogues and interviews with fans-beyond of the analysis of secondary data like documents, statutes and records made available by public agencies responsible for the organisation of football in Pernambuco, allowed us to understand these social groups –the O.F., over the past two decades have created new possibilities of interaction, group cohesion and maintenance.The study finally reveals that the football Organized Fans can be seen not only as sheer spectators of football art, and even less, as potential protagonists of urban violence; What we offer with our reporting, is a perspective to understand the phenomenon, not a priori and deterministic form, but as a fertile field, rich in possibilities and open to other studies, analyses and anthropological researches.