Organized Crime in Chicago

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert M. Lombardo
Keyword(s):  
State Government ◽  
Organized Crime ◽  
Political Corruption ◽  
Conspiracy Theory ◽  
Urban Centers ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
American Society ◽  
Sociological Explanation ◽  
American Cities

This book provides a comprehensive sociological explanation for the emergence and continuation of organized crime in Chicago. Tracing the roots of political corruption that afforded protection to gambling, prostitution, and other vice activity in Chicago and other large American cities, the book challenges the dominant belief that organized crime in America is a descendent of the Sicilian Mafia. According to this widespread “alien conspiracy” theory, organized crime evolved in a linear fashion beginning with the Mafia in Sicily, emerging in the form of the Black Hand in America's immigrant colonies, and culminating in the development of the Cosa Nostra in America's urban centers. Looking beyond this Mafia paradigm, this volume argues that the development of organized crime in Chicago and other large American cities was rooted in the social structure of American society. Specifically, the book ties organized crime to the emergence of machine politics in America's urban centers. It contends that Chicago's criminal underworld could not have existed without the blessing of those who controlled municipal, county, and state government. These practices were not imported from Sicily, the book contends, but were bred in the socially disorganized slums of America where elected officials routinely franchised vice and crime in exchange for money and votes. The book also traces the history of the African American community's participation in traditional organized crime in Chicago and offers new perspectives on the organizational structure of the Chicago Outfit, the traditional organized crime group in Chicago.

Introduction

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert M. Lombardo
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Organized Crime ◽  
Political Corruption ◽  
The Political ◽  
Sociological Perspective ◽  
Urban Centers ◽  
Social Structural ◽  
American Society ◽  
American Cities

This book examines the emergence and continuation of traditional organized crime in Chicago from a sociological perspective. It uses the term “organized crime” to define the political corruption that afforded protection to gambling, prostitution, and other vice activity in large American cities from the second half of the nineteenth century until the end of the twentieth century. The book challenges the alien conspiracy theory's interpretation that organized crime evolved in a linear fashion beginning with the Sicilian Mafia in Sicily, emerging in the form of the Black Hand in America's immigrant colonies, and culminating in the development of the Cosa Nostra in America's urban centers. The book instead argues that Italians continued to dominate organized crime after rising out of poverty because of the presence of “racket subcultures” within American society. It thus highlights the importance of social structural conditions for the emergence and continuation of traditional organized crime in American society. This introduction provides an overview of the chapters that follow.

Conclusion

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert M. Lombardo
Keyword(s):  
Organized Crime ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Social Conditions ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Conspiracy Theory ◽  
The Social ◽  
American Society ◽  
Ethnic Succession ◽  
The City ◽  
Succession Theory

This book has has argued that traditional organized crime in America is directly related to the social conditions that were found in American society during the early years of the twentieth century, rather than the result of a transplanted Sicilian Mafia as claimed by the alien conspiracy theory. Additional evidence against the alien conspiracy thesis comes from sociologist William Chambliss's study of “Rainfall West,” a pseudonym given to the city of Seattle. This concluding chapter first considers the arguments of ethnic succession theory before discussing racket subcultures and street crew neighborhoods and how the failure of social control allowed organized crime to develop further. It asserts that organized crime in Chicago was not related to the emergence of the Sicilian Mafia but was the product of America's disorganized urban areas. It also highlights the importance of community social structure for recruitment issues and the influence of differentially organized community areas for the development and continuation of organized crime in Chicago.

Glocalising the theory of generations: The case of Spain

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 333-357
Author(s):  
Manuela Caballero ◽  
Artemio Baigorri
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Social Research ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Social Changes ◽  
Collective Identities ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
American Society ◽  
A Current

This work poses difficulties in the use of the generation concept as a social research instrument, due to its complex and multidimensional nature. A complexity by which is not a concept widely used in a current Sociology that focuses more on the mathematisation. But some social processes cannot be reduced to algorithms. For the theoretical review we have used contributions from Sociology, Philosophy and History, because it is of a transversal disciplinary nature, and we have applied it to the identification of Spanish generations in the 20th century. Inspired by Ortega’s theses and Strauss and Howe empirical development implemented for American society, the resulting model presents six generations with different collective identities that reflect the social changes in the history of Spain during the last century. A model that, after being tested in sectorial investigations, may constitute a useful new tool for the analysis of social change.

Of Markets and Missions: The Early History of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches

2001 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 83-108 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melissa M. Wilcox
Keyword(s):  
Early Growth ◽  
Early History ◽  
Historical Inquiry ◽  
Social Changes ◽  
Internal Factors ◽  
The Social ◽  
The World ◽  
Back Ground ◽  
History Of ◽  
American Society

“It seems to me, now,” reflected Troy Perry, four years after founding a successful new Protestant denomination, “that it must have been a matter of timing, and I think that it was fate, too! God chose me for my mission at a time when He knew the world would respond, once the need was made clear.” While the question of divine ordination is a bit outside the scholar's jurisdiction, the question of timing is a crucial one for historical inquiry, and Perry's remarks show an insightful awareness that the success of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches (UFMCC) was due in large part to timing. As with any successful religious group, however, the seeds of the UFMCC germinated, sprouted, and grew as a result of a multitude of interconnected factors, including both external back-ground factors in American society at large and internal factors within the UFMCC itself. This article relates the history and early growth of the UFMCC to this constellation of factors in order to gain a clearer understanding of both the denomination itself and the social changes of which it was an integral part.

Ottoman Population Records and the Census of 1881/82–1893

1978 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 237-274 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kemal H. Karpat
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Social Transformation ◽  
Forced Migration ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Urban Centers ◽  
Cultural Economic ◽  
Population Movements ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
Major Factors

Population movements have always played a dynamic role in the transformation of human society throughout history. Indeed, there is not a single phase of history anywhere in the world which has not been related in some way to low or high rates of birth and mortality, to migration and settlement and to their social, cultural, economic, and political effects. The history of the Middle East supplies excellent examples to support this contention. The Muslim calendar begins with an act of migration, that is the hejira of a.d. 622. Migrants going from the countryside to urban centers or fleeing from areas hostile to Islam have always exerted a crucial influence upon the social and political destiny of Muslim countries. The refugees from Spain to North Africa in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the forced migration of Muslims from Russia (the Caucasus and Crimea) in the eighteenth to twentieth centuries, the shift of population in India, Pakistan, and Palestine in the 1940s, to cite just a few examples, have been major factors accounting, at least in part, for the social transformation of the Muslim world in general, and of the Middle East in particular.

Introduction

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Jelani M. Favors
Keyword(s):  
African Americans ◽  
White Supremacy ◽  
Cultural Nationalism ◽  
Black Colleges ◽  
Black Freedom Movement ◽  
The Social ◽  
Black Freedom ◽  
History Of ◽  
American Society ◽  
Freedom Movement

The introduction familiarizes the reader with the concept of the second curriculum – a pedagogy of idealism, race consciousness, and cultural nationalism that flowed through all black colleges and made them formidable epicenters of black militancy and activism. The case for constructing a longitudinal history of seven different institutions is made. The author repurposes the theory of communitas, first introduced by anthropologist Victor Turner, and uses this concept to define black colleges as dedicated, racialized spaces that countered the ideology of white supremacy that permeated American society and sought to crush the social, political, and economic advancement of African Americans. In doing so, HBCUs served as a vital cornerstone of the black freedom movement in America.

The Neighborhood Outfit

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louis Corsino
Keyword(s):  
Organized Crime ◽  
Grocery Stores ◽  
Social Forces ◽  
Italian American ◽  
Government Documents ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
Vital Component ◽  
Alternative Routes ◽  
New Recruits

From the slot machine trust of the early 1900s to the prolific Prohibition era bootleggers allied with Al Capone, and for decades beyond, organized crime in Chicago Heights, Illinois, represented a vital component of the Chicago Outfit. This book taps interviews, archives, government documents, and the author's own family history to tell the story of the Chicago Heights “boys” and their place in the city's Italian American community in the twentieth century. Debunking the popular idea of organized crime as a uniquely Italian enterprise, the book delves into the social and cultural forces that that created a vibrant Italian enclave while simultaneously contributing to illicit activities so pervasive the city's name became synonymous with vice. As it shows, discrimination blocked opportunities for Italians' social mobility. The close-knit Italian communities that arose in response to such limits produced a rich supply of social capital Italians used to pursue alternative routes to success that ranged from grocery stores and union organizing to, on occasion, crime. In particular the book offers invaluable insights into the ways established Outfit figures brought in new recruits and how social forces worked to guarantee a pool of potential soldiers. The book throws light on a little-known corner of the history of Chicagoland organized crime.

Explaining Organized Crime

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert M. Lombardo
Keyword(s):  
Organized Crime ◽  
Human Ecology ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Social Disorganization Theory ◽  
The Social ◽  
American Society ◽  
Ethnic Succession ◽  
Deviance Theory ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Succession Theory

This chapter reviews the theoretical underpinnings of the alien conspiracy and ethnic succession theories as explanations for the emergence and continuation of organized crime in American society. It first considers the arguments of the alien conspiracy theory, as well as the cultural deviance theory upon which it is based, before discussing the claims of the social disorganization theory as the basis of the ethnic succession theory. The chapter also examines the theories of human ecology, cultural transmission, and differential social organization, along with delinquency theories and their relation to organized crime, with particular emphasis on recruitment issues. Finally, the chapter looks at the relationship between Gerald Suttles's conceptualization of the defended neighborhood and racket subcultures.

Patterns of Enterprise in São Paulo: Preliminary Analysis of a Late Nineteenth-Century City

1984 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 291-312
Author(s):  
Gerald M. Greenfield
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Social Economic ◽  
Physical Structure ◽  
Historical Research ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Sources Of Information ◽  
Social Dimensions ◽  
Urban Centers ◽  
The Social ◽  
American Cities

Although the important roles and functions of Latin American cities have received recognition and discussion in historical writing, there exist few empirically grounded and detailed investigations of individual urban centers. Thus, reviewing the nature of historical research on Latin American urbanization, Sofer and Szuchman (1979: 113, 119) noted the dearth of quantitative investigations of the social dimensions of urban existence, as well as a reliance on aggregate data as opposed to such primary documentation as manuscript census returns, notarial records, and judicial assessments. They conclude that “historians have been reticent to explore the social data in primary documentation and join them with non-quantifiable sources of information in order to reach an existential understanding of the Latin American past.” Similarly, Socolow and Johnson (1981: 51) have pointed to the need for research concentrating on the “social, economic, and physical structure of individual cities and groups of cities.”

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