Assessing the Effectiveness of Organized Crime Control Strategies ...

Beare (1996:26) notes that insiders’ accounts of criminal organizations can yield a great deal of
useful information about the structure of these organizations, the nature and changes in their
operations, the motivations of members, and the extent to which legislation may have
encouraged insiders to tell their stories. Nevertheless, the veracity of these accounts must be
carefully assessed. Ianni (1972), for example, was said to be co-opted or deceived in his study of
the Lupollo crime family. Critics argue that the family concealed from Ianni some of its most
serious activities, such as heroin distribution and violence (Beare,1996:25). The value of
information provided by insiders is also dependent upon their location within the organization, as
just a few members understand how the entire operation works (Reuter, 1983).
Reuter also asserts that existing materials are limited by their nearly exclusive focus on the
Italian Mafia and on the settings of Chicago and New York. Other groups need to be considered
in discussions of OC. Reuter contends that even in the case of the Mafia, we still await a solid
understanding, as scholars have for long been embroiled in a sterile debate as to its existence,
rather than its strength, durability, and uniqueness. Furthermore, much of what we know about
the Mafia is based on the word of Joseph Valachi, OC’s most notorious informer (Block,
1994:3).
The reliability of information on OC provided by law enforcement agencies has been the subject
of considerable academic debate. These agencies have faced the criticism that they have
developed a fixed conception of OC (Beare, 1996:29). This conception is that of an “alien
conspiracy”, with OC viewed as being predatory and as corrupting society, while discounting the
role of citizens who seek illicit goods and services, as well as officials who may collude with
criminal groups. Critics contend that police intelligence work and the interpretation of data
generated is shaped by this conception.
In the 1960s and 1970s, for example, US law enforcement agencies believed in the existence of a
national Mafia criminal conspiracy. This belief was said to produce a self-fulfilling prophecy,
whereby the focus of police turned to Italian-American crime families. The predictable result
was that most criminal cases were Mafia-related (Beare, 1996:30). The view of OC as somehow
alien to society, rather than as a byproduct of the weaknesses and vices of its members, is also
said to serve the interests of police agencies by promoting their pursuit of additional resources.
Another concern is that the lack of sufficient data on OC has compelled scholars to rely
excessively on government documents, many of which have also historically adopted a
conspiratorial view of OC (Galliher and Cain, 1974). One scholar, for example, argues that the
work of royal commissions and inquiries into OC is often superficial and driven by a political
agenda: the need to relieve “a politically defined, media-generated crisis” (Beare, 1996:33).
Overall, it has been argued that the over reliance on official sources of information has impeded
the development of independent scholarship in this area. For their part, law enforcement
agencies have been reluctant to release information that might compromise their operations or
the safety of their officers (Auditor General of Canada, 2002).
The media can be fruitful sources of information on OC, due to their international scope, focus
on current issues, and the investigative skill of many journalists (Beare, 1996:34). Journalists
have figured prominently in the limited Canadian literature in this area. Prudence must be
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