Like father like son: Cultural Transmission and Children Protection in Calabrian Mafia Families

• In Event: IASOC Presents: Organized Crime and the Public

Abstract

Cultural approaches to mafia groups have focused more on the characterisation of mafias as deviant subcultures, rather than looking at what mafia groups share with their own culture of origin. By advocating the need to look at mafia as set of behaviours, embedded in culture, rather than simply as a deviant subculture, this paper will focus on the transmission of mafia values in mafia families. Specifically, this paper will look at the youth in Calabrian mafia clans, known with the collective name “‘ndrangheta”, in light of the new procedures - approved by both the Youth Court and the Antimafia directorate of Reggio Calabria - to revoke the patria potestas when one or both parents have been involved in mafia-related crimes. The analysis of confidential prosecution and court proceedings confirms how in certain areas mafias are indeed understood as sets of learned and transmitted behaviours, embedded in Calabrian culture. Only when considering mafias also as set of behaviours, within cultural values, receding the bonds between children and parents can be justified both for the protection of children and as ancillary punishment for convicted parents.

Author

• Anna Sergi, University of Essex