Organized Crime Activities across the World - Essay Example

Organized Crime Organized Crime Introduction The expansion of international trade together with the stimulations of globalization has broadened and diversified organized crime activities across the world. The nature of organized crime has been changing from the conventional hierarchical groups into loose networks operating together exploiting the unexplored market opportunities. “Organized crime is both a social system and a social world; the system is composed of relationships binding professionals, criminals, politicians, law enforcers, and various entrepreneurs” (Block, 1980). Organized crime is often identified as a part of social system which allows reciprocal services to be performed by criminals. This paper will discuss various aspects of organized crime by focusing on the fundamentals of criminal law. What is Organized Crime Simply, the organized crime could be called as the illegal activities performed under an organized set up intended to make profit. It has been considered as a multi-faceted phenomenon which is evidently associated with different activities like drug transport, illegally transporting human beings, illegal trafficking of firearms, smuggling, money laundering, and many more. Organized crime groups have developed their own highly equipped teams with modern weapons and operating systems. The criminals have also created national and international tie up with terrorist organizations and other rebellious groups. Organized crime can be in many forms. It ranges from the smallest crime where just two persons have agreed to contribute together, to the crime that may progressively lead to highest levels of Mafias among the gangs of immigrants. As Levitt and Dubner (2005) point out, the historical figures show that there were more than 1,300 street gangs, catering to every ethnic, political, and criminal issues in Chicago alone. Mafia activities are sometimes interchangeably used to represent highly organized crime. Fundamentals of Criminal Law Criminal law constitutes a very small part of the entire field of law and it is considered to be one of the most incoherent and underdeveloped areas of law. In olden days, tribal groups practiced their own private laws regarding the system of criminal justice. Some modern societies still maintain their own differences in criminal laws like civil law systems of France and Germany. In contrast, criminal laws in the United States are well structured and preserved by legislature for each jurisdiction. “Crimes are ‘owned’ by the state, prosecuted by the state, and the only thing separating a civil wrong from a criminal wrong is that fine line which exists because some legislature says it exists” (Fundamental of criminal law). Although, different countries have defined criminal justice system in varied manner, the ultimate aim of each system is to reduce crime rates and thereby improve social safety standards. The modern criminal justice system tends to deal with rehabilitation processes with intent to ensure prisoners’ re-entry to normal way of social life. The President’s Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice guides criminal justice policy in the United States. The criminal justice system is the main body of the rule of law which mainly constitutes three parts; law enforcement, adjudication, and corrections. United States practices capital punishment for aggravated murder and rarely for felony murder. Although all of the American colonies practiced capital punishment prior to the declaration of the independence, the crimes subject to death penalty and mode of execution have largely varied over time from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Obviously, the US legal system considers capital punishment as an effective way to deter homicides and other severe crimes. However the fundamental aim of every criminal law is to safeguard social interests that cannot be protected by citizens themselves. Impacts of Organized Crime Organized crime, more or less in the same way affects the social, economic, and political stability of the world. The major advantage that the transnational criminals enjoy is the absence of universally accepted measures to fight the organized crime. The organized crime is so powerful to influence the industrial sectors and even the economy of many of the developed countries. The book, ‘Transnational Organized Crime and International Security’ (Berdal & Serrano, 2002) puts forward a good example for this. It says that the legal industries rely on the precursor chemicals in large quantities for the cocaine and heroin processing, and attempting to restrict these chemicals can hinder legal trade and have been resisted by the chemical manufactures in the US and Europe (p.43). Apart from all, the most important element is that the leadership principle of organized crime negotiates as much as possible to keep connected with the politicians of the local community where they perform. Today, they also focus on maintaining their connection with the street-level police officers, the local community policemen, and the detective force across the cities for easy flow of their business. The unhealthy relationship between organized crime groups and socially responsible individuals hurts the interests of the society. As a result of the involvement of socially reputed persons in organized crime, preventive efforts seem highly impossible as they have been operating for decades by varying their affiliations overnight. Since organized crime activities severely impact the public safety, governments are forced to allot a large proportion of its revenues on prevention and intervention programs. Today organized crime and terrorism are the two sides of the same coin and cannot be separated since they are having certain similarities and difference in their activities. The World Trade Centre attack of 11 September 2001 was evidently a haunting organized crime which unveiled the dreadful facet of the concealed terror. The recent investigations have brought out the hidden linkage between the terrorist groups and transnational organized criminals. Although the sole aim of the organized crime groups is profit, they often involve in combined venture with the terrorists to make their tasks easy, especially in international trade and trafficking of drugs and weapons. This unfair internal linkage between organized crime and terrorism raises extremely severe threats to nations’ security. Legislative Frameworks The United Nations Office on Drug and Crime (UNODC) is on their efforts to perform closely with Governments, international organizations, and civil societies to reinforce the collaboration to counteract the influence of organized crime and drug transporting (UNODC 2011). The United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime is one of the major international instruments to counter organized crime (UNODC, 2011). The UNODC undertakes measures and uses the provisions of the Convention to formulate policies that counter the problems of domestic criminal offences. The policies include suggestion to implement new mutual legal assistance in order to facilitate extradition, law enforcement cooperation, technical assistance, and training (UNODC, 2011). The problem solving lies with the requisites for explaining what the organized crimes really are, where persons alone do not contribute to fulfilling the criteria. One of the ways to handle the situation is to hold that criminal justice agents and politicians engaged in criminal conspiracies are in fact, professional criminals holding two roles in the society; and thinking on the most important factor—the local connection—that the Federal government has put in so much efforts while trying hard on their strategies to stop organized crimes (Definitions of organized crime, n.d). Conclusion In total, organized crime has been prevalent in the world for decades, and it hurts the social interests of citizens though such crimes are committed for financial gains. Terrorism is a related issue of organized crime that has become a major challenge to governments as it maintains some hidden agendas other than profit. Although a number of governmental bodies as well as individual organization are working towards the elimination of organized crime, it requires more constructive and collaborative strategies. References Block, A. (1980). East Side, West Side: Organizing Crime in New York, 1930-1950. US: Transaction Publishers. Berdal R. & Serano. (2002). Transnational Organized Crime and International Security. Lynne Rienner Publishers. Definitions of organized crime. (n.d). What is Organized Crime?.Retrieved from http://www.organized-crime.de/organizedcrimedefinitions.htm Fundamentals of criminal law. (09 May, 2011). Retrieved from http://www.drtomoconnor.com/3010/3010lect01.htm Levitt, S. D & Dubner, S. J. (2005). Feakonomics: A rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything. US: Allen Lane. UNODC: United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. (2011). UNODC and organized crime. Retrieved from http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/organized-crime/index.html Read More