1. In this paper I will develop a thesis put forward by Giovanni Falcone on the Mafia's new aggressiveness as it has surfaced over the last twenty years, and on the surfacing of two criminal phenomena typical of the Italian reality:
a. terrorism (in its two forms: political violence from the extreme left, by the Red Brigades and similar groups, and the so called "stragism" (1) word used to define political violence of unclear origin);
b. the Mafia's organised criminal activities.
This thesis opens the way to many considerations and underlines the difficult process Italy went through to achieve a high level of economic development. Italy succeeded in joining the club of the most industrialised nations, but to do that it had to fight organised crime which undermined not only the population's security and trust towards the State, but also the national economic potential and the competitiveness of economy on the international level.
FALCONE stated: "a veil of silence soon descended on the Mafia phenomenon: the '70s were marked by terrorism. Almost all of the best magistrates and most of the security forces were engaged in fighting the Red Brigades and the other terrorist organisations. Few dealt with Mafia. It was at that time, however, that drug trafficking started and the Mafia became the power it still is today. A serious mistake was then made, because the conditions and the information available at the time could have been invaluable in understanding and fighting the Mafia. Between 1974 and 1977, from being scarcely active in the economic sector, the Mafia transformed itself into an ever-more aggressive organisation. (...)
In the following years, thanks to the weakness of the State's response, the Mafia flourished in all sectors of the economy. We started hearing about the Mafia of the public contracts, and subcontracts, the Mafia of the supermarkets, the Mafia of the shopkeepers, the Mafia of the bribes... as if there were thousands of different organisations, one next to the other. As if Mafia was not one and indivisible". (1991, page 105).

2. The first consideration should touch upon the impact that left-wing terrorism and the Mafia had and still have on the country's economy.
The Red Brigades and the other extreme left-wing organisations active in Italy in the '70s and the '80s, aimed at destroying the capitalist economy. Italy was depicted as the "weakest link" in the "imperialist" chain, because of its delayed (though very rapid) development, and because of its geopolitical position at the cross-roads between the world's East and West, and North and South. Yalta placed Italy within the Western area, but the country had to confirm this placing through free but hard-fought elections.
The terrorist aggressiveness in those years was also linked to the country's weakness consequence of the oil crisis. Unlike other developed countries, Italy's energy resources were and are minimal, and further, the country was very slow in considering the nuclear option for geographical, economic, cultural and political reasons.
Left wing terrorism has had serious consequences both on the political and the economic systems. The consequences on the political system have been analysed and examined in many historical and political publications. The consequences on the economic system have instead been somewhat neglected. I would like to mention some of them:
a. a discouragement of international investments in view of the risk that such "political violence" represented;
b. "weak management in the factories" in a moment of crisis that would have required instead an increase in productivity;
c. "collective negotiation" that tended to favour workers (in terms of salary, careers, working hours, productivity and incentives) even when the firms suffered reductions in profits and resources;
d. an increase in public intervention in redistributing resources with a view to easing social conflicts and to limit the spreading of the "extremist infection" within the world of work and the lower social strata.
The Mafia's aggression to the market economy is indirect, but because it comes from within it is so much sharper and devastating.
The Mafia accumulates capital through:
a. drug trafficking, which benefited from the increase in consumption after the '60s (Lamour-Lamberti, 1972; Baloni, 1983);
b. petty extortion, and extortion against major firms winners of public contracts;
c. threatening competitors in the race for public contracts and influencing with threats firms' trade activities;
d. unfair competition thanks to capital originating from illegal activities, a criminal income which allows a sort of capital dumping into the internal market;
e. influence on State bodies with the ensuing distortion of free competition in an economic system, like the Italian one, where State investments play a major role;
f. spreading of a "protectionist and parasitic" culture in some social strata.
Capital accumulation by the Mafia in some areas of the country has hindered the development of a market economy and has influenced negatively the development of healthy enterprises, often penalised by unfair competition.
It is also important to remember that extortion causes a deviant circuit. The firm (small or large), victim of extortion, tends to evade taxes and to falsify its accounts. It needs to create a "black" reserve fund in order to satisfy the requests of the criminal organisations (Marconi, 1985). So the victim is obliged to commit (minor or major) fiscal offences.

3. A second consideration touches upon the distortion of the repressive and preventive crime system inherited from the years of terrorism. In the decade of political violence, the State was obliged in a very short time to uprate its Police Forces in order to face an unprecedented wave of political violence (worse even than the "brigandage" phenomenon experienced after Italy's unification; this was defeated with direct intervention of the Army and with the enforcement of the war military code). The strengthening of the Police structures in the decade 1975-1985 was then aimed at contrasting the most alarming and serious threat: terrorism.
The case of Gen. DALLA CHIESA is very significant, in this respect. He, one of the most outstanding experts in fighting crime the Italian State had, was given responsibility for the fight against Mafia groups only towards the end of the terrorist period. It was not before the beginning of the '90s that an effective repressive system was created. It was founded on:
a. a series of modifications in the procedure in criminal trials and investigations; and
b. a more effective distribution of investigative resources and increased control over the national territory.
It should be underlined that the Italian State responded to the terrorist emergency with a number of laws which proved very effective.
AT first some "law enforcement" provisions were introduced (Act n. 152 of May 22nd 1975, Act n. 533 of August 8th 1977, Act n. 15 of February 6th 1980). I will not go into details here, but the aim of these three acts was to:
a. prevent subversive behaviours, even if not directly linkable to terrorism, thus limiting the area of influence armed organisations could rely upon;
b. provide the Police Forces with greater confidence in their operative activities;
c. strengthening the controls on the possession of arms;
d. provide Police Forces with more effective instruments in their crime prevention activities.
In this first stage the legislation introduced was not aimed at the final objective, its main purpose was in fact limited to the strengthening of the operative capabilities of the preventive apparatus .
Secondly the legislation on the "pentiti" (Act May 29th 1982) was introduced together with some provisions in favour of those who "renounced the armed struggle" (2) , contributed to sharpen the State's action until it defeated terrorist organisations.
Thus, in the fight against terrorism the legislative initiative developed in two phases:
a. general preventive legislation;
b. more specific legislation aimed at breaking down the organisations.

4. The struggle against terrorism in Italy was coupled by a political strategy aimed at redistributing resources favouring the country's most deprived areas and social strata.
Italian governments tried at the time to modify the public expenditure policy so as to smooth any social conflict which could be exploited by terrorists, and to reduce support for terrorism within the political areas which already tended towards extremism.
The following Table shows the increase in public expenditure (as a percentage of the global expenditure) at a time of intense terrorist activity, in two specific areas:
a. the social sector;
b. local and regional financing interventions.
The increase in the State's welfare contributions in favour of local administrations has brought about an increase in criminal activities around them.
The Mafia in those years managed to widen its fields of activity. It started "imposing tributes" to firms responsible for major public works; it also entered the public contract market. It succeeded in so doing because it could offer lower prices, thanks to the huge profits from criminal activities, and also because it could "influence" local politicians and administrators.



5. There is no evidence of direct contacts between the Mafia and terrorist organisations. It is however worth underlining that organised crime groups have, at times, followed some of the rituals typical of terrorism. In the Campania region in the '80s, for example, the Camorra tried to earn wider support by promoting its image as an organisation which favoured the poorer social strata. The Sicilian Mafia, in its operative development, appears to have borrowed from the Red Brigades the ritual of using a single weapon for different killings. The weapon becomes a sort of signature for the crime. A Kalashnikov was used to kill Stefano Bontade, Salvatore Inzerillo, Salvatore Contorno, Alfio Ferlito, and finally Gen. Carlo Alberto dalla Chiesa. Falcone writes: "We have come to the conclusion that a single gun, always the same, was used for all five murders".

In a similar way the Skorpio machine gun had become the symbol of the Red Brigades' terrorist attacks.
It is also probable that the Mafia learnt from terrorism how to carry out attacks with a highly destabilising potential. The killings of La Torre, promoter of an effective anti-Mafia law, of Gen. Dalla Chiesa, and of the magistrates Falcone and Borsellino are good examples in this respect.
An analysis of these last two attacks, and of the Mafia's modus operandi, should be based on the criteria used for examining political terrorism. The Mafia with these two actions aimed at achieving two results:
a. one that could be defined as instrumental, that is the physical elimination of two magistrates who knew in depth the Mafia phenomenon and were experts in investigative techniques
b. a second one that could be defined as demonstrative, that is to show how vulnerable the State's institutions were at a time of political crisis and of transition towards a new institutional phase (the year of the two killings is in fact considered the transition year from the so called 1st to the 2nd Repubblic).

6. The experience gained from fighting the terrorist phenomenon has been used by the law-makers and by the security institutions also in the fight against the Mafia.
If we examine the latest anti-Mafia legislation we can see that the basic scheme is the same as the one followed in the struggle against terrorism. The Rognoni-La Torre act provides for a widening of the investigating powers and improves the instruments for contrasting Mafia's criminal behaviours.
In a way this act can be considered as a sort of "law of police and of prevention" (Fiandaca-Costantino, 1983) in the sense that it was not specifically "targeted", but it helped to improve the observation, the understanding and the monitoring of the Mafia phenomenon.
In the second stage, during the '90s, new specifically targeted legislation allowed to hit more deeply into Mafia organisations. I will just mention a few of the new provisions introduced in this second stage:
a. environmental technical interception;
b. rules for the protection of the "pentiti" and of their families, and for the commission responsible for their "handling";
c. special detention conditions for members of dangerous criminal organisations.
So also in the fight against organised crime we can distinguish two levels in the legislative process:
a. a general preventive one;
b. a more specifically targeted one, aimed at breaking down the organisations.
The level B includes also the deployment of the Armed Forces, with preventive purposes, in the "areas at risk". This initiative has been welcomed by the local population, it has also released investigating resources from general duties of passive prevention, allowing greater concentration in the investigative activity.

7. The two stages in the action against terrorism and Mafia, have been coupled by an improvement of the intelligence available on the two phenomena. At the beginning terrorism was undervalued, and devalued. At the onset many (with the exception of some politicians and of the law enforcement institutions) considered it as a "sporadic" phenomenon, and the presence of an intelligent mind behind it was not perceived: some considered it just a "devilish" or maniac form of crime. It was only at a later stage that the overall terrorist strategy was understood and this development laid the foundations for the legislation on the "pentiti". The security forces understood that in order to convince members of ideologically compact organisations to renounce the armed struggle or "to repent" (together with the repressive determination) an ability to establish a dialogue based on the respect of their "dignity" was required.
In this respect, a turning point must be considered the decision made by the then Minister of the Interior, Hon. Oscar Luigi Scalfaro, to answer the Red Brigades' leaflets considering them not as products of a criminally sick mind, but as fruits of a solid ideological background and inspired by a strategic vision. This new attitude by the Authorities certainly accelerated the process of disintegration of the terrorist organisations. It must be stressed though that the dissolution of terrorism has been favoured also by "external", that is international, factors (in particular the modification in the East-West, and North-South relations).
Giovanni Falcone started a new philosophy in the approach to the Mafia phenomenon. An extremely rigorous magistrate and a careful interpreter of the "pentiti" 's statements, Falcone always considered the "dignity" of the members of criminal organisations. In this case again the transition from a stage of "undervaluation or devaluation" of the phenomenon to a phase of deeper understanding favoured the "detachment" from the criminal experience of many members of the Mafia organisation.
Mafia groups, like all criminal organisations rooted on a "national" or "regional" culture, could rely on wide support where they operated.
The criminal forms that are the expression of a strong local sub-culture, flourish also thanks to the protection supplied by the local environment.
This is the reason why a change in public opinion has been fundamental in the areas where the Mafia's presence was stronger. A number of public institutions, parties, and associations have made an effort to modify the Mafia's image and to develop a will to fight crime within society. Following a long educational process for the creation of such a new culture, the Mafia came to be portrayed not only as an "enemy" for the State institutions but also for the whole society. This has allowed the isolation of the Mafia from its traditional points of reference.

8. Something must be said also on the attitude of political parties towards the struggle against organised crime. In the past, the subject had created deep divisions within the party system. Today the confrontation is still open, but it should be stressed there has been a continuity in the Governments' commitment in fighting organised crime.
After the 1994 elections, which greatly reduced the strength of traditional political parties and marked a political turning point in the country, the governments showed a will to continue on the same path as the previous ones in the fight against organised crime.
No law has been modified or softened, even when from a strictly criminal procedure point of view they could have been criticised. The governments of the '90s showed to have reached a good understanding of the Mafia phenomenon and of the need to respond to it with stricter measures than those used against ordinary crime. The rules of today's trial procedure offer wide guarantees which could, however, favour members of armed groups or criminal organisations who act on the basis of "the war against the State" rather than in the logic of the simple criminal action. The Italian Parliament has been looking for some time for a solution that could, while guaranteeing maximum legality, be effective in fighting this kind of crime.

9. What has been so far said is directly linked to the Mafia phenomenon. In Italy, however, three other criminal organisations operate whose roots are to be found in local ethnical realities and in complex affiliation rituals: the 'Ndrangheta, the Camorra, and the Sacra Corona Unita.
They differ from the Mafia because:
a. they are differently rooted in social reality;
b. they tend to favour different kinds of criminal activities;
c. their origins do not go as far back.
It should be said, however, that drug trafficking has become a field where all these criminal organisations have found common ground.
Finally it should be said that the measures adopted to fight the Mafia have proved effective also against the other organisations which have been badly hit by the "pentiti" 's confessions.

10. In order to test the effectiveness of the measures adopted by Parliament and Government it is necessary to analyse separately the results achieved against:
a. the Mafia as an "organisation";
B. the Mafia as a "military" structure, or more specifically:
b 1. its terrorist activity against outstanding members of the institutions;
b 2. the internal violence within the various criminal cells, the so called "cosche";
b 3. its activity of violent social intimidation;
c. the Mafia as an economic organisation with its fields of activity, that are:
c 1. drug trafficking;
c 2. competitions for public contracts;
c 3. influencing and bribing politicians and administrators;
c 4. extortion;
c 5. "legal" investments.
a. Effectiveness against the Mafia's organisation
A considerable number of members of the Mafia's "elite" is now detained and most of those who were at large have been captured. Besides the leadership, also the Mafia's lower structure has been hit.
There are signals indicating that the Mafia is starting to renounce the "mystic" affiliation of its members, the initiation ceremony appears in fact to increase the risk of "repentance". The Mafia seems to be in the process of changing its connotation into an ordinary, "lay" criminal organisation, renouncing its traditional rituals. This is extremely significant. In fact, an organisation without a unifying factor, be it tradition, ideology or culture, is undoubtedly more vulnerable to the attack by the State.
Such a result should be ascribed both to the legislation on the "pentiti", but also to the new local culture of refusal of the Mafia's activity which is starting to spread in the areas of intense Mafia's presence.
Further, it should also be underlined that once Mafia looses its initiation rituals, it looses its reference points with the land of origin and can rely on reduced operational spaces.
B. The effectiveness against the Mafia's "military" structure
b 1. The Mafia's highly destructive "military" potential has been dramatically reduced. The demonstrative attacks of highly destructive force appear to be too risky for today's Mafia. In this the consequences of the pentiti's declarations can be clearly perceived, they have increased the vulnerability of the organisation's leadership.
b 2. The feuds among "cosche" continue to be intense with many violent episodes. The weakening of the organisation's leadership has in fact brought about an increase in the conflicts at a lower level.
b 3. There are signals indicating a reduction of the social intimidation, as is the case with extortion. Significant in this respect are: the feeling that the organisation is not invulnerable any longer and the change in the victims' attitude (see below).
c. Effectiveness on the Mafia's economic activities
c 1. Relatively to drug trafficking it has been possible to carry out successfully, also thanks to new legislation, internationally co-ordinated operations. The data on drug consumption and drug trafficking indicate, however, that this sector is still dangerously alive.
c 2. The new legislation on public contracts, and the controls enforced on administrative structures and on firms have made it more difficult for Mafia firms to take part in public works financed by the collectivity.
c 3. The influence on politicians and administrators has been substantially reduced. The experience gained from the recent past should encourage constant monitoring and controls in order to avoid that a close intertwining between criminal capital and corrupted sectors of the State could again develop.
c 4. The plague of extortion continues. But more and more are the victims that report extortion cases to the Police. The intensification in the fight against the Mafia phenomenon and a new social conscience have given the victims more courage to react and to report the crime to the Police authorities.
c 5. With regard to the legal investments by the Mafia it should be noticed that the new rules for the controls on the origins of bank deposits and the reduction of the "secrecy" in the credit sector have somewhat slowed the Mafia's financial operative capability. The matter, neverthless, involves also the international sector. An improvement in the co-ordination of the repressive action against this kind of economic crime is still hindered by the existence of the so called "financial sanctuaries" where the bank secret is unbreakable and which do not offer any form of co-operation in preventing investments of criminal origin.



BIBLIOGRAPHY
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