The difference mafias make: a triadic model of organized crime in ethnic conflicts

ABSTRACT

I propose a Simmelian triadic model of the interrelations between (1) host states, (2) separatist movements, and (3) organized crime. It formalizes three generalizable relational configurations: organized crime as (a) tertius gaudens, (b) mediator and (c) divisor et imperator, with operationalizable features defining the nature of each pair of relationships among the three agents. Using the paired case studies of the Serbia-Kosovo and Georgia-South Ossetia ethnic conflicts from 1989–2012, I illustrate the utility of the conceptual model in explaining divergences in separatist success. The model is argued to be superior to conventional and near-universal dyadic conceptualizations – overt or implicit.

KEYWORDS:

• Crime
• war
• nationalism
• insurgency
• ethnic

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Between 1945 and 1998 (when full-scale conflict began), Serbs and other minorities were reduced from 60% to less than 15%. Simultaneously, the Albanian population grew from 40% to 85%.

2. On centrality of this event in Serbia’s Kosovo policy, see Zirojevic (2000).

3. The controversy reached the NATO parliamentary assembly. Finnish and Russian investigators said one thing in their report, William Walker, American diplomat, said another in his. See (Rainio et al. 2001, and also:, Adam and Heine 2001, Kenney 1999).

4. See B92ʹs Insajder investigative projects ‘Nemoć Države’ and ‘Patriotska Pljacka,’ 2009–14.

5. It may even be argued that Gamsakhurdia’s rise to power was aided by organized crime, not merely his fall from it. Dissident Merav Kostava co-founded with Gamsakhurdia the youth organization ‘Gorgasliani’ and was jailed by the Soviets for it. The prominent Georgian independence activist and human rights agitator was killed in an automobile accident in 1989 – an incident concluding weeks of death threats and at least one failed KGB attempt at his life. His death is widely regarded as a Soviet murder by the Georgian population at large. Perhaps the most important outcome of the death was that Gamsakhurdia became ‘the only widely known person in public life credited with being a dissident’ – a significant reason he ascended to power in Georgia (See Souleimanov 2013, p. 91).

6. A curiosity, Abkhazia – one of the more successful separatist movements in the post-Soviet space – has a minority portion of Abkhaz nationals in the breakaway territory (less than 20% at certain times in the period – far less than Georgians, Mingrelians and others). On Abkhaz separatist movement’s receptiveness to confederal and gradualist solutions prior to the independence declaration of 1999, see Coppieters (2003, pp. 187–212).

7. Russian hypocrisy in regards to separatist causes was already as enormous as NATO’s in the former Yugoslavia. The luckless separatist effort of the prigorodny rayon in North Ossetia was crushed by Russia between 1992–8, to say nothing of Chechnya.

8. Emphasis in original.

9. Between 1999 and 2002, Ergneti smugglers assisted movement from the nearby Pankisi Gorge bordering Chechnya, ‘a haven for Chechen rebels and transnational criminal networks’ (Nilsson 2014, p. 108). This is a rare and marginal example of Ossetian criminals acting against Russian interests. But the bulk of criminal activity was ethnically impartial.

10. She further concludes that ‘[r]egions with the protection of wealth or patronage could engage in “safe” separatism, whereas those without clientelist linkages or wealth could not’ (George 2009, p. 28).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Danilo Mandić

Danilo Mandić is the author of Gangsters and Other Statesmen (Princeton U.P.) and co-editor of Changing Youth Values in Southeast Europe (Routledge). He published on war, nationalism and forced migration in Theory and Society, Nationalities Papers, International Migration, Ethnopolitics and other journals. His forthcoming book Drowned Out investigates Syrian refugees.