By Cynthia A. Olufade.

This book is based on Cynthia A. Olufade’s Master’s thesis ‘Oath taking and the transnationalism of silence among Edo female sex workers in Italy’, winner of the African Studies Centre, Leiden’s 2018 Africa Thesis Award. This annual award for Master’s students encourages student research and writing on Africa and promotes the study of African cultures and societies. This study aimed to interrogate the oath taking phenomena among Edo female sex workers in Italy. In a bid to understand how the oaths taken in Edo State, translates into an intangible aspect of the trafficking process. To achieve the aims of the study, the research utilised the qualitative method of data collection, it involved the use of in-depth interviews and observations. The study reveals that the transnational silence exhibited by different categories of actors in the Edo sex work network sustains the industry. The research also highlights that the oaths form only a part, albeit important of the construction of debt and bondage in the context of Edo transnational sex work. In light of its findings, the study concludes that the idea of transnationalism of silence is as effective as the oaths taken.

Leiden: Leiden University, 2020. 118p.

By Mika Junninen.

This study concentrates on Finnish professional criminals1 and their organisations in Finland and in cross-border crime operations. It is based on qualitative empirical material. The basic idea of this study was developed when working on the study “Crime across the Border - Finnish Professional Criminals and Estonian Crime Opportunities” (Junninen 1999). In the course of that study, it became clear that some Finnish professional criminals are working closely together and taking advantage of the national border, and have a good relationship with the Estonian underworld when committing crimes either in Finland or in Estonia. In the present study, I focus on 14 different Finnish groups active in the 1990s in smuggling (alcohol, tobacco and drugs), and/or procuring prostitutes, and/or handling stolen goods. The objective was to gather collective information about the world of the Finnish professional criminals by studying the personal characteristics of the group members, the crimes they commit, and the structures of the criminal groups. According to Finnish police sources, Finnish professional criminals have in recent years widened their scope of activity, become more violent and started to work more closely together (Häkämies 1999). In the overviews made by the Finnish National Bureau of Investigation, when EU standards for defining organised crime groups2 are applied, there were 27 organised crime groups active in Finland in 1999. The number of such groups has increased rapidly: in 1995, police identified only 10 active groups in Finland. (NBI 2000)3 . In addition, the criminal justice system operators of the European Union countries have paid attention to the growing organised crime problem and its impact on the work of the judges and prosecutors in member countries. In consequence, the EU created a European justice network in Amsterdam in 1997. In the network meetings, judges and prosecutors practise co-operation of authorities for solving cases where an organised crime group is operating in several EU countries. (Vallisaari 1997.) The global and national lack of information and studies concerning organised crime in general, and the internal and international relations of its participants made this research phenomenon more interesting and challenging.

Helsinki: European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control (HEUNI), 2006. 202p.

By Minna Viuhko and Anniina Jokinen.

Research on human trafficking and organised crime is relatively rare in Finland. During the recent years human trafficking, procuring and prostitution have been studied i.a. in a legal perspective (Roth 2007a; 2007b; 2008), in relation to cross-border prostitution (Marttila 2004; 2005a; 2005b; 2006; 2008), and in the context of commercialisation of sex (Jyrkinen 2005). The problems of identifying the victims of human trafficking (Putkonen 2008) and trafficking in women and illegal immigration (Lehti and Aromaa 2003) have also been examined, as well as the effects of globalization on the sex industry in Finland (Penttinen 2004). In addition, Finnish sex-workers (Kontula 2008), prostitution in Northern Finland (Skaffari and Urponen 2004; Korhonen 2003), sex bars (Lähteenmaa and Näre 1994; Näre and Lähteenmaa 1995; Näre 1998), and sex buyers (Keeler & Jyrkinen 1999) have been the focus of recent research. Also organised pandering and prostitution in Finland was studied in the beginning of the 2000s (Leskinen 2003). Organised crime is scrutinised by Junninen (2006) and Bäckman (2006). However, the connection between human trafficking and organised crime has not been a central focus of any specific recent study in Finland. It also seems that prostitution and procuring markets have changed during the recent years and because of this, new studies on the issue are needed. Although human trafficking, prostitution and organised crime have been researched extensively in the global context, in this report we refer mainly to the earlier Finnish studies. The aim is to provide a comprehensive view of the Finnish prostitution-related human trafficking situation in the context of organised crime. We approach the topic from a sociological perspective and with qualitative methods. This study covers the first decade of the 21st century.

Helsinki: European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control (HEUNI), 2009. 143p.

By Anneke Koning and Lina Rijksen-van Dijke

Child sex tourism is a growing problem and a relatively new challenge for the Dutch national police, which is faced with the task of combatting child sexual abuse by Dutch citizens abroad. Little is known about travelling child sex offenders. In this literature review, information from (international) scientific research, Dutch policy reports, and other documents is analyzed to investigate the characteristics, motives and techniques (modus operandi) of (Dutch) child sex tourists. We conclude that this offender group is not homogeneous, and that different motivations (preferential/situational) and modus operandi (short stay/long stay/online) apply. The diversity of the offender group requires a variety of initiatives which are well-adjusted to the different offender types. The scarcity of research on this topic furthermore illustrates the necessity to gather more intelligence and conduct follow-up research.

Leiden: Leiden University, 2017. 47p.

By A. J. G. Tijhuis

In this PhD study the interface between legal governments and corporations on the one hand, and transnational criminals at the other hand, is analysed in depth. In the first part of the book, a typology of interfaces is developed that can be used to describe interfaces between legal and illegal actors. Furthermore, an analytical model, the so-called lockmodel, is developed with which the 'laundering' of all kinds of transnational crime can be understood. The analysis is based on the literature on transnational crime as well as a range of case-studies. The case studies include e.g. individual arms traffickers, commercial banks, intelligence agencies, charities, bank secrecy jurisdictions etc. The second part of the book discusses the results of an empirical study of the illicit art and antiquities trade that was part of the PhD project and which has hardly been studied before by criminologists. With the collected data, the use of the typology and lockmodel is looked at. It shows that the laundering of stolen art and antiquities can be understood by the lockmodel that was developed on the basis of other crimes. Finally, an extensive overview of the illicit art and antiquities trade is provided.

Nijmegen: The Netherlands: Wolf Legal Publishing, 2006. 243p.

R. de Bont. Liem.

Illicit drugs continue to be a profitable area for criminal organizations operating within the EU. Drug use and drug markets can act as facilitators for all types of violence, which could ultimately lead to homicide. Yet, drug-related homicide (DRH) has not been monitored. The development of a drug-related homicide data collection is necessary to study this phenomenon. This report provides a first step towards a European-level DRH monitor.

Leiden; Leiden University, 2017. 66p.

Edited by Judith van Erp.

Corporate crimes seem endemic to modern society. Newspapers are filled on a daily basis with examples of financial manipulation, accounting fraud, food fraud, cartels, bribery, toxic spills and environmental harms, corporate human rights violations, insider trading, privacy violations, discrimination, corporate manslaughter or violence, and, recently, software manipulation. Clearly, the problem of corporate crime transcends the micro level of the individual ‘rotten apple’ (Ashforth et al. 2008; Monahan and Quinn 2006); although corporate crimes are ultimately committed by individual members of an organization, they have more structural roots, as the enabling and justifying organizational context in which they take place plays a defining role. Accounts of corporate fraud, misrepresentation, or deception that foreground individual offender’s motivations and characteristics, often fail to acknowledge that organizational decisions are more than the aggregation of individual choices and actions, and that organizations are more than simply the environment in which individual action takes place.

Basel: MDPI - Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute, 2018. 152p.

By Ralph Espach, Daniel Haering, Javier Melendez Quinonez, and Miguel Castillo Giron.

The Dilemma of Lawlessness explores in-depth three towns typical of Guatemala’s border regions and examines the economic, political, and security effects of the amplification of the drug trade in their streets, across their rivers, and on their footpaths. The cases reveal that trade has brought prosperity, but also danger, as illegal profits penetrate local businesses, government offices, and churches as longstanding local smuggling networks must contend with or accommodate the interests of Mexican cartels. The authors argue persuasively for the importance of cultivating local community capital to strengthen these communities’ resiliency in the face of these threats.

Quantico, VA: Marine Corps University Press (MCUP), 2016. 104p.

Edited by Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung and Regine Schönenberg.

Analyses of a Global Challenge to Democracy. ”In June 2011, the Heinrich Böll Foundation hosted an international conference on transnational organized crime (TOC). It was the first time that the Foundation addressed the issue of transnational organized crime in such a comprehensive manner. The intention of this event was to raise awareness about the interdependency of international criminal structures, legal economic processes, and the respective political orders. A further aspect that was addressed was the interwovenness of drug, arms, human and organ trafficking, and money laundering.”

Creative Commons (2013) 309p.

By Craig A. Zendzian.

Written by a former NYPD cop, this book gives a behind the scenes look at the hidden interests that lie behind casino gambling from Nevada to New Jersey. Provides a concise analysis of how politics, organized crime and special interests created one of the greatest gambling empires in the United States. CONTENTS: 1. Introduction, 2.Nevada and Earlier Gambling Movements in America, 3. The Bahamas and Casino Gambling, 4. Gambling Comes to New Jersey, 5. Let's Do Business: The Corporate Way That is, 6. Who Investigates Racketeers?, 7. Where Does It End?

NY. Harrow and Heston Publishers. 2012.

By Fabio Armao.

The post-Cold War era was characterised by both the recurrence of state wars and the spread of forms of organised violence other than wars. Asymmetric warfare between alliances led by the USA and groups of insurgents, such as those witnessed in Afghanistan and Iraq, coexist alongside domestic conflicts, such as that of former Yugoslavia and, more recently, Libya and Syria; and still other conflicts involving gangs, mafias or narco-traffickers. The massive military-industrial complexes conceived in the context of the threat of nuclear Armageddon are still there of course, but they now coexist with irregular armies of insurgents carrying out massacres through the use of light weapons and improvised explosives devices. This book oppose the idea that this situation prefigures the return to an anarchical, pre-political condition, by assuming that new wars are rather the product of the blurring of the public-private divide, induced by the end of the Cold War, together with globalisation. As a consequence, also the internal and external factors are blurred; and ever more permeable and elusive is becoming even the border between war and crime. Inside War goes beyond a state-centered analysis and adopts an interdisciplinary and multilayered approach, and is intended to foster the dialogue among researchers from different fields. It places war at the core of analysis, assuming that the reality of war is what we make of it; and that the only insurmountable limit to our comprehension of war is our way of knowing and representing it. Fabio Armao teaches courses in Politics and Globalisation Processes, and Criminal Systems. He has been Visiting Professor at Cornell University, and co-convenor of the Standing Group on Organized Crime, European Consortium for Political Research. Founding member of T.wai (Torino World Affair Institute), he is also member of the Editorial Board of ‘Global Crime’. His research interests and publications focus on international wars and geopolitics, on violent non-state actors and transnational organised crime, and on urban security.

Warsaw, Poland: deGruyter, 2015. 224p.

By West Africa Commission on Drugs.

After looking at the evidence, consulting experts from the region and around the world, and visiting some of the most affected countries and communities in West Africa, the Commissioners of the West Africa Commission on Drugs detail their conclusions in this report about how the problems of drug trafficking and consumption in the region should be tackled.

Geneva: WACD, 2014. 64p.

By A Joint Effort Between EU-ABC & TRACIT.

TRACIT has joined with the EU-ASEAN Business Council (EU-ABC) to issue a report that sheds light on the growing problem of illicit trade in the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN). The report, titled, “Tackling Illicit Trade in ASEAN”, comes at a time when illicit trade is gaining momentum in ASEAN and as officials prepare for the upcoming 14th ASEAN Ministerial Meeting on Transnational Crime (AMMTC). The paper investigates various forms of illicit trade in the region, the affected industry sectors and provides critical insight on how government and industry leaders can work together to introduce regulatory changes to confront this pressing issue.

NY: TRACIT. Advocacy Paper, 2020. 35p.

By The Transnational Alliance to Combat Illicit Trade (TRACIT).

The TRACIT report, "Examining the negative impacts of illicit trade on SDG 16", is part of TRACIT’s contribution to the partnership approach embodied in SDG 17 and a means by which business, the public sector and civil society can more effectively achieve the SDGs. The report updates key findings from the 2019 Mapping the Impact of Illicit Trade on the Sustainable Development Goals to focus on the criminal elements underpinning illicit trade and their relationship to SDG 16. Additionally, it incorporates observations during the COVID-19 pandemic, which show that criminal groups have swiftly exploited the situation and entrenched their positions in illicit trade.

TRACIT.ORG. 2021. 37p.

By Transnational Alliance to Combat Illicit Trade (TRACIT)

Among the worst crimes associated with illicit trade is the demand it creates for forced and child labor. The TRACIT report, The Human Cost of Illicit Trade: Exposing demand for forced labor in the dark corners of the economy,​ studies an overlooked corner of the global economy, namely the incidence of forced labor in illicit market activities. The report shows that women, children and men of all ages and race are forced to labor in illicit sectors, where they are abused by organized criminals in their pursuit of profits.

Occurrences of forced labor are examined in eight sectors where illicit practices are regularly reported. These activities include: (i) counterfeiting of apparel, footwear and luxury goods; (ii) counterfeiting of electronics machinery and equipment; (iii) substandard and falsified medical products; (iv) illegal mining; (v) illegal, unregulated and unreported fishing; (vi) illicit tobacco products; (vii) illegal pesticides; and (viii) illegal timber.

This report shows how organized criminals are using and abusing labor and demonstrates how forced labor intersects with multiple forms of illicit trade. The findings suggest that putting an end to these human rights abuses will only be possible by eradicating illicit trade and the demand for forced labor associated with it.

NY: Tract.Org. 2021. 52p.

By Jon Spencer, Rose Broad, Kauko Aromaa et. al.

This report was completed some time ago but for reasons beyond our control its publication has been delayed until now. The issue of the illegal movement of people retains its topicality and continues to be equally relevant as it was at the time of the project fieldwork. For example, recently, HEUNI has completed a further report on the FLEX project (Trafficking for Forced Labour and Labour Exploitation in Finland, Poland and Estonia, HEUNI Publication No. 68), and the report on trafficking for sexual exploitation published by The Swedish Council for Crime Prevention (Brå), accompanied by a Finnish country report published as HEUNI report No. 62 also indicate the importance of this area of research. The research reported on here was innovative as it included law enforcement practitioners and authority representatives in a constant dialogue with researchers. The aim was that this would allow for discussion of the data as it was gathered throughout the project. The intention was that data collection and interpretation formed a permanently iterative, self-correcting process and to some extent this was achieved. It was also an aim that the Expert Groups created for the project would continue once the research phase was completed in order to maximise the sharing of information and to sustain a dialogue between different professional groups. This aim proved to be over optimistic as there were too many problems caused by information sharing. It would seem that without external pressure and support, such formal cross-authority forms of co-operation do not survive spontaneously. The same could be observed in the context of the FLEX project. Our conclusion is that should such “horizontal” groups be created they will only continue if there is a budget and a responsible coordinating body established on a permanent basis. If not, the sustainability of such co-operative relationships is low.

Helsinki: European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control (HEUNI), 2011. 110p.

By Marina Foltea. This book assesses the consequences of Brexit for the control of illicit trade in tobacco products in the UK and EU. Based on the currently applicable legal framework, it examines the significance of a possible non-application of the acquis communautaire in the UK in matters relating to anti-illicit trade in tobacco legislation. It also analyses the modes of future cooperation between the UK and the EU in this area, as well as possible regulatory scenarios and their consequences. The book comprises six main sections. After the introduction (Section 1), Section 2 discusses the state of play of Brexit and possible outcomes of Article 50 of the Treaty of European Union procedure. Section 3 illustrates the data and trends of illicit tobacco trade in the UK. Section 4 describes the relevant legal (e.g. trade and fiscal measures) and enforcement frameworks in the UK and suggests possible post-Brexit scenarios in control of tobacco illicit trade. Section 5 focuses on the relevance of arrangements between governments and the tobacco industry in the control of illicit trade. Section 6 then analyses the relevance of key EU and global anti-illicit trade initiatives. Lastly, Section 7 the book offers some recommendations and conclusions on how the UK could control illicit trade in tobacco after Brexit Cham: Springer, 2020. 89p.