Mafiosi are first and foremost entrepreneurs in one particular commodity—protection—and this is what distinguishes them from simple criminals, simple entrepreneurs, or criminal entrepreneurs. Their relatives, friends, and friends of friends may be criminals inasmuch as they deal in illegal goods, but they may equally well be entrepreneurs in legal goods. In both cases these people are not mafiosi but customers, buyers cacher than suppliers of protection. Even in those instances in which mafiosi themselves are involved in some other economic activity, they should be considered, as it were, their own customers.

Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Busi…, loc. 46