My claim is that the main market for mafia services is to be found in unstable transactions in which crust is scarce and fragile. Such is the case, for instance, with illegal transactions in which no legitimate enforcement agency—in other words, the state—is available. There are many variants on the model. "Peppe" may be a single person or a network of more or less organized agents. He may supervise every transaction in a given marker, or he may be asked ex post facto to resolve a transaction in which cooperation and agreement have failed.

DEFINE: Defines the 'crust' scarcity condition and the 'Peppe' figure as an enforcer who fills governance gaps, clarifying the economic logic underlying organized crime.

Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Busi…, loc. 41