This book aims to make a contribution by showing that the parallel between the mafia and the state has clear limits, and, consequently, that the view of the mafia as a legal system in its own right does not actually stand up. First, as Chapters 5 and 6 make clear, the mafia is not a centralized industry but is constituted by many individual "firms" united by a brand name and, intermittently, a cartel. The norms adopted by the cartel are often breached and manipulated, and in no way are they part of a fixed and universally agreed-on code; nor is there any moral justification for them. Next, criteria of universality and equality (let alone transparency) are irrelevant: protection is sold on a private basis to individual customers; its price varies according to the customers' wealth and position, the types of services required, and last but not least the whims of the seller. The mafia is not even a "minimal state" as defined by Nozick (1974)—one which enjoys an undisputed control over the use of force in a certain territory and protects everyone, whether they like it or not. Finally, the parallel with a democratic state is even more tenuous: mafiosi are not accountable to their subjects, and the mafia has not citizens but at best clients. The more accurate counterpart to the mafia is a business.

XREF: Connects to economic and political theory frameworks like Nozick's minimal state and legal pluralism debates. Builds on: "Shadow organizations mirror state structure with courts and statutes."

Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Busi…, loc. 26