| Massive increases in international trade, travel, and finance, along
with improvements in communications technologies appear to have
drastically altered the form, scope, and structure of organized crime as
we enter the 21st century. The key questions are whether these changes
have fundamentally changed the nature of organized crime or the nature
of the social threat emanating from organized crime. In order to
address these issues organized crime must be reconceptualized
and redefined within the context of international capitalist expansion.
It is the contention of this paper that organized crime has changed very
little. It is still composed of reasonably small, localized, highly
adaptable organizations. But the massive expansion of capitalism in the
late 20th century has brought with it attendant opportunities for new
markets, increased economic and political corruption, and new
technologies which can be easily exploited by criminal capitalists.
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Updated 05/20/2006