The Mafia as a criminal enterprise has garnered much interest over the years and has created much discussion about how it originated and developed in America. Although the concept of a mafia, in common parlance, may refer to “organized crime” as imported from different countries (particularly Russia, Japan, and Hong Kong), most scholars use the term to refer to activity by people who immigrated to the United States from Italy, specifically from the island of Sicily, located near the southern region of the country. The Sicilian Mafia, sometimes called La Cosa Nostra (or, less formally, the Mob), refers to a loosely knit group of organized crime syndicates. The fact that immigration and ethnicity are important factors in understanding the Mafia makes it more intriguing and ...

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