Mafiology, n. The methods used by mafias to pursue their agendas.
We’ve all seen portrayals of mafias in movies of course. We have an impression of how a mafia works, and there’s a fair amount of truth in that impression. But because not all of the internal workings of a mafia lend themselves to dramatic movie scenes, important things we should be aware of are just not so visible in our entertainment-dominated ways of learning.
And as with all sorts of other processes, mafiology and its manifestation, mafiocracy, have become more sophisticated and powerful in recent decades, benefiting from developments in digital technology.
While it’s common for political power struggles to exhibit some mafiocratic methods, the legitimate ones take seriously things like constitutions, due process, parliamentary procedure, the rule of law, and some measure of civil behavior and integrity.
Mafias Do Not Care
Mafias care only about their own internal rules, as exemplified by La Cosa Nostra’s requirements for becoming a “made man.” For the rest of us, murder is not only illegal but way over the edge morally. For them, it’s simply a procedural necessity and has nothing to do with rules from outside the organization.
Ideology is another point of distinction. Legitimate politicians tend to have sets of beliefs, particularly when it comes to economics. While the words “conservative” and “liberal” are tossed around without a lot of definition, legitimate politicians tend to believe those words represent ends of a meaningful spectrum of beliefs, and they see themselves as advocates of policies based somewhere on that spectrum.
Mafias will pretend to observe ideologies in their efforts to recruit chumps, but under the surface it is pure brutal power struggle. A mafia does not care about ideology.
Isn’t it amusing that Hitler’s Nazi party and Stalin’s Communist party are purported to represent opposite ends of an ideological spectrum. In fact their “ideologies” were identical. They had only to do with the aggregation of power, the same “set of beliefs,” which is “I believe that I should have what you have.”
Says your local crime boss: “My belief is that I should be in control of everything, capiche?” You won’t find him (never her) discussing the merits of parliamentary versus limited-term governance.
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