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The collapse of communism and the Soviet Union led to the emergence of transitional and
failing states. This, coupled with the liberalisation of the global financial markets, triggered an
enormous growth in global organized crime.
Misha Glenny has travelled five continents over three years to investigate the terrifying reach
of these international criminal networks. The result – McMafia: Crime Without Frontiers - is a
completely original and comprehensive account of international organised crime. He builds a
breathtaking picture:
Glenny argues that the shadow economy has grown so fast that it may now account for
20% of the world's GDP.
He has interviewed the gangsters, their victims, politicians and policemen. The
individual stories are fascinating, tragic, frightening and occasionally funny. He has met
cyber criminals in Brazil, negotiated clandestine meetings with the FARC left wing
guerrillas and cocaine-cultivators in Columbia and watched Bedouins smuggle drugs
and cigarettes across the Sinai desert into Israel. One of the most heart-stopping parts
of the book the interview with a Moldovan woman who had been duped into a summer
‘job’ abroad, only to find herself enslaved in a brothel in the Middle East.
McMafia offers insights into the pitfalls of a globalisation where the rules dividing the
legal from the illegal are often far from clear.
The book addresses the topical issue of drugs legalisation head on - looking at the
arguments from both the producer and consumer countries. Glenny questions whether
conventional policing methods are appropriate.
He delineates how the yawning gap between rich and poor has forced millions into
criminal trade just to feed and clothe themselves. The structure of organised crime
means that money doesn’t trickle down. It trickles up. It creates political instability
and conflict around the globe. Glenny passionately argues that the time has come to do
something about it.
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