The Vory : Russia's Super Mafia
Mark Galeotti (Author)
"The first English-language book to document the men who emerged from the gulags to become Russia's much-feared crime class: the vory v zakone Mark Galeotti is the go-to expert on organized crime in Russia, consulted by governments and police around the world. Now, Western readers can explore the fascinating history of the vory v zakone, a group that has survived and thrived amid the changes brought on by Stalinism, the Cold War, the Afghan War, and the end of the Soviet experiment. The Vory-as the Russian mafia is also known-was born early in the twentieth century, largely in the gulags and criminal camps, where they developed their unique culture. Identified by their signature tattoos, members abided by the Thieves' Code, a strict system that forbade all paid employment and cooperation with law enforcement and the state. Based on two decades of on-the-ground research, Galeotti's captivating study details the Vory's journey to power from their early days to their adaptation to modern-day Russia's free-wheeling oligarchy and global opportunities beyond"--Publisher's description
Informational works
1 online resource (xii, 326 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates) : black and white photographs.
9780300187625, 0300187629
1037273617
Cover page; Halftitle page; Title page; Copyright page; CONTENTS; ILLUSTRATIONS; PREFACE; ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS; A NOTE ON TRANSLITERATION; INTRODUCTION; Part One FOUNDATIONS; CHAPTER 1 KAIN'S LAND; Criminal histories; Can Russia be policed?; Peasant justice; Policing the countryside; Horse thieves and the bandit tradition; CHAPTER 2 EATING KHITROVKA SOUP; Sins of the city: crime and urbanisation; Russian rookeries; A policeman's lot was not a happy one; Gangs of the city; The vorovskoi mir; CHAPTER 3 THE BIRTH OF THE VORY; War, revolution and crime; Lenin's bitter compromise; Bandits and '49ers' Stalin's childrenThe thief within the code; CHAPTER 4 THIEVES AND BITCHES; Bitch in law; Cracks in the code; The balance of terror tilts; The bitches' war; After Stalin; CHAPTER 5 THIEF LIFE; Vor life; Talking tough: thieves' language; One world, one language; Tattoos: writing resistance on the body; Cultures, clothes and custom; Women in the thieves' world; Part Two EMERGENCE; CHAPTER 6 THE UNHOLY TRINITIES; Stalin's legacy; Gangsters under pressure . . .; ... street gangs on the rise; The fish that rotted from the head; The shadow men . . .; ... and their gangster friends CHAPTER 7 GORBACHEV'S GANGSTERSThe Bootleg Revolution; Gangster-entrepreneurs; The new gangs; Tomorrow belonged to them; CHAPTER 8 THE 'WILD NINETIES' AND THE RISE OF THE AVTORITETY; Yeltsin's 'superpower of crime'; The protection market and its understandings; From bandity to biznismeny: the 2000s; The end of the vorovskoi mir?; Part Three VARIETIES; CHAPTER 9 GANGS, NETWORKS AND BROTHERHOODS; Gangs and networks; The 'standard hierarchy' and the Uralmash brigade; The 'regional hierarchy' and the Far Eastern Association of Thieves; The 'clustered hierarchy' and the Northern Route The 'core group' and the TambovskayaThe 'criminal network' and Solntsevo; CHAPTER 10 THE CHECHEN The gangster's gangster; Born of blood; The highlanders; A tradition of resistance; The two Chechnyas; Bratva in Russia; The protection racketeers' protection racketeer; Kadyrov's empire; CHAPTER 11 THE GEORGIAN The expatriate vor; Bay leaves: the Georgians in Russia; Tariel Oniani and the Georgian 'iron'; Grandfather Hassan's boys; The rise of the youngsters; CHAPTER 12 THE GANGSTER-INTERNATIONALIST; On definitions; Bad neighbours: organised crime in post-Soviet Eurasia The rise and fall of the first waveSamosval and Yaponchik: empire builders or exiles?; From conquistadores to merchant-adventurers; A tale of two underworlds; 'Pax Mafiosa' or global economy?; Part Four FUTURE; CHAPTER 13 NEW TIMES, NEW VORY; Deep crime and the deep state; 'It's all business'; 'Ironing the firm'; The gangsterisation of business; 'Everything and everyone is for sale'; When is a vor no longer a vor?; CHAPTER 14 MAFIYA EVOLUTIONS; The first big shock: 2008; The second big shock: 2014; The day of the cheeserunners; New opportunities; The khaker: the virtual vor; War or peace?
In English