Neviditelná moc - Mafie a stát v moderních evropských demokraciích – de Saint-Victor Jacques (2023)

The mafia was born from the ruins of the feudal system, but its expansion occurred only with the development of democracy and capitalism. It quickly took root in Naples, Sicily, and Calabria, and owes its flourishing to the criminal pacts it formed with parts of the political and social elite. ***** The book reconstructs the political history of the mafias and their expansion on the European continent. The author maps their cradle and finds the first actors in the story: corrupt nobles, unscrupulous celebrities, wealthy landowners, hired killers... He uncovers the invisible ties of these 'criminal sects' to the emerging democracy and follows their conquest of America. ***** With the Cold War, a speculative mutation of mafia networks emerges, and the author unravels the methods of their parasitism on the liberal economy. We are in an era of drug trade expansion, the creation of tax havens, the compromise of the Vatican Bank, and real estate scandals, where mafia bosses shake hands with politicians, industrialists, and financiers. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, new opaque groups grow in Europe, utilizing this 'model' to conquer further territories... ***** About the author: ***** French historian Jacques de Saint Victor (1963) works at the Sorbonne Paris Nord university,…