Project description
A closer look at organised crime
Organised crime flourishes in countries with high levels of corruption, political instability and violence, and limited economic growth. However, causal evidence on the economic and political consequences of organised crime is insufficient. The EU-funded CLEAN project will increase our understanding of organised crime’s effects on the distribution and efficacy of public spending. Moreover, it will investigate organised crime’s effects on public procurement and subsidies to private companies as well as the practices which lead corrupted politicians to direct public funding to criminal groups. It will also study the effects of the immigration of criminal groups in the cases of Italy and the Netherlands and the arrival of mafia members into the US during the prohibition era.
Objective
Organized crime is systematically associated with lower economic development and higher corruption, political instability and political violence across countries. However, causal evidence on the economic and political effects of organized crime remains limited.
The present proposal advances our knowledge of organized crime in two main directions. First, I will explore the effects of organized crime on the allocation and effectiveness of public spending, focusing on two important areas of government spending: public procurement and public subsidies to private firms. This analysis will advance our knowledge of the practices through which captured politicians can distort the allocation of resources in favour of criminal organizations, their implications for the efficiency of government intervention, and the effectiveness of alternative policy responses.
Second, whilst previous research has focused almost exclusively on the traditional areas of origin of criminal organizations, I will study the effects of criminal groups moving to new regions and countries. I will focus in particular on three different contexts: i) the “transplant” of criminal organizations from southern to northern Italian regions; ii) interactions of immigrants and natives in criminal activity in the wake of recent migration to the Netherlands; and iii) the inflow of members of the Sicilian Mafia into the US during the period of alcohol prohibition (1920-1933). The present proposal will advance our understanding of how criminal groups can relocate to new regions and countries; their interactions with the criminal groups that may already be present there; and the economic and social effects in the areas of destination. From a methodological perspective, all projects will take advantage of unique micro-level data and state-of-the-art econometric methods for impact evaluation to provide clean evidence on causal relationships.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- social sciences law human rights human rights violations political violence
- social sciences sociology social issues corruption
- social sciences other social sciences development studies development economics
- natural sciences chemical sciences organic chemistry alcohols
- social sciences sociology demography human migrations
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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H2020-EU.1.1. - EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
ERC-COG - Consolidator Grant
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2019-COG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
20136 Milano
Italy
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.