A free market in quality can dissolve the demand for mafia protection

Evidence

But what exactly is the mafia? The hypothesis developed here is that the mafia is a specific economic enterprise, an industry which produces, promotes, and sells private protection. — Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Business of…, 10 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Greater competition among intermediaries reduced demand for mafia protection; Mafia membership is a trading license allowing both purchase and sale of protection — Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Business of…, 655; State inefficiency and regulation create the market for mafia protection. (+9 more)

Related

• The mafia can be understood as an industry selling private protection (similarity 0.93)
• The mafia protects everyone from peasants to arms dealers (similarity 0.88)
• Mafia protection treats crime as disputes, not offenses (similarity 0.88)
• Mafia protection is a demanded commodity substituting for trust (similarity 0.88)
• The mafia’s competitors are ideologies offering free or state-backed protection (similarity 0.87)
• Mafia protection requires maintaining relations with the underworld it polices (similarity 0.87)
• American mafia arose where supply met demand, not from export (similarity 0.87)
• Mafia behavior is rational once considered as a protection-selling industry under competitive pressure (similarity 0.86)
• Mafia protection customers range from spot buyers to kin (similarity 0.86)
• Demand for protection does not guarantee supply of a mafia (similarity 0.86)
• Protection demand, not commodity prosperity, predicts mafia entry into a market. (similarity 0.86)
• Mafia protection is often genuinely sought after by customers, not merely imposed (similarity 0.86)
• Mafia membership is a trading license allowing both purchase and sale of protection (similarity 0.85)
• Protection in southern Italy bypassed the state’s monopoly and entered the market (similarity 0.85)
• Mafia protection suppresses the emergence of honest-dealing business norms. (similarity 0.85)

Broader Connections

• The mafia can be understood as an industry selling private protection #expands (0.85) — Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Business of…, 10
• Mafia markets are distinguished by demand for protection, not general prosperity #expands (0.80)
• Mafia protection tracks opportunity, not moral principle or universal rules #expands (0.80)
• The mafia persists in a turbulent equilibrium without monopoly or dissolution #contradicts (0.80)
• The mafia’s competitors are ideologies offering free or state-backed protection #expands (0.78)
• Mafia enforcement makes distrust rational and blights mutual-benefit competition #expands (0.75)
• Mafia protection makes distrust self-perpetuating and endogenous. #expands (0.75) — Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Business of…, 70