Imprisonment paradoxically increased a mafioso’s legitimacy among villagers

Evidence

During this time, some notable changes in the relative standing of Ardena and his group among villagers took place. The provision of security and the way the barter system was conducted gained them respect and esteem. The incarceration they suffered in 1898 and 1903 served tu enhance the legitimacy and reasonableness of their action. Now villagers began to go to Ardena with other problems… These modest beginnings were transformed into a successful long-term enterprise. — Diego Gambetta, The Sicilian Mafia The Business of…, 239

Categorization

• XREF: Prison time as reputational capital — an inversion of state-imposed stigma that fits Schelling-style credible commitment and also echoes Milgrom on reputation as enforcement.