The Sicilian Mafia II: Family and Business

‘They weren’t like anyone else. They did whatever they wanted.’

This is how Henry Hill describes the local mafiosos in the film Goodfellas; and it is also what most people assume the mafia to be about, that is, freedom to do whatever you want, regardless of the laws or public opinion. But what we must remember is that the mafia of Hill’s generation was already on the decline; it was no longer bound by the same customs that initially captured the public imagination. As Robert Dainotto writes in his book, Mafia: A Cultural History, the public fascination with the Mafia, ‘was the same fascination, no doubt, which stands behind the success of the Godfather saga. In one word: nostalgia. The Mafia, here, is nothing less than the longing for a world we have lost […] a world of honour, family values and rustic chivalry’.

As John Dickie writes in his History of the Sicilian Mafia:

real Sicilian mafiosi are obsessed with the rules of honour that limit their actions. A man of honour may dodge, manipulate, and rewrite those rules, but he is nonetheless always aware that they shape how he is perceived by his peers.

This feudal mafia with its ‘rustic chivalry’ eventually gave way to a business-minded crime syndicate (in a process similar to the dismantlement of other…