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Understanding Recruitment to Organized Crime and Terrorism

  • Provides systematic review of the social, psychological and economic drivers of criminal network recruiting

  • Presents new insights into recruitment of terrorism and organized crime organization

  • Highlights key drivers of recruitment as well as areas for future research

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Table of contents (13 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-viii
  2. Introduction

    • David Weisburd, Ernesto U. Savona, Badi Hasisi, Francesco Calderoni
    Pages 1-21
  3. Factors Affecting Radicalization and Recruitment to Terrorism

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 23-23
    2. What Is the State of the Quantitative Literature on Risk Factors for Radicalization and Recruitment to Terrorism?

      • Michael Wolfowicz, Yael Litmanovitz, David Weisburd, Badi Hasisi
      Pages 25-53
    3. Terrorist Recidivism in Israel: Rates, Patterns and Risk Factors

      • Tomer Carmel, Michael Wolfowicz, Badi Hasisi, David Weisburd
      Pages 85-104
    4. The Link Between Prior Criminal Record and Violent Political Extremism in the United States

      • Michael A. Jensen, Aaron Safer-Lichtenstein, Patrick A. James, Gary LaFree
      Pages 121-146
    5. Testing a Threat Model of Terrorism: A Multi-method Study About Socio-Economic and Psychological Influences on Terrorism Involvement in the Netherlands

      • Vanja Ljujic, Inge Versteegt, Frank Weerman, Fabienne Thijs, Jan-Willem van Prooijen, Fatima el Bouk et al.
      Pages 147-171
  4. Factors Affecting Recruitment to Organized Crime

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 173-173
    2. Systematic Review of the Social, Psychological and Economic Factors Relating to Involvement and Recruitment into Organized Crime

      • Tommaso Comunale, Francesco Calderoni, Martina Marchesi, Elisa Superchi, Gian Maria Campedelli
      Pages 175-204
    3. Socio-Economic Inequalities and Organized Crime: An Empirical Analysis

      • Michele Battisti, Giovanni Bernardo, Antri Konstantinidi, Andros Kourtellos, Andrea Mario Lavezzi
      Pages 205-239
    4. The Criminal Careers of Italian Mafia Members

      • Ernesto U. Savona, Francesco Calderoni, Gian Maria Campedelli, Tommaso Comunale, Marco Ferrarini, Cecilia Meneghini
      Pages 241-267
    5. Investigating the Psychological Profile of Organized Crime Members

      • Gerardo Salvato, Maria Laura Fiorina, Daniela Ovadia, Gabriele De Maio, Elisa Francescon, Gabriella Bottini
      Pages 269-275
  5. Back Matter

    Pages 337-348

About this book

This volume provides insights on how recruitment patterns develop for two related types of criminal networks: organized crime and terrorism. It specifically explores the social, situational, psychological, and economic drivers of recruitment. Although organized crime networks and terrorism networks can differ in underlying goals and motivations, this volume demonstrates common drivers in their recruitment, which will provide insights for crime prevention and intervention.

The goal of the book is to explore the current knowledge about these common drivers, as well as highlight emerging research, to identify and prioritize a research agenda for scholars, as well as policymakers. The research presented in this work aims to fill existing gaps in the knowledge of recruitment to both organized crime and terrorism. For each area, it provides a systematic review of the existing research on social, psychological, and economic drivers of recruitment. It then presents findings from independent original research aimed to explore new ground not covered in these previous studies.

The contributions to this volume were the result of a research project funded by a European Union Horizon 2020 grant, and present a diverse, international mix of expertise and cases. It will be of interest to researchers in criminology and criminal justice, as well as related fields such as sociology, psychology, and international relations.  

Chapter 13 of this book is available open access under a CC BY 4.0 license.

Editors and Affiliations

  • Institute of Criminology Faculty of Law, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel

    David Weisburd, Badi Hasisi

  • Department of Criminology Law and Society, George Mason University, Fairfax, USA

    David Weisburd

  • Transcrime, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan, Italy

    Ernesto U. Savona, Francesco Calderoni

About the editors

David Weisburd is a Distinguished Professor at George Mason University and Director of the Center for Evidence-Based Crime Policy. He is also the Walter E. Meyer Professor of Law and Criminal Justice at the Hebrew University Faculty of Law in Jerusalem. He serves as Chief Science Advisor at the Police Foundation in Washington DC and is Chair of its Research Advisory Committee. He has received many awards for his contributions to criminology and crime prevention.  These include: the Stockholm Prize in Criminology (2010); the Klachky Family Prize for the Advancement of the Frontiers of Science (2011); the Jerry Lee Award for Lifetime Achievement in Experimental Criminology (Division of Experimental Criminology, ASC, 2014), the Robert Boruch Award for distinctive contributions to research that influences public policy of the Campbell Collaboration (2014); the Sutherland Award for "outstanding contributions to the discipline of criminology" (ASC, 2014); the Israel Prize (generally regarded as the State of Israel's highest civilian honor) (2015); the Mentoring Award for “excellence in mentorship in the discipline of Criminology and Criminal Justice” (ASC, 2016); and the August Vollmer Award for contributions to the prevention of crime (ASC, 2017).

Ernesto U. Savona is Director of TRANSCRIME, Joint Research Centre of the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore and the Università degli Studi di Trento and since 2003 professor of Criminology at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan. From 1986 to 2002 he was professor of Criminology at the Faculty of Law at the Università degli Studi di Trento. In 2003 he was appointed Editor in Chief of the European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research, an international refereed Journal published by Springer. He is also Editor in chief of the series Research in Brief in International and Comparative Criminology published by Springer. He has been consultant to the United Nations, Council of Europe, the European Union and various national governments. He was also nominated President of the European Society of Criminology for the years 2003/2004. In June 2011 he was appointed Chair for the term 2011-2012 of the Global Agenda Council on Organized Crime del World Economic Forum.

Badi Hasisi serves as an associate professor and Chair of the Institute of Criminology, Faculty of Law, The Hebrew University. His work focuses on the interaction between community and the criminal justice agencies, with specific emphasis on the particular problems faced by minority groups with the criminal justice system. He also specializes in homeland security ad terrorism. In the last three years he received about 900,000 € from the European Commission to study terrorism. He also specializes in evaluating innovations in the criminal justice system. Prof. Hasisi also specializes in the legal history of Mandate Palestine. His recent study focuses on analyzing the reaction of the British court system during the Mandate in Palestine to family honour crimes, especially among the Arab community. He received the 2018 best article prize of the Israeli Organization of Law and History and the Fattal Prize for Excellence in Legal Research & Criminology. Prof. Hasisi also serves as the Executive Editor of the Journal of Quantitative Criminology.

Francesco Calderoni is Associate Professor at the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore and researcher at Transcrime Joint Research Centre of the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, the University of Bologna and the University of Perugia. He is coordinator of the International Ph.D. in Criminology and of the master curriculum in Policies for Security at the M.Sc. in Public Policies at Università Cattolica in Milan. He is Associate Editor at Global Crime. He was awarded the Ambrosoli Prize 2010 by the Milan City Council for the best Ph.D. thesis and the Canada-Italy innovation award 2014 by the Canadian Embassy in Italy for the application of network analysis methods to criminal organizations.

Bibliographic Information

  • Book Title: Understanding Recruitment to Organized Crime and Terrorism

  • Editors: David Weisburd, Ernesto U. Savona, Badi Hasisi, Francesco Calderoni

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-36639-1

  • Publisher: Springer Cham

  • eBook Packages: Law and Criminology, Law and Criminology (R0)

  • Copyright Information: Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020

  • Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-030-36638-4Published: 12 June 2020

  • Softcover ISBN: 978-3-030-36641-4Published: 12 June 2021

  • eBook ISBN: 978-3-030-36639-1Published: 11 June 2020

  • Edition Number: 1

  • Number of Pages: VIII, 348

  • Number of Illustrations: 35 b/w illustrations

  • Topics: Transnational Crime, Terrorism and Political Violence, Social Structure, Social Inequality

Buy it now

Buying options

eBook USD 109.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book USD 139.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book USD 139.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access