Russian critics of the transformation of Russia point to a number of current problems they attribute to capitalism, such as rampant organized crime, official corruption, inability to pay members of the armed forces, a high unemployment rate, and high prices for certain goods. Many of these problems might have developed in any case. At the same time, in spite of these problems, it would seem that the move to a capitalist economy is not likely to change unless the masses become even more disenchanted with the system than they are now. The communists tried to appeal to voter discontent in the recent election and failed. The people may decry aspects of the new market economy, but they are still dedicated both to reform and to stability. Continuing down the road to reform is seen

Its secretive and amorphous nature makes it difficult to investigate, especially for outside observers. Its combination of death and honor lends itself easily to yellow journalism. Its connections to former KGB agents smacks of global conspiracies and stirs the remnants of cold war mentality.14

Corruption in Russia has been a great and growing theme in the past decade. In Economic Crime in Russia, Alena Ledeneva, a Russian sociologist now teaching in London, has assembled a group of mainly academic writers who, taken together, give less vivid but more systematic accounts than journalism can of the scale and depth of the problem. Workers, who often do not get paid, steal from their employers; company directors steal from the state; generals steal from the military budget and use recruits as free labor to build dachas; bankers construct networks of illegal money transfers and divert state funds to their private accounts; officials charge fees for every kind of transaction; and the Mafiya grows and grows.7

Russian organized crime on one level is a collection of gangs having tentacles in all manner of enterprises, but it is also seen as a parasite that may yet strangle its host. The Russians are aware of this even if they often complain about Western "hysteria" over the Mafiya, but "its own statistics and representatives seem to encourage such hysteria. Kulikov and his successor, Sergei Stepashin, both regularly cite alarming if largely meaningless statistics, such as the oft-repeated suggestion that it controls forty per cent of the Russian economy."8 According to the Russian Central Bank, $1 billion is being illegally sent out of the country every month by criminals, though it is not clear that this is true. An objective examination shows that once the observer moves past the most overt manifestations of organised crime, meaning the thugs and drug-dealers in the streets, it is often much more difficult to separate the criminals from the new generations of biznismeny ("businessmen") or from politicians and movers and shakers of every variety: "Is the mafiya thus simply a matter of semantics? This very real uncertainty reflects the way that, in the countries of the former Soviet Union in general, and Russia in particular, distinct patterns have emerged."9

The Mafia developed in Italy during a time of war and strife for the people of Sicily. The Russian mafiya developed from several forces that also strained society, these being 1) a criminal and terrorist political culture; 2) a sense of political and economic alienation; 3) links between criminals and rulers; and 4) a deliberate "strategy of tension" on the part of certain political actors.

Strong-arm tactics are used to enforce unfair business policy and to obtain customers. . . The cumulative effect of the infiltration of legitimate business in America cannot be measured. Law enforcement officials agree that entry into legitimate business is continually increasing and that it has not decreased organized crime's control over gambling, usury, and other profitable, low-rise criminal enterprises.12

Some common words found in the essay are:
Soviet Union, Sicilian Mafia, Millions Italians, Sicily Russian, Ledeneva Russian, Criminal Legislation, Los Angeles, Crime Commission, Lower Manhattan, Rooted Russian, organized crime, law enforcement, soviet union, legitimate business, russian organized crime, russian organized, controlled organized crime, criminal organization, sicilian mafia, form organized, form organized crime, free market, soviet free, local law enforcement, soviet free market,
Approximate Word count = 2818
Approximate Pages = 11 (250 words per page double spaced)