Studies of Organized Crime – Women and the Mafia-Female Roles in Organized Crime Structures

Our investigation into the role of women in organized crime sprang from the great tradition in Palermo of research on this subject—for example, the conference La donna nell’universo mafioso (Women in the Mafia Universe), organized by the Faculty of Educational Science in February 1997, and the works of Teresa Principato and Alessandra Dino, which include the outstanding book Mafia e donna, le vestali del sacro e dell‘onore (Mafia and Women, Vestals of Honor and the Sacred) (Flaccovio, Palermo, 1997), as well as the research of Umberto Santino and Anna Puglisi.