“Gangs in Uniform” in Turkey: Politics at the Articulation between Security Institutions and the Criminal World

Abstract

“Mafia” is a common, even banal, term in public debate in Turkey today. Many NGOs and media sources warn against “mafia” groups running rife in a variety of different domains.² At the end of 1998, the department of the Istanbul Police dealing with organized crime and arms trafficking set up a “hello-mafia” hotline for people denouncing extortionist activities. The crowning “glory” of this development was the enormous success of the 2002 television series Kurtlar Vadisi (Valley of the Wolves),³ which presents a romanticized depiction of the world of the baba; it attracted a large following and even led to some imitations. More generally, the media use the term “mafia” in both an inflationist and a sensationalist way, qualifying any delinquent activity as “mafia-esque.” This both trivializes the term and contributes to the dilution and confusion of the phenomenon itself.