tag:theconversation.com,2011:/uk/topics/naples-14411/articlesNaples – The Conversation2022-12-12T16:26:50Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1939242022-12-12T16:26:50Z2022-12-12T16:26:50ZMarried to the mob: what the lives of two Camorra women tell us about how to challenge the power of the mafia<blockquote>
<p>I told the judge: “Dottore, I’m on the first floor. If they want to retaliate again, they know where to find me … All the lives they’ve taken from me – they took my brother, they took my husband. I don’t think there’s anything else.</p>
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<p>Lucia has had a harsh life. A petite and elegant 80-year-old woman with piercing brown eyes that are starting to fail and a melancholic smile, she lives on her own in a middle-class neighbourhood of Naples near the Maradona stadium. Lucia may look like your typical well-kept Neapolitan grandmother, but there is much more to her than meets the eye.</p>
<p>She was born during the second world war into what would become one of Naples’ more powerful criminal families, the only girl between two boys. Her father, like many men in the immediate post-war period, got involved in any business opportunity going to make money and survive. She denies that he was ever a <em>mafioso</em>, saying he was only ever looking out for others – but this is how he is described in most newspaper articles, police and judicial reports.</p>
<p>In the 1980s, Lucia had a prime view of the Neapolitan underworld and its devastating violence. Her younger brother was an emerging Camorra member specialising in relationships with corrupt businessmen and judges. Her husband, a car dealer, secretly collaborated with his brother, an international drug trafficker and significant criminal figure. On paper these were respectable businessmen, but in reality they were important <em>camorristi</em> – members of a key Camorra city clan.</p>
<p>Then, in the early ‘90s, both Lucia’s husband and younger brother were killed in mafia hits. She cries during our interview, which is conducted online because of COVID restrictions, especially when she talks about her brother’s murder. Lucia explains that she has had to bottle up her emotions ever since:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I’ll confess this to you: I have experienced great pain, great fear and great suffering. This is my whole life.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Life imprisonment</h2>
<p>It is said that you can only be born into a criminal family – otherwise you will always be an "outsider”. While this is true of Lucia, Teresa was a complete outsider to the criminal underworld as a child. One of nine siblings, her mother was a housewife and her father worked for the municipal dairy:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>My father was hard-working and my mother raised us with love and care … [They] taught us good values, to respect everyone. My father always played with us children.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Yet like Lucia, Teresa also became a Camorra wife. This proud great-grandmother, now 68, first met her husband Giuseppe in 1968 at the age of 14. He would go on to become a <em>capo zona</em> (neighbourhood boss) for the Camorra, but in 1990 was sent to prison for life with a minimum tariff of 30 years.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/288776/original/file-20190820-170910-8bv1s7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><strong><em>This story is part of Conversation Insights</em></strong>
<br><em>The Insights team generates <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/insights-series-71218">long-form journalism</a> and is working with academics from different backgrounds who have been engaged in projects to tackle societal and scientific challenges.</em></p>
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<p>When I last interviewed Teresa in July 2022, she was very angry with Giuseppe, who is now back home on conditional release. She feels she has wasted her life supporting the Camorra and a man who has spent most of his adult life in prison.</p>
<p>Teresa says she used to love spending time in her tiny-but-cosy flat in a working-class district near the busy Neapolitan waterfront. But over the two years that Giuseppe has been back with her, she has become scared and spends a lot of time walking around the city to avoid being at home alone with him:</p>
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<p>I did so much for him and he answers: “No one asked you to.” I spent my life and money on him and he replies: “But I made you live the good life.” It is hell – he loves no one. He has become the devil.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Hiding in the shadows</h2>
<p>There is another important character in this story: Naples. I am married to a Neapolitan and have a love-hate relationship with Italy’s third largest city.</p>
<p>When you walk around Naples, you don’t necessarily feel or see the Camorra. Rarely do you witness its business dealings or its beatings. It prefers to hide in the shadows, but there are small traces that become visible if you know what to look for.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499980/original/file-20221209-29206-4pofku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="aerial view of city" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499980/original/file-20221209-29206-4pofku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499980/original/file-20221209-29206-4pofku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=327&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499980/original/file-20221209-29206-4pofku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=327&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499980/original/file-20221209-29206-4pofku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=327&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499980/original/file-20221209-29206-4pofku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=410&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499980/original/file-20221209-29206-4pofku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=410&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499980/original/file-20221209-29206-4pofku.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=410&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The city of Naples with Mount Vesuvius in the background.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Felia Allum</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
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<p>Walk down a street in the <a href="https://www.naplespass.eu/info-and-tips/attractions-art-and-culture/what-to-see-in-the-spanish-neighborhood-quartieri-spagnoli">Spanish quarter</a>, for example, and if you are not a local a whistle may sound to warn Camorra colleagues that an unidentified person is walking in their direction. The criminal activities and individuals disappear in a second, whether to avoid possible rivals or a police bust.</p>
<p>One lunchtime walking home, I caught a glimpse of two youngsters on a moped carrying an enormous Kalashnikov rifle as they drove up and down the streets controlling the territory. Everyone looked at the floor and the tension was palpable, but they passed without incident. Normality was restored.</p>
<p>The Camorra protects its territory but it also wants to make people feel safe and gain their respect. My brother-in-law, when he lived in the city centre, once went into a bar for a coffee and in a flash, a young man had stolen his wallet. Everyone in the cafe looked confused – how could this happen to a local? Within five minutes, the wallet was back in my brother-in-law’s hands – with the understanding that he would not go to the police. </p>
<p>Let’s not forget that the Camorra looks out for its local community. It makes good business sense to guarantee peace and social consensus.</p>
<h2>A more complete picture</h2>
<p>Over the past 20 years, I have sought out the <a href="https://researchportal.bath.ac.uk/en/publications/women-doing-it-for-themselves-or-standing-in-for-their-men-women-">stories</a> of <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11133-018-9389-8">women who orbit the Neapolitan criminal underworld</a>. I believe sharing their voices can help build a more complete picture of organised crime to complement the city’s judicial overview. Above all, I hope it can help us understand how to counter the mafia’s deeply harmful grip on communities all over Naples and beyond.</p>
<p>Women have traditionally been ignored and considered irrelevant in the story of the Camorra and other Italian mafias, and indeed <a href="https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9781003146568/graphic-narratives-organised-crime-gender-power-europe-felia-allum-anna-mitchell">in most organised crime groups around the world</a>. In 2006, the Neapolitan Camorra was made famous by <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/oct/16/my-life-in-the-mafias-shadow-italys-most-hunted-author-robert-saviano">Roberto Saviano’s accounts</a>: he documented its members, structures, activities and links to politics. He even illustrated some of its female protagonists, but they were always presented as the exception rather than the rule.</p>
<p>In contrast to the rural Sicilian and Calabrian mafias, the Camorra has deep roots within the city of Naples. The <a href="https://direzioneinvestigativaantimafia.interno.gov.it/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/Relazione_Sem_II_2021-1.pdf">Anti-mafia Investigation Directorate</a> (DIA) estimates there are 44 active clans in the city and a further 98 across the rest of the Campania region. In 2021 alone, they were <a href="https://www.anteprima24.it/napoli/omicidi-napoli-2021-primati/">reported</a> to have been involved in 26 murders and 65 attempted murders.</p>
<p>While many get distracted by the “<a href="http://www.lejournalinternational.info/en/les-baby-gangs-la-jeunesse-mafieuse/">baby gang</a>” phenomenon – groups of children and teenagers forming their own criminal gangs in Naples – Camorra clans remain <a href="https://theconversation.com/mafia-in-naples-is-still-going-strong-and-we-must-not-forget-how-it-affects-everyday-life-in-the-city-120177">heavily involved</a> in extortion, drugs and counterfeit goods. They have become savvy about social media and the potential for new business opportunities such as online fraud. Whenever necessary, they have the ear of both local and national officials.</p>
<h2>Falling in love</h2>
<p>Both Lucia and Teresa admit they fell for the wrong men. But they were not coerced or forced, despite how it might appear from the outside. Both describe complex relationships that were at once loving, coercive, inconsistent and contradictory. Of course, they weren’t only married to their husbands but the mob too.</p>
<p>Despite Teresa’s love affair with Giuseppe as a teenager, he married another girl who had told him she was pregnant. Once he realised she was not, he came looking for Teresa again. But because he was now married, they had to run away together as their strict parents could not accept this irregular relationship.</p>
<p>The couple found a small basement flat in a nearby district and had their first child in 1974. After that Teresa’s parents could not keep away. They turned up at the hospital and peace was restored when they met their new granddaughter.</p>
<p>Lucia’s romance was more turbulent. Her future husband kidnapped her in 1959 when she was 17 because he “had a sick love” for her, but feared her father would never approve of him. Lucia defends his subsequent violence and jealousy towards her by arguing that “I was still a child for him – so I had to stay that way”.</p>
<p>After two years, they returned to Naples and in time Lucia’s father accepted the relationship – but it was an agitated marriage. Lucia says she only fell in love with her husband once she had her first child:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I never went to complain to my father or my brothers, not least because they would say: “At the end of the day, you wanted him.” But at that age, how could I know? I wanted him as I couldn’t get close to any other man after being with him.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Many people imagine mafia women either to be male-like leaders or unimportant bystanders. Lucia and Teresa are neither of these caricatures. Their marriages and the families that grew out of them spawned love, trust and loyalty. They were in partnerships against the common enemy, the Italian state. Family relationships were transformed into criminal ventures. It seemed to me that Lucia knew and accepted what she was getting into – and Teresa says the same:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Yes, I started to understand many things. I understood, but by now we were too involved. When you get into this thing, you can’t get out afterwards – you don’t leave.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Invisible ghosts</h2>
<p>Italian mafias are always portrayed as male-centred criminal organisations, whether in films and TV series, academic and newspaper articles, legal judgments or police reports. Women, if present at all, are purely representatives of the men, <a href="https://theconversation.com/mcmafias-passive-women-simply-arent-credible-91268">with no independent agency</a>.</p>
<p>By failing to challenge this “master” narrative, women’s criminal activities are overlooked and the fight against mafias is weakened. Women are an integral part of these groups with their own agency and their own criminal knowledge and capacity for violence.</p>
<p>My studies show that women often bear joint responsibility for the planning of criminal activities, but this remains hidden within the informal world of the household. In this private space, they participate, advise and organise. They are not coerced or forced; they are aware, knowledgeable and involved. Without these women, the criminal structures would find it difficult to survive.</p>
<p>So why are the majority of them “invisible ghosts” to us? Judicial records and police reports tend not to pick up the involvement of women because it is often behind closed doors, discreet and unpaid and therefore invisible. While much of Italian civil society reinforces patriarchal values that diminish the role and value of women, family life is a negotiated space where women can predominate. The same is true in Italian mafia families, where women – especially mothers and wives – can become equals to their men in the criminal underworld.</p>
<p>Over the course of our conversations, Lucia and Teresa highlight how living in a criminal space is not a black-and-white affair, as described in fiction or academic books. They show me that behind every successful male mafioso, there is likely to be a strong woman. But this doesn’t mean they are free of regrets.</p>
<h2>A family slain</h2>
<p>Lucia does not directly acknowledge the criminal activities of her husband or younger brother. She accepts that her husband did some loan sharking and that he went to prison for four years for his activities. But she is vague about the details because she was also part of this family business. Her husband put one of his companies under her name in order to hide their illegal profits, for which she went on the run and eventually spent time in prison in 1981. She never makes it clear why – she just did time for the family business.</p>
<p>Lucia’s son, who I have also interviewed and is not involved with the Camorra, acknowledges his mother’s apparent duplicity – of knowing but not wanting to know, of being involved without wanting to. Lucia says she always had a sense of how things would play out – first when her father was shot (but not killed) in 1980, then when her younger brother and husband were assassinated a decade later.</p>
<p>Her father was punished by her brother-in-law after he had supposedly “behaved improperly” towards Lucia’s sister-in-law, exposing a deep internal rift in this Camorra clan. Lucia told her husband that she knew who had ordered her father’s shooting but was not believed – probably because she was a woman. </p>
<p>While she maintains that her younger brother was “an honourable man”, to anti-mafia prosecutors he was a key member of the dominant Camorra alliance in the late 1980s, involved in drug trafficking and other criminal activities. He too was murdered, in 1991, apparently because his associates suspected he was a police informer. </p>
<p>Lucia recalls that her brother’s killer was someone he knew, whom he had taken in and looked after. She likens this Camorra execution to “being kissed and then shot in the back” – and says it “crucified” her:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I raised him – and when he died it was my great pain. We cried together when we were children because daddy wasn’t around, so he was like a son as well as a brother to me. That was my first big pain – my biggest pain.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Almost unimaginably, two years later Lucia’s husband was murdered because his brother, a top mafia boss, had decided to collaborate with the state. Her husband was offered state protection (as all relatives of informers are) but he refused point-blank; it is believed he was murdered as a form of indirect revenge.</p>
<p>After her husband’s murder, Lucia was also offered state protection but she too refused. There was simply nothing left for her to lose:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>All the lives they’ve taken from me – they took my brother, they took my husband. I don’t think there’s anything else … I experienced great pain, great fear and great suffering.</p>
</blockquote>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499850/original/file-20221208-9377-9fo5k3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Giant mural on two apartment buildings" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499850/original/file-20221208-9377-9fo5k3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499850/original/file-20221208-9377-9fo5k3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499850/original/file-20221208-9377-9fo5k3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499850/original/file-20221208-9377-9fo5k3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499850/original/file-20221208-9377-9fo5k3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499850/original/file-20221208-9377-9fo5k3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499850/original/file-20221208-9377-9fo5k3.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Che Guevara depicted in Naples’ San Giovanni a Teduccio neighbourhood, known as ‘the Bronx’, which has its own Camorra issues.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Felia Allum</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
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<h2>Breaking from the Camorra</h2>
<p>As <em>capo zona</em>, the boss of their local neighbourhood, Teresa’s husband Giuseppe was much respected and admired by his local community. She explains “they loved him” because he brought calm and was a “reference point” people could turn to in times of hardship:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>From the beginning, I realised my husband was with these people … I would ask him: 'But what are you doing? What kind of people are they?’ And he would say to me: ‘Teresa, let’s say it’s a life …’ By then he had it in his blood. The truth is they make you persist because they show you the money … They even bought my husband a car. He was starting to dress smartly – and I had everything.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Teresa was fully aware of her husband’s activities and supported and helped him. He would explain everything to her and they usually agreed. She never pretended not to know. But she admits:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We got ourselves into a mess, me and him. Not a small one. There was no turning back then. I spent my nights in bed waiting for him to come back home, with the fear that they would kill or arrest him. Those were terrible nights.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In 1990, Teresa’s husband was arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment for being the leader of a violent group of <em>camorristi</em>. Teresa went from being a “Lady Camorra”, living the good life, to a Camorra widow, visiting her husband in different prisons across Italy while dealing with his lawyer.</p>
<p>Her husband chose not to negotiate with the state, which would have given him a leaner sentence. He frequently told Teresa not to wait for him, saying: “Leave me because I wasn’t a good husband.” But Teresa swore she would stick by him, as did the clan. She explains how the Camorra tried to buy their loyalty and silence:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>[The clan] came in and hired a lawyer, and they gave me 100,000-150,000 Italian lira [then about £400-£600] a week. This is the way the clan keeps members loyal … It is very difficult to say no when they offer this financial help – but in time we did.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Two years into her husband’s prison sentence, Teresa decided to break free from the Camorra, its control and its power. She recalls how one day they came to her door and she said she no longer wanted their money. She would look after herself and her five children alone because she “didn’t want them to go down the same path”. She got a job working in a local market where, she says: “People were scared of me because I was the local boss’s wife.”</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Life got even more difficult – I had to scrape together money so that my husband had money in prison, and to raise my children and for house expenses. My life was bad – you don’t know what it was like. You can’t even imagine.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Teresa grew very depressed, lost a lot of weight and turned to the local nuns for help. They looked after her and gave her a job. Over the 30 years of Giuseppe’s imprisonment, she slowly rebuilt her life, waiting for the day her husband would be released. Eventually he was allowed to take a job outside the prison three days a week. But, says Teresa, life remained “complicated”.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/500000/original/file-20221209-33110-qh64s7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Woman walking away down narrow street" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/500000/original/file-20221209-33110-qh64s7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/500000/original/file-20221209-33110-qh64s7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=385&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/500000/original/file-20221209-33110-qh64s7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=385&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/500000/original/file-20221209-33110-qh64s7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=385&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/500000/original/file-20221209-33110-qh64s7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=484&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/500000/original/file-20221209-33110-qh64s7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=484&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/500000/original/file-20221209-33110-qh64s7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=484&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A woman walks alone through the narrow streets of Naples.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/woman-walking-alone-under-acient-arch-74400820">Giuseppe Parisi/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A wasted life?</h2>
<p>Teresa acknowledges that the clan system in Naples entraps people. Since breaking free of the Camorra’s grip, she has had to work hard to ensure her children did not get sucked in – but she has been successful. Her five kids all have regular jobs: one works in a bakery, one owns a small restaurant, two are looking for work after COVID made them redundant, and another has moved to the north of Italy to work in a hospital. Above all, she says, they are happy people.</p>
<p>Lucia, now a widow for almost 30 years, has also focused on getting her children as far as possible away from a life of crime. According to her son, even though they are now out of the clan system, the local bosses still treat Lucia and the rest of her family with respect and admiration – her surname alone still produces reverence in others.</p>
<p>Being born into the Camorra has probably made it more difficult for Lucia to question and fully escape its grip. On top of all the killings, she has survived cancer too. After we speak for some time, she admits to feeling enormous pain and sadness as she reflects on her life, then says: “But this is my whole life – I have lived everything.”</p>
<p>Teresa, in contrast, says she regrets “everything”, having wasted her life on the wrong man and his choices. After 30 years in prison, he came out two years ago. Teresa had to sign the paperwork to be his guarantor on the outside, but her dream of living a comfortable old age with the man of her life has not quite worked out.</p>
<p>Giuseppe is still under licence – he has limited freedoms and must spend most of his time at home, with the police doing house visits to check on him at antisocial hours. Prison has had a huge impact: he is depressed and traumatised, and this in turn affects everyone around him. </p>
<p>Teresa describes him as “a monster living in her house”. She worries that Giuseppe is destroying everything she has built with her five children while he was in prison – in particular, a loving family atmosphere. She does not know what the future looks like, but is seriously considering her options as her love and soul have been destroyed.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/500001/original/file-20221209-34972-4pofku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A wall of human skeletons" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/500001/original/file-20221209-34972-4pofku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/500001/original/file-20221209-34972-4pofku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/500001/original/file-20221209-34972-4pofku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/500001/original/file-20221209-34972-4pofku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/500001/original/file-20221209-34972-4pofku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/500001/original/file-20221209-34972-4pofku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/500001/original/file-20221209-34972-4pofku.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Surrounded by death: skeletons in Naples’ famous Fontanelle cemetery.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/skeletons-famous-naples-italy-cemetery-fontanelle-1925252858">Desert Bee/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The role of women in organised crime</h2>
<p>Listening to these women’s accounts of their lives within the Neapolitan underworld shows how much more nuanced organised crime is than the way it is depicted on screen.</p>
<p>Lucia and Teresa are anything but weak and incapable. They have lived full lives as women, wives, mothers and sisters at the heart of the city’s underworld. They navigated this criminal space: it was not a glamorous life but a question of surviving – avoiding rival clans’ bullets and the handcuffs of the police and anti-mafia investigators.</p>
<p>The plurality of these women’s roles and responsibilities is fundamental to the way the Camorra functions. Without their emotional, physical and financial support, their husbands would not have made successful careers within the mob.</p>
<p>Women may not formally join a mafia as “made” members during an official affiliation ritual, but this doesn’t mean they only have irrelevant walk-on parts. Women may not make the drug deals or coordinate the transportation, but they aren’t oblivious of what they are carrying in their car or bag, or how their bank accounts are being used. However unsavoury, their long-time criminal involvement demands greater recognition and understanding.</p>
<p>Whether looking at women in Italian mafias or female members of British criminal gangs, we need to review our <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12117-014-9223-y">understanding of women in crime groups</a> by listening to their voices and experiences. Only then can we get near a complete picture of their roles in the continued success and growth of organised crime. Perhaps in this sense, we are all part of the mafia problem.</p>
<p><em>Names have been changed to protect the anonymity of interviewees</em></p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=112&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=112&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=112&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/313478/original/file-20200204-41481-1n8vco4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=140&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em>For you: more from our <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/insights-series-71218?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=InsightsUK">Insights series</a>:</em></p>
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<li><p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/online-safety-what-young-people-really-think-about-social-media-big-tech-regulation-and-adults-overreacting-196003?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=InsightsUK">Online safety: what young people really think about social media, big tech regulation and adults ‘overreacting’
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<li><p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/why-do-so-many-men-get-away-with-rape-police-officers-survivors-lawyers-and-prosecutors-on-the-scandal-that-shames-the-justice-system-192782?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=InsightsUK">Why do so many men get away with rape? Police officers, survivors, lawyers and prosecutors on the scandal that shames the justice system</a></em></p></li>
<li><p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/qatars-death-row-and-the-invisible-migrant-workforce-deemed-unworthy-of-due-process-191017?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=InsightsUK">Qatar’s death row and the invisible migrant workforce deemed unworthy of due process
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<p><em>To hear about new Insights articles, join the hundreds of thousands of people who value The Conversation’s evidence-based news. <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/newsletters/the-daily-newsletter-2?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=InsightsUK"><strong>Subscribe to our newsletter</strong></a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/193924/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Felia Allum received funding from The Leverhulme Trust (2018-2022: MRF-2017-075) for her research on women in organised crime groups. She is co-author of Graphic Narratives of Organised Crime, Gender and Power in Europe, Routledge, May 2022)</span></em></p>In contrast to their depiction in most mafia films, women are an integral part of these groups with their own criminal knowledge and capacity for violenceFelia Allum, Professor of comparative organised crime and corruption., University of BathLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1874712022-08-02T17:00:18Z2022-08-02T17:00:18ZFive books to read that bring Naples to life<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475647/original/file-20220722-12-5da8r6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3000%2C2083&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/naples-italy-march-20-2015-classical-273331316">Yulia Grigoryeva/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Napoli, or Naples for English speakers, is my favourite city. It’s a city of stark contrasts – glorious architecture competing with multi-layered graffiti, hidden piazze surrounded by piled-up rubbish. </p>
<p>Naples might be the only place where, late in the evening, you can see a group of nuns carrying takeaway pizza back to their convent. It is, after all, the city where the pizza was invented. It has been reviled for its mafia clans while being deeply steeped in age-old superstitions, with polished skulls in countless crypts. </p>
<p>It is also the place where, twice a year, the entire population prays that its patron saint San Gennaro’s blood will liquefy as a portent of good luck. </p>
<p>Here are five novels that really bring this wonderful city to life:</p>
<h2>1. <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/12/10/the-sweet-linearity-of-my-brilliant-friend">My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante</a></h2>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="Book cover with two girls crouching by a car." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475640/original/file-20220722-16-ypzjwc.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475640/original/file-20220722-16-ypzjwc.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=903&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475640/original/file-20220722-16-ypzjwc.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=903&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475640/original/file-20220722-16-ypzjwc.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=903&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475640/original/file-20220722-16-ypzjwc.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1135&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475640/original/file-20220722-16-ypzjwc.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1135&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475640/original/file-20220722-16-ypzjwc.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1135&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Europa</span></span>
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<p>There is no better place for a late afternoon aperitivo than the Piazza San Domenico Maggiore in the heart of the historic centre to soak up the atmosphere of this vivacious city, and no better novel to get a flavour of it than Elena Ferrante’s My Brilliant Friend (2012). Following childhood friends Lenù and Lila through their troubled teenage years into adulthood, this book wonderfully conveys the spirit of Napoli.</p>
<p>Ferrante masterfully conjures up images of this colourful city as we follow her characters along to the Piazza Carlo III, the Albergo dei Poveri, the botanical garden, Via Foria and Port’Alba. For anybody already familiar with Napoli, these are well-known landmarks; for those new to the city they serve as a good starting point for a mid-morning <em>passeggiata</em> (a leisurely stroll) that should always end with a lunch time slice of pizza. When in Napoli, do as the Neapolitans do.</p>
<h2>2. <a href="https://www.publishersweekly.com/9781609451134">Blood Curse by Maurizio De Giovanni</a></h2>
<p>Maurizio De Giovanni’s Commissario Ricciardi series is set in Fascist era Napoli, between 1922 and 1943. Ricciardi solves murders aided by his peculiar visions – he can see the last seconds of a murder victim’s life – and his insatiable appetite for sfogliatelle, a sweet pastry originating in the Campania region. </p>
<p>His novels are full of atmospheric detail, like this passage from Blood Curse: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>The Vico del Fico was a blind alley, an inset halfway up one of the steep streets of the Spanish Quarter. At the entrance to the alley was a shrine to Our Lady of the Assumption … then there was a little piazzetta, invisible from the street: five bassi teeming with life.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>They are gritty and violent but convey a real sense of a city where passions run high and loyalties cannot be betrayed.</p>
<h2>3. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/may/28/naples-44-norman-lewis-rereading">Naples’44 by Norman Lewis</a></h2>
<p>Similar impressions of Naples were made by the British Intelligence Officer Norman Lewis while he was stationed in Napoli during the second world war. His military memoir Naples’44 (1978) conjures up images of coffee at the Gran’ Caffè Gambrinus on Piazza Plebiscito, or meals at Zi’ Teresa’s in the shadow of Castell d’Ovo. It is a testament to his affection for this city of contrasts: a lament for the poverty and corruption he encounters but simultaneously a love letter to the beauty that captivated him.</p>
<h2>4. <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/falling-palace-a-romance-of-naples-by-dan-hofstadter-409930.html">Falling Palace: A Romance of Naples by Dan Hofstadter</a></h2>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="Naples skyline from a balcony with a lamppost and statue of a woman." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475641/original/file-20220722-26-4yc98o.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475641/original/file-20220722-26-4yc98o.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=925&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475641/original/file-20220722-26-4yc98o.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=925&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475641/original/file-20220722-26-4yc98o.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=925&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475641/original/file-20220722-26-4yc98o.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1162&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475641/original/file-20220722-26-4yc98o.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1162&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475641/original/file-20220722-26-4yc98o.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1162&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Vintage</span></span>
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<p>Written in 2006, this book is an evocative account of Hofstadter’s time spent in Napoli as he followed his Italian girlfriend. Hofstadter beautifully depicts this city of contrasts as he tries to settle there. The book recounts living in a traditional <em>basso</em> (a typical Neopolitan ground-floor flat) and befriending many local characters, like the owners of the many curio shops, the typical Neapolitan lottery vendor and the men carving traditional Nativity scenes. </p>
<p>Just as De Giovanni, much of Hofstadter’s account is focused on the <em>Quartieri Spagnoli</em> (Spanish Quarter) whose “reputation for violence, caused by rival Camorra clans” was well known to him but where he “never felt menaced in the streets”. </p>
<p>He too conjures up the overcrowded <em>bassi</em> where, passing “their wide-open doors or windows”, he would “glimpse intimate yet completely unself-conscious scenes: tired housewives fanning themselves under pictures of Padre Pio; muscular youngbloods shining up their Vespas next to their beds; groups of girls sewing or basting skirts or dresses”. For Hofstadter, like so many other writers, it is the very contradiction of Napoli – beauty vs dereliction, sweet domesticity vs crime – that makes this city so captivating.</p>
<h2>5. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/aug/26/roberto-saviano-interview-gomorrah-piranhas">Gomorrah by Roberto Saviano</a></h2>
<p>No list of books about Napoli would be complete without Gomorrah, which delves straight into its dark heart. Also written in 2006, the book depicts Saviano’s infiltration of local Camorra clans and their dominance over local businesses and industry.</p>
<p>Gomorrah, which has been adapted into a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HT7Wok6jPzI">film</a> and a successful <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4QORgagblU&ab_channel=ArrowFilms">TV series</a> (2014-2021), is a brutal and discomforting read. The book shows just how much crime infiltrates daily life in Napoli. </p>
<p>Nevertheless, I would hazard that Saviano’s motivation for this book was his deep love for his home city and his one-man crusade to rid it of the crime that has plagued it for so long.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/187471/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christine Berberich does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A city of contrasts, these books represent the heart and the violence of this Italian city.Christine Berberich, Reader in Literature, University of PortsmouthLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1537552021-03-15T14:29:01Z2021-03-15T14:29:01ZSinkholes: when the ground fights back after centuries of exploitation<p>First, it swallowed a car. A few hours later, two terraced <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-55755159">buildings</a>. At 9pm on January 20, a <a href="https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/large-sinkhole-swallowed-car-manchester-19670705">crater</a> measuring 4 sq metres appeared in Walmer Street, Manchester. Another sinkhole shocked local Scottish walkers, <a href="https://www.thecourier.co.uk/fp/news/local/fife/1950691/walkers-are-advised-to-avoid-the-area-large-sinkhole-closes-section-of-fifes-coastal-path/">swallowing</a> a section of coastal path between Dysart and West Wemyss on February 4. And, in early March, a sinkhole in Cumbria opened up <a href="https://news.sky.com/story/farmer-riding-quad-bike-swallowed-up-by-60ft-sinkhole-in-field-12236766">beneath a farmer riding a quad bike</a>. He was rescued by firefighters and taken to hospital. </p>
<p>These are only recent examples from the UK. The ground opening up and engulfing whatever lies in its path is a pretty common occurrence. <a href="https://nhess.copernicus.org/preprints/nhess-2018-18/nhess-2018-18.pdf">Globally</a>, for every 0.1°C rise in temperature, the number of sinkholes increases by 1%-3%. </p>
<p>A particularly big sinkhole opened in Naples at 6.30am on January 8. The 20-metre deep, 50-metre wide hole <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/08/giant-sinkhole-hospital-car-park-in-naples-italy">suddenly appeared</a> in the car park of the Ospedale del Mare Hospital. It swallowed an oblong section of the car park, caused a power cut and forced the temporary closure of a facility for coronavirus patients.</p>
<p>Sinkholes are particularly common in Naples. <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1474706511003007">More than 190</a> have opened up in the city between 1915 and 2010, and there are about two to four major incidents per year. A <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1296207420304489?via=ihub">recent study</a> on the historic centre of Naples has identified nine historical churches in imminent risk and a further 57 in potential risk of catastrophic ground collapse. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hRRTUXaX_0">Sinkholes</a> are not a new or even a bizarre phenomenon. They occur naturally when minerals below the land surface gradually dissolve in rainwater to form cavities. The sudden appearance of a sinkhole occurs when water loosens the soils around and above cavities just enough for the ground above to fall in. </p>
<p>But these scary phenomena are made <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/feb/20/are-humans-causing-more-sinkholes">a lot more common</a> by humanity’s historical interference with the ground. The growth in intrusive construction, deep mining, poorly managed burial of construction and demolition wastes and, crucially, changes in climate that have brought about heavier rainfalls have all caused the recent abnormal rise in number of sinkholes.</p>
<p>Most people don’t think much about the ground. Perhaps this isn’t surprising – there doesn’t seem much to consider. Our relationship with it is usually one-way and with a single objective: we aim to “improve” it or exploit it to provide whatever functional service we seek – turning it into a strong foundation for buildings, or using it as a source of minerals or water. </p>
<p>But the ground is actually a complex and fine-tuned system, a combination of many components – rock, minerals, bacteria, plants – that work and live independently, but continuously interact with one another to create the solid surface and soil we live on and take for granted. Disrupting these natural components and their harmony allows natural hazards such as sinkholes to occur.</p>
<h2>The Naples sinkhole</h2>
<p>Let’s use the Naples sinkhole to explore how this actually happens in practice.</p>
<p>The Ospedale del Mare Hospital sits on rock called “phonolitic tephrite”. The term tephrite comes from the Greek <em>tephra</em>, meaning ash. This is a porous and brittle rock with a distinct yellowish-grey colour. </p>
<p>Roman builders first used this rock as building stone. Centuries of quarrying led to formation of a complex <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/14/travel/14explorer.html">network of cavities</a> beneath Naples, the like of which can be seen in the stone façade of Sarno Baths in Pompeii. The cavities underlie sandy ash and a top layer of urban soil mixed with wastes and construction rubble.</p>
<p>The top soil is rich in calcium and naturally interacts with carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to produce very soluble carbonates. This top soil <a href="https://earther.gizmodo.com/huge-sinkhole-opens-up-in-italian-hospital-parking-lot-1846033704">was battered</a> in three days of storms in December 2020. It took five days for the flood water to seep into the ground through historical access shafts, washing away the soluble carbonates, loosening the cavity and triggering the sinkhole.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1347595203419512833"}"></div></p>
<p>Conventionally, natural ground is engineered into foundation soil for buildings and roads by compacting and grouting (injecting chemicals like cement into the ground). Natural pores in soil are either destroyed or filled with chemicals. For soil, less pores means better strength, but also means penetration of larger volumes of rainwater into the ground through fewer and narrower openings. This high intensity seepage can wash away soluble minerals, loosen the soil around buried cavities, and trigger sinkholes. </p>
<p>So how do we stop this from happening? </p>
<h2>New groundwork</h2>
<p>Over the past two decades, researchers have been trying to establish new methods of engineering the ground that satisfies the demands of cities but does not disrupt the ground’s natural systems. For example, <a href="https://pureportal.strath.ac.uk/en/projects/engineering-fungal-networks-for-ground-improvement-engineering-fu">researchers</a> at Strathclyde University have used fungi to form incredibly durable complex root-like networks of natural fibres in soil to hold it together. These are fibres that can even recover themselves in the face of damage. And, in Newcastle, <a href="https://www.ncl.ac.uk/press/articles/archive/2016/10/thinkingsoils/">researchers</a> are genetically engineering bacteria to make soil an “adaptive living material”, so that it strengthens itself in respond to load. </p>
<p>But the “products” of these techniques can clog the natural voids in soil. We are also yet to establish the effectiveness of these techniques in deeper grounds, particularly in urban soils, which are mixed with construction wastes. </p>
<p>My research team studies ways to strengthen natural voids in urban soil, from surface to depths, in three engineered layers: a crust, topsoil and subsoil. </p>
<p>We engineer natural bacteria in the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/science/biological-soil-crust">crust</a> to discharge a very sticky glue-like gel and bind soil grains together. Beneath, the topsoil is designed to be light, alive and breathable, rich in <a href="http://mires-and-peat.net/media/map26/map_26_09.pdf">organic fibres</a> that weave soil grains together. We <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40891-019-0173-y">engineer</a> these organic fibres to allow them to stretch far more before they rupture during ground movements. The subsoil in urban areas is usually rich in construction wastes. We develop ways for these wastes to feed on the carbon dioxide in soil and transform into very strong fibres.</p>
<p>Many engineers have come to see the way people treat the ground as unproductive, damaging and as backward as our treatment of endangered species, delicate ecosystems and the climate itself. We need to recruit the age-old natural engineering skills of the ground itself to build a more sustainable world.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/153755/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Arya Assadi Langroudi does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>For every 0.1°C rise in temperature, the number of sinkholes increases by 1 to 3%.Arya Assadi Langroudi, Senior Lecturer in Geotechnical Engineering, University of East LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1547742021-03-01T21:14:20Z2021-03-01T21:14:20ZNaples memorialized its 17th century plague with a festival for healing, and so should we after COVID-19<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/384135/original/file-20210214-19-1qkrkk1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=188%2C197%2C5703%2C3745&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Monuments are good; so are civic festivals. The 'plague column' at Piazza San Domenico Maggiore, in Naples.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Obelisco_di_San_Domenico,_piazza_San_Domenico_Maggiore_(Napoli)_01.jpg">(Mongolo1984/Wikimedia Commons)</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="https://www.google.com/maps/@40.8483993,14.2552795,3a,75y,280.66h,101.73t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sxx-yvcIB0CmlHiK3aweCqQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656">A poignant reminder of death</a> stands in Naples, where the old Roman road meets the main college street and the imposing <em>palazzos</em> step back to reveal a sun-drenched plaza. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386866/original/file-20210228-17-dn0ffz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="The San Domenico column, Naples." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386866/original/file-20210228-17-dn0ffz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386866/original/file-20210228-17-dn0ffz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386866/original/file-20210228-17-dn0ffz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386866/original/file-20210228-17-dn0ffz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386866/original/file-20210228-17-dn0ffz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386866/original/file-20210228-17-dn0ffz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386866/original/file-20210228-17-dn0ffz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The San Domenico column, Naples, shown in May 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/">(damian entwistle/Flickr)</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The spire of San Domenico — a stone obelisk topped with a <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Saint-Dominic">statue of the saint</a> — is one of Europe’s “<a href="https://daily.jstor.org/how-to-memorialize-a-plague/">plague columns</a>.” Such monuments were erected after <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/ereh/het013">devastating epidemics in the 17th century</a> to memorialize the religious figures believed to have interceded to stop the spread of disease.</p>
<p>Vienna still has the most famous one, <a href="https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/morbid-monday-plague-columns">though others survive</a>. Of the three columns standing in Naples, <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/4238769?seq=1">only the spire of San Domenico</a> was erected to actually commemorate a plague. As art historian Maria Ann Conelli <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/4238769">points out</a>, the column shares its form with a type of <a href="https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/344430">temporary funeral monument</a> erected to display the coffin of a prominent citizen in baroque-era Italy. </p>
<p>As the one-year anniversary of the World Health Organization’s declaration of a global pandemic approaches (and as <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/canada-more-than-doubles-covid-19-vaccine-distribution-this-week-1.5326477">vaccination programs begin</a>), it might finally be time to consider how our modern age wants to remember this plague. </p>
<h2>End-of-plague festival</h2>
<p>Pulitzer-winning art critic Christopher Knight <a href="https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/story/2020-05-05/coronavirus-plague-columns-memorials-trump-tower">recently suggested</a> we should build a new plague column to remember COVID-19 victims. It’s a brilliant idea. But columns take time. The spire of San Domenico, begun two years after <a href="https://wellcomecollection.org/works/cav46qt4/items?canvas=1&langCode=ita">the 1656 epidemic</a> <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/4238769">took 79 years to complete</a>.</p>
<p>The Neapolitan civic officials of 1656 have another lesson to teach about how to remember a plague: they put together a grand celebration to mark the containment of the epidemic and help heal a wounded city. For 10 days (instead of the usual eight), beginning on Dec. 1, 1656, the city was transformed by festivities both solemn and joyous.</p>
<p>“After such calamity, and in such a short time,” <a href="https://reader.digitale-sammlungen.de/de/fs1/object/display/bsb11345118_00184.html">says a contemporary Jesuit account</a>, the city put together a celebration that was “if not the greatest, as is often said, then at least, no one can deny, one not unequal to those seen in Naples in the midst of its greatest happiness.” </p>
<p><a href="https://reader.digitale-sammlungen.de/de/fs1/object/display/bsb11345118_00007.html">This source</a>, a Jesuit text that celebrated miracles performed during the plague, had reason to put things in the best light. Yet it describes events typical of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1163/9789004251830_014">Neapolitan feasts</a>, for which <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=HTtiQgAACAAJ&dq=Feste+Ed+Apparati+Civili+E+Religiosi+in+Napoli+De+Viceregno&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiC06aOi47vAhWHrp4KHZjyD6MQ6AEwAHoECAIQAQ">there are many sources</a>. </p>
<p>Painters, sculptors, musicians, the military, clergy, bureaucrats and politicians all had a role to play. As the procession moved through the streets, people worshipped before spectacular new altars and statues, and listened to musical performances and the thunder of artillery.</p>
<p>“As much a spectacle of beauty as of piety,” <a href="https://reader.digitale-sammlungen.de/de/fs1/object/display/bsb11345118_00182.html">the author wrote</a>. “Not a simple tribute, but a full triumph.”</p>
<h2>Commissioning artists</h2>
<p>The festivities began with a more sombre event on the evening of Dec. 1. The officials responsible for combating the disease, the deputies of health, <a href="https://reader.digitale-sammlungen.de/de/fs1/object/display/bsb11345118_00175.html">sat in the cathedral</a> facing a <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=vaioJXFbhS0C&pg=PA122#v=onepage&q&f=false">bejeweled</a> statue of Saint Francis Xavier as he was proclaimed protector of the city. </p>
<p>Six months earlier, as the bodies were piling up in the streets, the deputies <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=vaioJXFbhS0C&pg=PA43#v=onepage&q&f=false">had prayed to</a> him to intercede and save Naples. On that Saturday in December, the voices of four choirs resounded through the cathedral in a work of thanksgiving, the <em>Te Deum</em>. </p>
<p>“In the number and quality of singers, it was the best of the whole festival,” <a href="https://reader.digitale-sammlungen.de/de/fs1/object/display/bsb11345118_00175.html">wrote the author</a>.</p>
<p>Though the religious character of that night might seem striking today, in 1656 all civic officials in Naples professed the Roman Catholic faith and believed it was their duty to ask saints to perform miracles. In June, the Neapolitan city council had in fact <a href="https://doi.org/10.2307/3046040">commissioned artist Mattia Preti</a> to paint new frescoes depicting saints to be mounted above the city’s gates in order to protect against the plague.</p>
<p>This religious zeal was just one part of a complex civic life — and struggle against an epidemic — with some bracingly familiar features.</p>
<p>There were conspiracy theories about the origins of the virus — <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=IDM1gZMr-tkC&pg=PA27#v=onepage&q&f=false">that it was</a> “artificially spread to kill the people” as vengeance for an <a href="https://www.historytoday.com/archive/masaniellos-naples-revolt-against-spain">earlier uprising</a>. There was the problem of where to bury the bodies. And there was the heartbreak <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=IDM1gZMr-tkC&pg=PA63#v=onepage&q&f=false">over shuttered</a> theatres, schools and businesses.</p>
<p>“The whole city had become a tomb,” <a href="https://books.google.ca/books?id=IDM1gZMr-tkC&pg=PA40#v=onepage&q&f=false">one observer recalled</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387038/original/file-20210301-17-1ujryw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Painting of people struck by plague." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387038/original/file-20210301-17-1ujryw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/387038/original/file-20210301-17-1ujryw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387038/original/file-20210301-17-1ujryw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387038/original/file-20210301-17-1ujryw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387038/original/file-20210301-17-1ujryw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=534&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387038/original/file-20210301-17-1ujryw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=534&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/387038/original/file-20210301-17-1ujryw6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=534&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Piazza Mercatello in Naples during the plague of 1656, painting by Domenico Gargiulo.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Museo Nazionale di San Martino/Wikimedia Commons)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>For the city in the shadow <a href="https://www.nesdis.noaa.gov/content/this-day-history-eruption-mt-vesuvius-1631">of Mount Vesuvius</a>, the December feast must have felt like an eruption of joy. By Sunday night, the solemn religious processions gave way to “the great rejoicing of fireworks and lights.” Neapolitans were so familiar with fireworks displays from past festivals that the account of them <a href="https://reader.digitale-sammlungen.de/de/fs1/object/display/bsb11345118_00181.html">simply says</a> that they, “being of the usual sort, don’t need their own particular recounting.”</p>
<h2>Social connection, joy</h2>
<p>Today, we are all hungry to enjoy the familiar things we did before the pandemic. Neapolitans were too. As a city facing <a href="https://www.wiley.com/en-us/The+Revolt+of+Naples-p-9780745607245">economic, political and religious divisions</a>, Naples celebrated these crucial festivals in order to bring together the city’s disparate parts for a few precious days. </p>
<p>Festivals admittedly served to glorify favoured Catholic saints and strengthen the viceroyalty. But they also put artists to work, fostered social connection and allowed for a brief spasm of joy. Some historians, <a href="https://jhupbooks.press.jhu.edu/title/becoming-neapolitan">like John Marino</a>, emphasize the former; others, like <a href="https://manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/9780719078224">Gabriel Guarino</a>, the latter.</p>
<p>When we’re finally ready to get back to normal after COVID-19 will we be content to mark the event with a shopping spree, a haircut and a meal? Or will we take a page from the Neapolitan playbook, updated for our pluralistic world, and come together for a (responsible, socially distanced) feast of music, fellowship and fireworks <a href="https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-event-cancellations-communication-is-key-to-retaining-public-trust-133594">that could aid social, cultural and economic</a> recovery right now? </p>
<p>Let’s commission spectacular works of music, art and sculpture, as the Neapolitans did, and prepare to revel in eight days of celebration.</p>
<p>If it goes well, we can make it 10.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/154774/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>I previously received a SSHRC Doctoral Fellowship and a University of Toronto Dünnhaupt Travel Fellowship for archival research in Naples.</span></em></p>As the one-year anniversary of the World Health Organization’s declaration of a pandemic approaches, it might be time to consider how our modern age wants to remember this plague.Keith Johnston, Adjunct Lecturer in History, Algoma UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1417242020-07-15T13:08:10Z2020-07-15T13:08:10ZFrom the Grand Tour to My Brilliant Friend: how Naples captured our imagination<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/347381/original/file-20200714-139992-3yukse.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=8%2C0%2C5483%2C3639&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Moody Naples.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/powerful-lightning-dark-stormy-sky-above-1407223931">IgorZh/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Overlooking sparkling sea and overshadowed by Mount Vesuvius, the Italian city of Naples is a popular and evocative setting in popular culture. </p>
<p>HBO’s acclaimed TV adaptation of <a href="https://www.europaeditions.com/author/2/elena-ferrante">Elena Ferrante’s best-selling Neapolitan novels</a> returned to UK screens for its second series this summer. Its popularity follows that of Sky Atlantic’s <a href="https://www.sky.com/watch/title/series/b4da1913-6f48-47f4-a321-bd9784bd323b/gomorrah">Gomorrah</a>. This series, also set in Naples, is inspired by author Roberto Saviano’s exposé of the local criminal organisation, <a href="https://theconversation.com/mafia-in-naples-is-still-going-strong-and-we-must-not-forget-how-it-affects-everyday-life-in-the-city-120177">the Camorra</a>. </p>
<p>The adaptation of these works follows the enormous commercial success of Ferrante’s and Saviano’s books within Italy and beyond. But they are also testament to the enduring appeal of Naples as a source of inspiration and as a brand that sells – and sells well – on the world stage.</p>
<h2>A contradictory city</h2>
<p>In the 18th century, the city was a stop on the <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=NvcgAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA164&dq=naples+grand+tour&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjPzKqC5MrqAhWTURUIHeuwDFgQ6AEwAXoECAUQAg#v=onepage&q=naples%20grand%20tour&f=false">Grand Tour</a>, the traditional trip around Europe taken by young and wealthy northern Europeans and Americans. </p>
<p>These visitors were attracted by tales of Naples’ extraordinary beauty and by the nearby wonders of Vesuvius and Pompeii. They were greeted on arrival by a <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=q6cwDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA62&lpg=PA62&dq=naples+demographic+monster&source=bl&ots=v4qUn9PPYu&sig=ACfU3U3T9yZ_T0YZUHE6NjIHYs8zYc481g&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjC0e6X4MrqAhWBwuYKHd6KBYMQ6AEwCXoECAgQAQ#v=onepage&q=naples%20demographic%20monster&f=false">“demographic monster”</a>: a frenetic and rapidly expanding city, often experienced as an assault on the senses. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/347377/original/file-20200714-22-551h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/347377/original/file-20200714-22-551h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347377/original/file-20200714-22-551h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347377/original/file-20200714-22-551h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347377/original/file-20200714-22-551h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347377/original/file-20200714-22-551h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347377/original/file-20200714-22-551h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Narrow streets in Naples.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/naples-italy-may-5-2017-street-1092622424">Nadezhda Kharitonova/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The contrast between the magnificence of the city’s setting and the squalor of its rowdy underclass contributed to Naples’ proverbial reputation as a “paradise inhabited by devils”. It also resulted in the widespread portrayal of Naples as an exotic and often incomprehensible place, simultaneously seductive, thrilling and bewildering.</p>
<p>That ambiguity is also present in Italian attitudes to the city. On one hand, since Italy was unified in 1861, Naples has been held up as the epitome of all things Italian. More often, though, it is seen as a thorn in the side of the modern nation-state. In the late 19th century, the Italian South – and Naples in particular – was viewed by its northern rulers as <a href="https://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9780312221683">uncivilised and barbaric</a>.</p>
<p>Over the course of the 20th century, however, Naples became celebrated as the cradle of Italian popular culture. According to media scholar <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Italian-Cultural-Studies-David-Forgacs/dp/0198715099">Peppino Ortoleva</a>, Naples became to “Italian popular culture what the New Orleans-Nashville axis is to US culture”. The city was a hotspot for talent and experimentation.</p>
<h2>Cultural hotspot</h2>
<p>Naples has a long musical history: its songs from the 19th century are still popular today. The famous <a href="http://www.naplesldm.com/napsongtexts.php#sole">“’O sole mio”</a>, sung in Neapolitan dialect, was written in 1898. Another song, <a href="http://www.naplesldm.com/napsongtexts.php#funiculi">“Funiculì, funiculà”</a>, was composed to celebrate the opening of the funicular railway on Mount Vesuvius in 1880.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/d_mLFHLSULw?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Luciano Pavarotti singing ’O sole mio.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This strong musical tradition evolved to produce Italy’s first musical film (<a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0046831/">Carosello Napoletano</a>, 1953), its most celebrated singer-songwriter <a href="https://www.pinodaniele.com/">Pino Daniele</a>, and its first experiments with rap and world music. Naples was quick to embrace the advent of film, with director <a href="https://wfpp.columbia.edu/pioneer/ccp-elvira-notari/">Elvira Notari</a> producing some of early cinema’s most intriguing work. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/347386/original/file-20200714-139969-10hck1q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/347386/original/file-20200714-139969-10hck1q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=831&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347386/original/file-20200714-139969-10hck1q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=831&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347386/original/file-20200714-139969-10hck1q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=831&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347386/original/file-20200714-139969-10hck1q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1045&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347386/original/file-20200714-139969-10hck1q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1045&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/347386/original/file-20200714-139969-10hck1q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1045&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Neapolitan actor Antonio Griffo Focas Flavio Angelo Ducas Comneno Porfirogenito Gagliardi de Curtis di Bisanzio, known as Totò.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tot%C3%B2,_Neapolitan_actor_1943.jpg">Ludovico Virgilio/Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The city emerged as a major source of performance talent, especially in the aftermath of the second world war. The plays of <a href="https://www.dramaonlinelibrary.com/person?docid=person_filippoEduardoDe">Eduardo De Filippo</a> and the comic genius of actor <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0869451/">Totò</a>, the most popular Italian performer of all time, secured Naples’ renown at a national level. </p>
<p>Naples’ role in film transferred to the international stage with the rise of Sofia Loren, who grew up in the city, in the 1950s. By then, Italy was a major production centre for English-language films, featuring Hollywood stars like Gregory Peck, Audrey and Katherine Hepburn, Clark Gable and Charlton Heston. </p>
<p>The popularity of Naples among English-language audiences capitalised on the memories of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/may/28/naples-44-norman-lewis-rereading">Allied soldiers</a> who had been stationed in Naples following the city’s liberation in 1943. It also profited from the large Italian community in the US, many of whom hailed from the Naples area. </p>
<h2>Changing perceptions</h2>
<p>These 1950s films – romances and comedies, for the most part – played on the warm sunlight and natural beauty of the Bay of Naples. They portrayed the city as an upbeat and beguiling place, populated by strong women, fallible men and resourceful rascals struggling to get by.</p>
<p>That picture contrasts sharply with the image of Naples in contemporary culture. For international audiences especially, Naples has become a place of dark intrigue. It is caught between Gomorrah’s post-industrial noir and the violence-tinged nostalgia of Ferrante’s world. </p>
<p>Contrary to expectation, perhaps, the appeal of that world is not restricted to our bookshelves and screens. The (pre-pandemic) rise of <a href="https://visitnaples.com/shop/go-morrah-tour-the-beauty-of-naples-suburbs/">Gomorrah</a> and <a href="http://www.lookingforlila.com/tours">Ferrante-related tours</a> confirm the allure of the dark side of Naples. </p>
<p>Despite its obvious selling power, this representation of the city is not without its risks – and not just for Naples. Its dark connotations threaten to overshadow the traditional image of Italy and the artisanal “Made in Italy” brand so carefully curated for the global economy. Which version of Naples will triumph is anyone’s guess.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/141724/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ruth Glynn's research on 'Naples and the Nation' is funded by a UKRI Leadership Fellowship. </span></em></p>Naples holds an enduring – and ambiguous – place in cultural representations of Italy.Ruth Glynn, Professor of Modern Italian Culture, University of BristolLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1385922020-05-15T09:46:21Z2020-05-15T09:46:21ZCoronavirus: crime cartels helping communities will extract a high price in years to come<p>The citizens of Iguala in the southern Mexican state of Guerrero, <a href="http://wradio.com.mx/radio/2020/04/28/nacional/1588094431_942427.html">encountered several billboards</a> hanging on different sites recently. They read: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>People of Iguala, we ask you to please stay inside your home, we do not want chaos outside. You have to respect the lockdown, we will seriously hurt those who we catch outside. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>This wasn’t the work of some over-zealous local government official. The messages were put up by the local narco cartel. This was not an isolated case: criminal gangs have also been imposing curfews in other Mexican states and <a href="https://g1.globo.com/rj/rio-de-janeiro/noticia/2020/03/23/coronavirus-traficantes-e-milicianos-impoem-toque-de-recolher-em-comunidades-do-rio.ghtml">Brazil</a> and <a href="http://alexpresents.com/2020/04/14/taliban-ms-13-hayat-tahrir-al-sham-join-coronavirus-fight/">El Salvador</a>.</p>
<h2>States within states</h2>
<p>During the coronavirus pandemic, governments have undoubtedly been the lead actors in imposing restrictions on their populations while financially supporting individuals and firms for lost income. But in numerous countries, governments have very limited capacity <a href="http://ideas.repec.org/s/spr/ecogov.html">or have</a> to <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3840506?seq=1">live with</a> mafia-type organisations. These groups differ from standard criminal operations because they act like a state within a state. </p>
<p>As researchers Gianluca Fiorentini and Sam Pelzman <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/economics-of-organised-crime/632CA5713D3BAACB30F830D2C2B1F15F">wrote in 1995</a> of these groups, they “perform inside [their] territory those activities that typically characterise a collective decision-maker’s intervention on the economy: levying of taxes, coercive provision of public goods, and regulation of private agents through non-fiscal tools”. Little has changed since. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/el-chapo-is-no-robin-hood-but-social-bandit-myth-still-endures-in-latin-america-137207">El Chapo is no Robin Hood – but social bandit myth still endures in Latin America</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Mafia outfits <a href="https://globalinitiative.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/GI-TOC-Crime-and-Contagion-The-impact-of-a-pandemic-on-organized-crime.pdf">have lost profits</a> in many of their <a href="https://www.unodc.org/documents/data-and-analysis/covid/Covid-19-and-drug-supply-chain-Mai2020.pdf">core businesses</a> during the pandemic, such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-coronavirus-is-changing-the-market-for-illegal-drugs-134753">drug dealing</a>, human trafficking and <a href="http://www.internationalaffairs.org.au/australianoutlook/turning-adversity-into-advantage-how-organised-crime-is-responding-to-covid-19/">gambling</a>. But they still have plenty of money from previous years’ activities to be able to step in with support.
Besides imposing curfews, they have been providing various public services. These vary hugely around the world, but there are some common trends. </p>
<p>For one thing, these oranisations have been providing free food and other essential goods to poor people who are running out of cash. A few weeks into the Italian lockdown, for example, this <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/10/mafia-distributes-food-to-italys-struggling-residents">was happening</a> in Naples and Palermo. </p>
<p>In Naples, the local <em>camorra</em> crime gang has <a href="https://napoli.fanpage.it/spese-domicilio-camorra-napoli/">even been</a> making home food deliveries to people along with illegal drugs. This comes as no surprise in a region where the state was slow to provide help even to those who are entitled to such benefits, never mind the unentitled millions <a href="https://www.istat.it/it/files/2020/01/Conti-economici-territoriali.pdf">who earn</a> a living in everything from agricultural labour to domestic work but are not tax-registered. Criminal groups in southern Italy have <a href="https://elpais.com/sociedad/2020-04-18/la-mafia-es-inmune-al-virus.html">also been providing</a> financial help to individuals, with gifts of sometimes €300 or €400 at a time (£266 to £354). </p>
<p>In Mexico, the criminal cartels <a href="https://www.cide.edu/coronavirus/2020/04/27/covid-19-despensas-y-narco/">have also been</a> providing food to the poorest in the states of Guerrero, Michoacán, Tamaulipas and Guanajuato. They seem to take marketing more seriously than their Italian counterparts. The Gulf cartel of north-east Mexico, for example, <a href="https://elpais.com/internacional/2020-04-17/el-narco-mexicano-aprovecha-el-virus-para-exhibir-su-poder-ante-las-camaras.html">has been</a> handing out boxes of food and hand sanitiser sealed with a sticker bearing its name and logo. Meanwhile, such has been the shortage of health supplies in parts of Mexico that some hospitals have <a href="https://www.eldinamo.com/actualidad/2020/04/21/coronavirus-mexico-hospitales-piden-ayuda-a-bandas-de-narcotrafico-ante-escasez-de-insumo-sanitarios/">even been</a> seeking the help of the cartels to procure the necessary equipment. </p>
<p><strong>Central Mexico</strong></p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/335009/original/file-20200514-77255-ah66ag.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/335009/original/file-20200514-77255-ah66ag.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/335009/original/file-20200514-77255-ah66ag.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=317&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335009/original/file-20200514-77255-ah66ag.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=317&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335009/original/file-20200514-77255-ah66ag.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=317&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335009/original/file-20200514-77255-ah66ag.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335009/original/file-20200514-77255-ah66ag.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335009/original/file-20200514-77255-ah66ag.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.google.co.uk/maps/search/mexico/@22.1787212,-104.5559057,6z">Google Maps</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Organised crime groups have also been delivering essential goods in Colombia, <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/south-africa-coronavirus-lockdown-gangs-cape-town-a9474101.html">South Africa</a> and Japan. In Japan, for instance, the <a href="https://www.occrp.org/en/coronavirus/japanese-gangs-vie-for-power-amid-pandemic"><em>yakuza</em></a> distributed masks and toilet paper when they were scarce in supermarkets. </p>
<p>In Brazil, at a time when President Jair Bolsonaro has been underplaying the severity of the pandemic, gangs have <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2020/apr/21/bolsonaro-wont-help-with-coronavirus-so-brazils-favelas-helping-themselves-video">reportedly been</a> offering hand sanitiser to people in the <a href="https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/what-are-the-favelas-of-brazil.html"><em>favelas</em></a>. Such groups can easily access these goods by exploiting their business networks and trafficking routes.</p>
<h2>Business backing</h2>
<p>Criminal groups are <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/25/why-mafia-taking-care-of-everyones-business-in-pandemic">also providing</a> financial help to struggling local businesses. <a href="https://www.agi.it/cronaca/news/2020-03-31/coronavirus-usura-ndrangheta-gratteri-8033085/">One example</a> is the <em>‘ndrangheta</em>, the strongest mafia group in Italy, which is offering loans at interest rates lower than the local banks. These loans are primarily aimed at the likes of small businesses in construction and hospitality, who can’t access credit from banks but urgently need liquidity. The <em>‘ndrangheta</em> and similar groups have <a href="https://www.interpol.int/Crimes/Organized-crime">plenty of funds</a> to make available. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/335050/original/file-20200514-77230-18vwwz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/335050/original/file-20200514-77230-18vwwz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/335050/original/file-20200514-77230-18vwwz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335050/original/file-20200514-77230-18vwwz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335050/original/file-20200514-77230-18vwwz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335050/original/file-20200514-77230-18vwwz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335050/original/file-20200514-77230-18vwwz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/335050/original/file-20200514-77230-18vwwz2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Italy’s criminal groups have being making home deliveries.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/banner-reading-basta-mafia-stop-on-1296625459">christianthiel.net</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Mexican criminal groups are also giving out loans to <a href="http://www.omnia.com.mx/noticia/141244">small businesses</a>. No doubt the coronavirus <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/es/2020/04/30/espanol/opinion/crisis-economica-mexico-coronavirus.html">response from</a> President López Obrador is an added incentive: he <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/b91c4ac7-76ad-4c1e-bbb5-2caebe148feb">has been refusing</a> to borrow to provide a stimulus package, while continuing the country’s austerity drive – despite protests from many Mexicans.</p>
<p>Yet support can work both ways. The huge amount of money that some governments are injecting into the economy will provide optimal opportunities for fraudulent business claims and the like. The <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2020/04/25/europe/mafia-bosses-italy-coronavirus-trnd/index.html">sight of</a> mafia bosses in Italy being released from jail to protect them from coronavirus is only going to help these groups to take advantage. </p>
<p>Without a doubt, the help that mafia-type organisations are offering to households and firms will come at a high cost for many countries. The criminals are <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2020/04/27/mexican-cartels-are-providing-covid-19-assistance-why-thats-not-surprising/">trying to</a> gain political capital and extend control over their territory. When the crisis is over, they will ask for favours in return, such as money laundering or protection from the police. And a higher unemployment rate will tempt more people to join their ranks to secure stable earnings. </p>
<p>For the time being, the governments of countries where these mafias operate must not only deal with the coronavirus but limit the advancement of these groups at the same time. This is an additional important reason for supporting the general public at this difficult time, even if there may be no perfect solution to groups that have been entrenched for many years.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/138592/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Matteo Pazzona does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Many governments can’t afford to offer the sort of economic stimulus we’ve seen in the west, and organised crime is only too happy to fill the gap.Matteo Pazzona, Lecturer, Brunel University LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/872672017-11-15T13:13:32Z2017-11-15T13:13:32ZStreet art: young Italians shake Camorra’s hold on public space<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194808/original/file-20171115-19829-19i14l4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Inward</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In some ways, Naples is really two cities in one. By day, it’s a city of such beauty and character that it’s often used as a <a href="http://napoli.repubblica.it/cronaca/2016/12/01/news/hollywood_in_piazza_plebiscito_ciak_per_mary_magdalene_-153188276/">set for films</a>. But by night, away from the busy piazzas, the isolated side streets become the stage for violent turf wars, as <a href="https://theconversation.com/young-guns-take-charge-of-europes-mafia-clans-with-deadly-results-74339">young, ambitious criminals</a> seek to dominate lawless streets. </p>
<p>From afar, it appears that not much has changed in Naples. The city’s traditional problems persist; crime, and the fear of it, continues to cripple the local community, at times scaring people from going out at night, starting new businesses and letting children play in the streets. Objections are stifled by an “omertà” – a conspiracy of silence, fed by fear of retribution, which stops people from speaking out against organised crime groups. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194794/original/file-20171115-19768-s8421r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194794/original/file-20171115-19768-s8421r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=378&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194794/original/file-20171115-19768-s8421r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=378&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194794/original/file-20171115-19768-s8421r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=378&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194794/original/file-20171115-19768-s8421r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=475&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194794/original/file-20171115-19768-s8421r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=475&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194794/original/file-20171115-19768-s8421r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=475&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Like a prayer: Banksy’s Madonna mural.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/theresedreams/9549121599/sizes/l">Therese Trinko/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But recently, a silent transformation has been taking place on the streets of Naples and its surrounding region, Campania. Slowly, civil society has started taking back control of the public collective space. Culture and education once again are providing a remedy to the ill-effects of organised crime groups, and their activities in Naples. </p>
<h2>Reclaiming the streets</h2>
<p>Building on initiatives from the 1970s, such as the “<a href="http://corrieredelmezzogiorno.corriere.it/napoli/notizie/arte_e_cultura/2013/10-aprile-2013/fiorenza-vi-racconto-mensa-montesanto-suoi-bambini-rivoluzionari-212583530022.shtml">canteen for working class children</a>”, which sought to transform society starting with its youngest members, many urban and cultural regeneration projects have sprung up in Naples over the past 15 years. For example, the <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.it/2017/11/02/le-gomorre-servono-solo-a-scandalizzare-i-borghesi-ai-ragazzi-di-periferia-io-porto-shakespeare-la-bellezza-e-il-vero-riscatto_a_23261684/?ncid=fcbklnkithpmg00000001">Teatro dei Mendicanti</a> (Beggars’ Theatre) works to make Shakespeare accessible to children in San Giovanni a Teduccio, and <a href="http://www.iltappetodiiqbal.com/chi-siamo/">Il Tappeto di Iqbal</a> offers circus training to local kids in the district of Barra, as an alternative to roaming the streets. </p>
<p>Such projects have successfully carved out places for local communities to come together and participate in cultural, educational and artistic activities, away from the threat of violence. But there’s another form of regeneration, which is helping citizens to reclaim isolated, abandoned or inaccessible spaces throughout Naples and its surrounds – street art. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194785/original/file-20171115-19782-6hv4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194785/original/file-20171115-19782-6hv4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194785/original/file-20171115-19782-6hv4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=815&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194785/original/file-20171115-19782-6hv4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=815&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194785/original/file-20171115-19782-6hv4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=815&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194785/original/file-20171115-19782-6hv4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1024&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194785/original/file-20171115-19782-6hv4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1024&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194785/original/file-20171115-19782-6hv4qd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1024&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An evocative mural by Ernest Pignon-Ernest in Naples, Italy.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Luca Palermo</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Unlike more traditional visual arts, which are sometimes considered elitist and can be confined to specific audiences, street art speaks to all people. <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/mary-mccarthy/street-art-as-a-tool-for-_b_15329722.html">It activates</a> not only cultural, but also social, economic and political processes, developing a personal and collective sense of belonging, fostering a unique cultural identity and sparking social awareness.</p>
<p>Street art can also bring fame, and sometimes fortune, to areas which were formerly overlooked, as happened with Ernest Pignon-Ernest in Naples during the 1980s and ‘90s, and Banksy in the UK and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2017/sep/07/banksy-walled-off-hotel-palestine-gift-shop">Palestine today</a>. Today, it is empowering local people to reclaim public spaces and to shatter the “omertà” which has so long held sway over Naples.</p>
<h2>Painting Ponticelli</h2>
<p>Ponticelli is a poor, <a href="http://www.comune.napoli.it/flex/cm/pages/ServeBLOB.php/L/IT/IDPagina/31164">densely-populated district</a> in the east of the city. Many of its residents live in squalid conditions, unemployment and crime rates are high and it is also home to a Roma settlement, which is often subject to attacks and vandalism. </p>
<p>In 2015, the district was selected to host a street art project by <a href="http://www.inward.it/?platform=desktop">Inward</a>, an institute for urban creativity. Given the area’s strong Camorra presence, and its run-down and depressing architecture, Inward saw the need to give residents a renewed sense of ownership over public spaces, as well as improve the local aesthetic. </p>
<p>Inward worked hand-in-hand with the local community to install six murals on the walls of a group of dilapidated council flats, called Parco Merola. Each picture was sensitively chosen to symbolise local people, issues or events. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/3EMJkbqV2p","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<p>A 2015 work by up-and-coming artist <a href="http://www.isupportstreetart.com/artist/jorit-agoch/">Jorit AGOch</a> shows the scarred face of a young girl, recalling the continuous arson attacks against the local Roma camp. Another mural, drawn by artists Rosk and Loste, depicts two smiling children with a football, representing the power of education, aspiration and dreams. </p>
<p>Inward also encouraged the local kids to read the books that inspired the murals, by organising a massive book swap in each council block. Children were encouraged to read the books, make post-it notes and pictures, and exchange these with other children to help spark their imaginations. </p>
<p>Meanwhile in Casapesenna, in the province of Caserta, another project saw two artists – <a href="http://www.alberonero.it/">Alberonero</a> and <a href="http://giopistone.it/">Gio Pistone</a> – combine their styles to transform a degraded building in the local neighbourhood. Their work sends a message of hope for those who firmly believe that the community of Casapesenna and Caserta have the power to overcome the terror wreaked by Camorra families, and to regain possession of their territory.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194788/original/file-20171115-19789-18xr5ib.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/194788/original/file-20171115-19789-18xr5ib.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194788/original/file-20171115-19789-18xr5ib.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194788/original/file-20171115-19789-18xr5ib.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194788/original/file-20171115-19789-18xr5ib.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194788/original/file-20171115-19789-18xr5ib.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/194788/original/file-20171115-19789-18xr5ib.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Coming together in Casapesenna.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Luca Palermo</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These recent initiatives seek to provide a positive alternative to the cycle of crime, violence and death fuelled by the Camorra – offering children a model of behaviour based on imagination, optimism and freedom. As <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/michelle-young/post_3047_b_1307119.html">in Brazil</a>, street art is being used in Naples to engage with children in local communities, to prove that the neighbourhood can be a safe, collective space, and not one controlled solely by the local clans. </p>
<p>In Naples, it seems, a third city is emerging once again; one with a flourishing new street art scene, which is coaxing citizens back into public spaces, and giving the young and the marginalised a new voice to speak out against the Camorra.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/87267/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Locals use beauty in the battle to reclaim public space from the clutches of organised crime groups.Felia Allum, Senior Lecturer in Italian and Politics, University of BathLuca Palermo, Research Fellow in History of Contemporary Art, Department of Humanities and Cultural Heritage, Università della Campania "L. Vanvitelli"Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/743392017-03-23T12:02:16Z2017-03-23T12:02:16ZYoung guns take charge of Europe’s mafia clans – with deadly results<p>Over the last few years, the police and judiciary have proved largely successful in capturing and prosecuting the leadership of some of Europe’s most notorious crime syndicates. Nowhere is this clearer than in Naples – home to the Camorra, the notorious Neapolitan mafia. </p>
<p>Many of the Camorra clans that dominated the city during the 1990s and early 2000s have seen their most experienced leaders arrested and sent to prison, including <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2012/05/naples-mob-paolo-di-lauro-italy">Paolo Di Lauro</a>, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/italian-crime-boss-arrested-after-girlfriend-posts-pictures-on-facebook-2011-8?IR=T">Salvatore D’Avino</a>, <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/5351152/More-than-70-arrested-in-raids-on-Camorra-mafia.html">Raffaele Amato</a>, <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1572741/Mafia-boss-Edoardo-Contini-arrested-in-Italy.html">Edoardo Contini</a>, and many more. </p>
<p>This should be good news; the arrests of these middle-aged mob bosses mean that the criminal underworld has been emptied of charismatic leaders, disrupting the clans’ hierarchies and operations. But there have been unintended consequences. Efficient law enforcement strategies have left a vast vacuum in the Camorra, which a younger, more reckless generation of aspiring clan leaders are now vying to fill.</p>
<p>As a result, the situation in Naples is one of anarchy, instability and danger. With no guidance from established camorristi, inexperienced young men are inflicting chaos on the city. Local businesses which once formed the power base of established clans now suffer from even <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3662292/Not-just-crumbs-Naples-mobsters-extort-high-price-bread.html">greater extortion</a> and violence at the hands of their successors.</p>
<p>Turmoil in the illicit drugs trade is indicated by ever more frequent shoot outs between rival clans, as they fight over control of supply and distribution. Meanwhile, young teenagers who lack prospects in the context of <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/11e0d4b2-c056-11e6-81c2-f57d90f6741a">Italy’s stagnant economy</a> are <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/mafia-crime-wave-in-naples-blamed-on-unemployed-teenage-recruits-being-used-to-peddle-drugs-rob-and-10493634.html">easily recruited</a> as foot soldiers and drug dealers, in exchange for instant cash.</p>
<p>And whereas the previous generation tried to be discreet, this next generation of camorristi have taken to Facebook to threaten rivals, goad the police and glorify mob culture and death. They <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/09/13/mafia-gangsters-in-naples-styling-themselves-on-islamist-terrori/">imitate Islamic State</a> by growing beards and using strong language with references to terrorism, to create a sense of shared identity among their group.</p>
<p>Their latest form of power play is to drive around at night on mopeds, shooting in the air. These raids (called “stese”) are a way for young gangs to affirm their existence, intimidate citizens and threaten rivals. This behaviour has led the judiciary to speak of their crimes as <a href="http://documenti.camera.it/leg17/resoconti/commissioni/stenografici/html/24/audiz2/audizione/2017/02/08/indice_stenografico.0189.html">a form of “urban terrorism”</a>.</p>
<h2>Young lives claimed</h2>
<p>Inevitably, innocent bystanders have been caught in the crossfire: in September 2015, a 17-year-old <a href="http://www.rainews.it/dl/rainews/articoli/Ucciso-a-17-anni-papa-morto-anche-per-colpa-Stato-bfbda960-e474-45d4-816c-11e4bc93999a.html">was killed</a> as he sat on his moped while out with friends on a Saturday night. And in January 2017, a ten-year-old girl <a href="http://www.ilfattoquotidiano.it/premium/articoli/ambulanti-contro-il-pizzo-clan-feriscono-una-bimba/">got caught up</a> in a punitive shoot out. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/161794/original/image-20170321-5405-2sxiih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/161794/original/image-20170321-5405-2sxiih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/161794/original/image-20170321-5405-2sxiih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/161794/original/image-20170321-5405-2sxiih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/161794/original/image-20170321-5405-2sxiih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/161794/original/image-20170321-5405-2sxiih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/161794/original/image-20170321-5405-2sxiih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=501&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Victims of their circumstances.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/pixelthing/5564829218/sizes/l">pixelthing/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But this erratic violence is also removing the possibility of redemption for those who get caught early in their criminal careers. In his 2016 documentary <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeIjqfngCaQ">Robinù</a>, Italian journalist Michele Santoro quoted some emerging criminals, saying: “At 15, they learn how to shoot, at 20, they are killers and they don’t reach 30”. During their short lives, there is no time for traditional values. Instead, they crave celebrity status. As one young camorristi said: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Nowadays, it is those who commit the most crimes and break the most rules, who are recognised as the leaders.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Worryingly, this trend is emerging in other cities across Europe. Liverpool, England has also become a hub for drugs and arms sales, with a thriving organised crime community seeking to control these activities. There have been four murders since April 2016, which were thought to be <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-38849062">associated with local gang</a> turf wars.</p>
<p>The use of firearms, especially in turf wars, often revolves around drug markets. This remains a major concern in European cities, but appears to be low down the political and police agendas. For instance, Europol’s latest <a href="https://www.europol.europa.eu/activities-services/main-reports/european-union-serious-and-organised-crime-threat-assessment-2017">serious and organised crime threat assessment</a> clearly prioritises technological innovation, and criminals’ capacity to engage with and adapt to the digital age through new online developments such as online illicit trade, encrypted communication channels and so on. But the guns wielded by territorial clans are not virtual. They are real – and they kill.</p>
<p>In 2013, <a href="http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/flash/fl_383_en.pdf">58% of EU citizens</a> expected the level of firearms-related crime to increase over the next five years. Between July 2014 and June 2015, <a href="http://www.ilfattoquotidiano.it/2016/02/16/napoli-nelle-mani-della-camorra-sei-faide-25-gruppi-e-un-esercito-di-killer-e-procurarsi-un-arma-e-il-gioco-dei-ragazzi/2465476/5/">1,285 guns and 23,000 munitions</a> were seized in the province of Naples. And in the UK, the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/oct/20/violent-crime-in-england-and-wales-rises-police-figures">latest figures</a> up to June 2016 indicate that gun crime is also on the rise (an increase of 7%). In 2015 alone, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/sep/28/rising-number-of-guns-being-smuggled-into-uk-metropolitan-police-say">714 firearms</a> were taken off the streets of London.</p>
<p>Organised crime groups, gangs and mafias operate within a vicious world of crime, power and money. But there have been unintended consequences, since the police and judiciary have finally taken effective action against these groups. The emergence of a new generation of gang leaders suggests that effective law enforcement is not enough to dampen the incentive for young people to get involved in criminal gangs. Instead, it may be time to reconsider the impact of the principles behind some recent social and economic policies, which are affecting the lives of so many people across Europe.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/74339/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Felia Allum is an Associate Fellow at RUSI, London. </span></em></p>Police and the courts have locked up some of Europe’s most notorious mob bosses – but the next generation of would-be kingpins are even worse.Felia Allum, Senior Lecturer in Italian and Politics, University of BathLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/563822016-03-29T09:32:32Z2016-03-29T09:32:32ZWhy are some European cities better than others at dealing with garbage?<p>The end of Beirut’s <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/03/trash-pickup-resumes-lebanon-month-garbage-crisis-beirut-160320035647973.html">eight-month garbage crisis</a> may be in sight, now that trucks have begun removing the piles of rubbish accumulating in the streets to temporary landfill sites. The problems began when the city’s main landfill site <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/trash-pickup-resumes-in-lebanon-ending-eight-month-crisis-1458412632">was closed</a> last July, after local residents protested that it was at capacity. No alternative sites were provided for waste disposal, so garbage began to pile up on the city’s peripheries, and eventually in the city itself. </p>
<p>When crises like this occur in other countries, Europeans tend to congratulate themselves on their efficient waste management systems. But the recent <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/11/malaga-strike-continues-with-rubbish-clogging-streets">strike by garbage collectors</a> in the Spanish city of Málaga – which resulted in enormous rubbish heaps choking the streets – shows how not all EU members manage their waste well. </p>
<p>It’s not a new situation in Europe either: the Campania region in southern Italy has suffered serious problems with municipal waste management <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0956053X12005818">since the mid-1990s</a>. The area between Naples and Caserta has even been nicknamed the “<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/30/world/europe/beneath-southern-italy-a-deadly-mob-legacy.html">land of fires</a>”, as a consequence of the frequent blazes burning up huge mounds of illegal and hazardous wastes. </p>
<p>At one point <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/11/AR2007071100206_pf.html">in 2007</a>, the US Embassy in Rome warned Americans against travelling to Naples and its surrounds, citing health risks. The city’s tourist trade <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/why-no-one-wants-to-travel-to-naples-2015-7?r=US&IR=T">still suffers</a> from its reputation for dirty streets.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116018/original/image-20160322-32323-sck37m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116018/original/image-20160322-32323-sck37m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116018/original/image-20160322-32323-sck37m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116018/original/image-20160322-32323-sck37m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=332&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116018/original/image-20160322-32323-sck37m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116018/original/image-20160322-32323-sck37m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116018/original/image-20160322-32323-sck37m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Warm welcome.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/waxorian/4609328866/sizes/o/">waxorian/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>So why do some European countries manage their waste well, while others lurch from catastrophe to catastrophe? After all, the EU has issued directives for all its member states regarding waste disposal, so you’d expect some consistency. </p>
<h2>Not all waste is equal</h2>
<p>For one thing, the amount of municipal waste generated <a href="http://www.ec.europa.eu/eurostat">differs substantially</a> between EU countries, ranging from 747kg per capita in Denmark, to 272kg per capita in Romania in 2013. These variations reflect differences in economic wealth and consumption patterns, but also depend on how municipal waste is collected and managed. </p>
<p>Landfill has generally been the main method of municipal waste treatment and disposal in the EU. But a defining moment occurred in 1975, when <a href="http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CONSLEG:1975L0442:20031120:EN:PDF">EU laws</a> introduced the so-called “waste hierarchy”. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116618/original/image-20160329-13698-cgbf60.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116618/original/image-20160329-13698-cgbf60.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116618/original/image-20160329-13698-cgbf60.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116618/original/image-20160329-13698-cgbf60.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116618/original/image-20160329-13698-cgbf60.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116618/original/image-20160329-13698-cgbf60.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116618/original/image-20160329-13698-cgbf60.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=565&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The waste hierarchy.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The waste hierarchy indicates an order of preference for different measures to reduce and manage waste. The hierarchy prioritises waste prevention: this could include using <a href="http://ec.europa.eu/growth/industry/sustainability/ecodesign/index_en.htm">environmentally-friendly product designs</a>, implementing local waste prevention plans and financial disincentives such as landfill tax. When waste is created, the hierarchy then gives priority to direct re-use, then to recycling and recovery methods – such as energy recovery from waste to produce heat or electricity – and last of all, to disposal. </p>
<p>It was optional for member states to adopt the waste hierarchy; but there was an expectation that it would be included within national waste management laws. It was hoped that the hierarchy would protect the environment, conserve resources and minimise the amount of waste generated. </p>
<h2>Slow on the uptake</h2>
<p>For a couple of decades, very few countries took any notice of the hierarchy. High levels of landfilling continued across the EU throughout the 1990s. It wasn’t until 1999 that addressing the issue became a political priority, which led to the EU’s landmark <a href="http://ec.europa.eu/environment/waste/landfill_index.htm">landfill directive</a>. </p>
<p>Specific targets were not set for the overall reduction of disposal via landfill, but for the amount of plant and food waste sent to landfill. Further directives emphasised the need for member states to adopt the waste hierarchy. The most significant was the <a href="http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=celex%3A32008L0098">EU Waste Framework Directive</a>, introduced in 2008, which set an objective that 50% of all municipal solid waste was to be recycled or composted by 2020. </p>
<iframe src="https://charts.datawrapper.de/bTrqQ/index.html" frameborder="0" allowtransparency="true" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" webkitallowfullscreen="webkitallowfullscreen" mozallowfullscreen="mozallowfullscreen" oallowfullscreen="oallowfullscreen" msallowfullscreen="msallowfullscreen" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>But even these blanket targets offer no guarantee of successful waste management across Europe. For one thing, many countries break European laws without any obvious consequences; for example Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia <a href="http://www.cms-cmck.com/Hubbard.FileSystem/files/Publication/06f2315d-88d6-4e74-9add-a0e2c57ac543/Presentation/PublicationAttachment/9172a666-e76f-408e-95ff-a62b69a429c7/Waste%20Management%20in%20Central%20and%20Eastern%20Europe.pdf">missed the 2010 and 2013 targets</a> for diverting biodegradable municipal waste from landfill. </p>
<p>What’s more, every country takes a different approach: a huge range of combinations of recycling, composting, incineration and landfilling are used across the EU. Northern and central European countries have made most progress in terms of moving away from landfill: Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Austria, Sweden and the Netherlands landfill less than 3% of their municipal waste. Meanwhile, countries in the east and south have made <a href="http://www.cms-cmck.com/Hubbard.FileSystem/files/Publication/06f2315d-88d6-4e74-9add-a0e2c57ac543/Presentation/PublicationAttachment/9172a666-e76f-408e-95ff-a62b69a429c7/Waste%20Management%20in%20Central%20and%20Eastern%20Europe.pdf">little or no progress</a>. </p>
<h2>Waste not want not</h2>
<p>The reasons for this disparity are complicated, but factors include the availability of finance, political and social will, technical skills, suitable planning and legal frameworks, and a wide range of other social, demographic, cultural and administrative factors. The notion that decisions should be taken as closely as possible to EU citizens also means that member states are obliged to come up with waste management strategies to suit their people, rather than take a uniform approach. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, Eastern European countries which that have only recently joined the EU — such as Lithuania, Slovakia and Latvia – have not been required to use the waste hierarchy as a guiding principle. It isn’t straightforward to implement the waste hierarchy within a country: new laws must be brought in, systems for data collection and monitoring set up, and separate collection and sorting systems for different kinds of waste established.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116029/original/image-20160322-32306-mespk9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116029/original/image-20160322-32306-mespk9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116029/original/image-20160322-32306-mespk9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116029/original/image-20160322-32306-mespk9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116029/original/image-20160322-32306-mespk9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116029/original/image-20160322-32306-mespk9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/116029/original/image-20160322-32306-mespk9.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Barcelona’s waste collection sucks – in a good way.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Reciclatge_Llinars_Catalunya.JPG">1997/Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There are some good examples of what works though. Countries with strong political leadership and cross-party agreement on environmental issues – such as Germany, Denmark, Norway and Switzerland – tend to <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0956053X15001993">manage waste well</a>. What’s more, countries which view waste as a resource have found novel and productive uses for it. </p>
<p>Belgium <a href="http://www.preciousmetals.umicore.com/PMR/">recycles precious metals</a> such as gold and platinum from electronics; Germany <a href="http://www.nnfcc.co.uk/news/biogas-in-germany-a-model-to-follow-or-avoid">harvests biogas</a> from the breakdown of organic materials; Wales has focused on getting people to sort waste correctly for more effective recycling and to <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921344915301245">lower greenhouse gas emissions</a>. And the clever use of automated technology, such as <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1AbFUOIe1g">underground vacuum-powered waste disposal systems</a>, have helped keep streets clear in cities such as Barcelona, London and Copenhagen.</p>
<p>The protection of our environment is becoming an increasingly <a href="https://theconversation.com/beyond-paris-what-was-really-achieved-at-the-cop21-climate-summit-and-what-next-52320">important global priority</a>, and the political, commercial and health benefits of effective waste management are clear. With time, these facts should give countries the incentives they need to manage their waste effectively. Future waste management will become more about lifestyle choices and less about managing the wastes we generate.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/56382/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ian Williams receives funding from UK research councils and the EU. </span></em></p>Despite a series of EU laws on waste management, some countries are still a bit rubbish.Ian Williams, Professor of Engineering and the Environment , University of SouthamptonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/362772015-01-15T06:03:10Z2015-01-15T06:03:10ZThe very useful art of assessing a supervolcano without making it erupt<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/69058/original/image-20150114-3891-fqh8a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">If Campi Flegrei ever goes off, you won't want to be in Naples - or Europe!</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/emainthecoffee/476237979/in/photolist-J5QXD-drW76x-9fCX6g-8KZKw4-7iK4vz-f7KXLt-9NM1by-pMc4Ky-81Y6a2-qwfeyi-o3hwrZ-gvR4QZ-gME3KC-hycMvd-arFHsZ-pRzJ1H-7J285W-fEn3Lj-6hVsmj-6hVsmh-5ZJLMc-pNzJrG-fDL3Cw-pdQkJK-q3iRV5-a884et-kjcowK-ocz19m-otij4z-q6zDa3-cEZRW1-jvqaXU-cv6e5o-cv6ez9-fDu8na-cYbs7o-obqhor-cKTAUN-gGY9Li-iDkd3Y-b5SiDp-hdTkQe-gRiWPC-c2QDd1-cKUMNS-yrzJf-drWfkS-5XFc6w-jcK847-hJMPg7">Emanuele Nicastro</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Ever heard of <a href="http://www.volcanodiscovery.com/campi-flegrei.html">Campi Flegrei</a>? It is a supervolcano in southern Italy. Literally translating as “fields of fire,” only the <a href="http://io9.com/what-will-really-happen-when-yellowstone-volcano-has-a-508274690">Yellowstone caldera</a> in the United States has more potential to devastate. </p>
<p>The Naples urban area, with its four million inhabitants, extends within this amazing volcanic complex, though it lies mostly beneath the sea. The last time that Campi Flegrei <a href="http://www.geo.mtu.edu/volcanoes/boris/mirror/mirrored_html/Montenuovo.html">erupted was</a> less than 500 years ago, in 1538. It was one of the volcano’s smallest eruptions down the millennia, but it lasted a week and killed 24 people. </p>
<h2>The risks</h2>
<p>You may think that the chance of living in a city where the weather is nice and warm and you smell history at every corner is well worth the volcanic risk. But before buying the tickets, note that Campi Flegrei and <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/earth/collections/mount_vesuvius">Mt Vesuvius</a>, his more famous and much smaller brother (remember Pompei?) are just the visible scars of a supervolcano whose <a href="http://www.vuelco.net/campi2.php">previous eruptions</a> 35,000 and 15,000 years ago spread volcanic materials over an area of 10,000 sq km. The effects of an eruption of Campi Flegrei could dwarf those of any eruption recorded in human history, and, in the worst-case scenario, challenge human life on the old continent.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/69050/original/image-20150114-3859-13vqcls.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/69050/original/image-20150114-3859-13vqcls.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/69050/original/image-20150114-3859-13vqcls.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69050/original/image-20150114-3859-13vqcls.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69050/original/image-20150114-3859-13vqcls.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=382&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69050/original/image-20150114-3859-13vqcls.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69050/original/image-20150114-3859-13vqcls.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69050/original/image-20150114-3859-13vqcls.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=480&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Vesuvius: big brother’s little brother.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/glosters/3704149196/in/photolist-5BMQME-cCZXis-8ZASJi-dNfef1-7z1jBX-bp5avf-9LDioy-a3Rswx-a3Ui8Y-ezHgdK-6DjJvj-dXEHk9-2fuJfs-KZ9cg-gMD3zD-8ZE1qf-dYYK36-5Vje4X-9VDe23-5zkK6f-4NUrvD-4y5eLQ-cCZUfG-npkHNg-8bjVu6-7b3Wd4-nBj2ec-98LF9y-823jhT-bXgFip-8NHQEg-buGCFj-f28U3R-5uiYBD-4eZMQz-pNPkBN-bgVpdR-oS68A-4phaG8-pHCTi-49Q4MY-98EBqE-546erG-6TY9j9-98EBV1-pjfVT9-2ra2Sv-5jLZMy-bLgdR6-7t2Jqd">shipscompass</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This is possibly the moment where you start thinking about what scientists are doing to understand if and when such an eruption will take place. The good news is that the <a href="http://www.ov.ingv.it/ov/en.html">Vesuvius Observatory</a> (OV), monitoring both Mt Vesuvius and Campi Flegrei, is the oldest volcanology observatory in the world. Here geologists, geophysicists, and physicists join forces in a unique environment to understand what’s beneath these volcanoes.</p>
<h2>Drilling and drawbacks</h2>
<p>A good example is the <a href="http://www.icdp-online.org/projects/world/europe/campi-flegrei/">EU deep drilling project</a>, which the OV sponsors. The idea is simple: you drill to a depth of 2.5 miles inside Campi Flegrei caldera to get sensitive scientific data and rock samples, and obtain geothermal energy from the heated volcanic complex. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/69061/original/image-20150114-3874-1y2622y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/69061/original/image-20150114-3874-1y2622y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/69061/original/image-20150114-3874-1y2622y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69061/original/image-20150114-3874-1y2622y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69061/original/image-20150114-3874-1y2622y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69061/original/image-20150114-3874-1y2622y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=563&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69061/original/image-20150114-3874-1y2622y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=563&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69061/original/image-20150114-3874-1y2622y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=563&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Ah southern Italy: sun, sea… and lots of boiling lava.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Luca de Siena</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But what happens when you drill an active caldera like this one? As with many simple ideas, this project has been accused of being simplistic and <a href="http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2011-01/what-could-possibly-go-wrong-deep-drilling-supervolcano">somewhat dangerous</a>, due to the fact that the drilling itself may cause changes in the state of the volcanic complex, triggering earthquakes and, possibly, a volcanic eruption.</p>
<p>This is a perfect example of striking the balance between not doing enough to prevent a catastrophe, and doing too much. In the case of Campi Flegrei, the drilling was stopped by the local authority after only a preliminary hole had been drilled. <a href="http://www.icdp-online.org/projects/world/europe/iceland/">In other volcanoes</a>, the drilling caused no problems, but the debate about the safety of the technique rages on – and it has the added disadvantage of being very expensive. </p>
<p>A possible solution may come from another, completely different question: is there another way to “see” inside a volcano without drilling? Using modern technology, we can look at distant stars and inside our own bodies. Can we do the same with a volcano? The answer is that although it is not the same, we can. </p>
<h2>How attenuation tomography works</h2>
<p>You can’t use light to look into the Earth, at least not the “light” we employ to look at the cosmos. And there is no instrument that can scan a volcano like we can do with a human body. But the Earth and, to an even greater extent, volcanoes, talk to us continuously – although our ears are not particularly good at listening. Notice that I say “listening” rather than “looking,” since the sound waves from our voices are in fact the most similar to the Earth’s way of expression: earthquakes, producing elastic waves.</p>
<p>When a strong earthquake happens it is similar to a shout that we record by measuring vibrations on the Earth’s surface. We can use this shout to <a href="http://www.iris.edu/hq/files/programs/education_and_outreach/aotm/7/SeismicTomography_Background.pdf">scan the</a> deep Earth interior, looking at how and where the velocity of the waves is changed by the medium. </p>
<p>Having said that, the voice of a large tectonic earthquake is actually quite plain. A supervolcano like Campi Flegrei speaks in much more interesting and various ways, with magma and hot fluids creating a song of continuous drumbeats and blasts.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/69053/original/image-20150114-3888-m7vizx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/69053/original/image-20150114-3888-m7vizx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/69053/original/image-20150114-3888-m7vizx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69053/original/image-20150114-3888-m7vizx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69053/original/image-20150114-3888-m7vizx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=404&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69053/original/image-20150114-3888-m7vizx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=508&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69053/original/image-20150114-3888-m7vizx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=508&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/69053/original/image-20150114-3888-m7vizx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=508&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Campi Flegrei’s sulphurous nostrils.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/ekieram/1843803321/in/photolist-3NVYur-dqEhg1-oM7MZH-8Jpqj6-8JnRD4-8Jpk9t-8Jr1XQ-8Jr1wj-8JpkVD-8Jr6RN-8Jss8U-8JpNbX-8JsP2U-8JnQJi-8JnUue-8JsGXJ-8JsxqC-8JqTtS-8JqT1y-8JsPmu-8JnNuB-8Jo4ut-8JssZd-8JpLTH-8JnQg8-8JsL3N-8JsJ95-8JpHKK-8JsJyY-8JpCqM-8Jr2mA-8JsxPY-8Jrft7-8JpDEn-8JnYxz-8JqUR9-8JnN5F-8JnSBe-8Jr181-8Jptqt-8JsCR9-8JpqKP-8JpJXx-8JsBzm-8JqYBY-8JrcMu-8JpBG4-8JsALm-8JsQbm-8Jobn6">EkieraM</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Volcano seismologists use this energy to produce images of what’s inside them. Here’s how this works, in simple terms. Think of loud music coming out of a stereo (the earthquake). If the stereo is in your room, you hear it strong and clear (the louder the nearer you are to it). </p>
<p>Now put a wall between you and the stereo. The volume is lowered as the sound energy is either reflected by the wall or lost inside it. If you are able to measure which notes are lost the most and where “the wall” is you are performing an “attenuation tomography”: only that, instead of the wall, we are talking about a magmatic chamber. </p>
<p>This technique is still relatively new. The Japanese developed it for their volcanoes in the 1990s, but it is only in the past decade that it has reached the West. It has also been applied to Mt St Helen in the north-western US and some South American volcanoes, but not yet to Yellowstone. </p>
<p>In combination with other geophysical and geological observations, we have used this technique to establish that there is <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2009JB006938/abstract">no large magmatic chamber</a> under Campi Flegrei between 0km and 4km depth – at least there wasn’t during the last seismic crisis, which <a href="http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&ved=0CDYQFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Felea.unisa.it%3A8080%2Fjspui%2Fbitstream%2F10556%2F1486%2F1%2Ftesi_I_Sabbetta.pdf&ei=Os-2VOz0JYXxaozsgYAE&usg=AFQjCNHbJ398rAyVP8xGLCk7WOLnJarf3Q&sig2=NWa4TTGL3dB39srGwk0Uuw&bvm=bv.83640239,d.ZWU">was between</a> 1980 and 1984. </p>
<p>So if you were thinking about relocating to southern Italy, perhaps this suggests that you would be safe and sound. It probably does mean that there is no immediate risk of an eruption of lava or magma, though you could still see eruptions of gas and fluids (a so-called phreatic eruption). </p>
<p>The volcano is alive and “breathes,” even inside the Naples urban area. You can see it in the way its surface goes <a href="http://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/2030/">up and down</a> each year and you can smell it from the steam produced by the holes that the volcano <a href="http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/LocationPhotoDirectLink-g187785-i67186179-Naples_Province_of_Naples_Campania.html">has opened</a> on the Earth’s surface. </p>
<p>This “breathing” is a constant reminder to those living in the area, though it is possibly good news. You can think of it like a bottle of champagne continually losing pressure. Having said that, we do not know what’s happening deeper underground – except that there is probably <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2008GL034242/full">magma at a depth of 8 km</a>, which is quite a long way down, feeding both Campi Flegrei and Mt. Vesuvius. If magma is recharged and heated continuously, the pressure could grow and the lava could arrive to the surface very quickly – though with clear signs days/weeks before the eruption.</p>
<p>A volcano scientist monitoring Campi Flegrei uses all these senses to understand what he would see if we could actually drill a large hole in the ground. Although we are still not perfect at it, we have at least started listening to Campi Flegrei’s voice.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/36277/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Luca spent four years working for the Vesuvius Observatory, including three at PhD level and one as a post-doc </span></em></p>Ever heard of Campi Flegrei? It is a supervolcano in southern Italy. Literally translating as “fields of fire,” only the Yellowstone caldera in the United States has more potential to devastate. The Naples…Luca De Siena, Lecturer, University of AberdeenLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.