The Meaning of Discourses as an Analytical Framework for Organized Crime

“Organized Crime 3.0” is a collaborative German-wide research project aiming to provide a thorough empirical overview on organized crime in Germany. The project employs a mixed-methods design in which both quantitative and qualitative methodological approaches are combined to collect and analyze a large variety of data. Combining qualitative interviews with professionals (e.g. police officers, lawyers, prosecutors etc.) and incarcerated persons with the analysis of criminal case files and parliamentary documents, we find it helpful to employ a discourse perspective to bring out both the specific problematization of organized crime and its importance for strategies of combatting organized crime. Within our talk, we want to present our empirical results from the different data analyses and show what can be gained from a discourse perspective on organized crime. In this way, the paper aims to not only present the current empirical situation of organized crime in Germany but also discuss new theoretical-methodological perspectives which could contribute to an overall better understanding of complex crime phenomena.