Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #104648 in Books
• Published on: 2008-04-03
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 432 pages

Review
meticulous, dangerous and groundbreaking three-year investigation into the world of international organised crime
--Tribune

`Beg, buy or borrow a copy - just don't steal it'
--Word Magazine

Sunday Times Culture
`Misha Glenny made his reputation as a BBC reporter during the break-up of the Soviet empire and in the Balkan wars. Those experiences introduced him to the murky, bloody, terrifyingly successful operations of the East European mafias, dominated by Russians. For this book, Glenny has extended his researches worldwide. He describes gang operations in Bombay, sex slavery and money-laundering in Israel, the Canadian marijuana trade, Nigerian investment scams, Brazilian cyber-crime and much else. His message is that the global marketplace has empowered criminals on a huge and terrifying scale.... He tells a grisly story very well'

Mail on Sunday
`Like a journalistic Indiana Jones he has travelled the world in search of his prey, displaying impressive stamina, intellectual chutzpah and physical bravery on the way... This is the most important non-fiction book of the year so far'

Customer Reviews

Disturbing but enlightening
Living in a 'nice', law abiding country like the UK it's easy to be ignorant of, or turn a blind eye to the darker side of life that most people on earth have to deal with on a day-to-day basis.

My wife is Russian and her family lived through the collapse of the USSR and the period they refer to as 'The Lawless Times' in the early 90s. Speaking to them about it brings home just how tough you had to be to survive back then, and it's no surprise that some people rose to the top to fill the vaccuum left when the forces of law and order collapsed.

Tough people took what they could, weaker people suffered - along with their families. We're now living with the consequences of this collapse and the following rise of criminal gangs to the size multi-national corporations.

This book covers much more than the collapse of the communist states, and shows how the networks of criminality have linked up across continents and become powerful, sophisticated money making machines that thrive on the suffering of others.

Eye opening and a little frightening, this book will change your perspective on the world and will help you understand how the 'nice' countries like ours are the ones that have made these enormous empires possible through things like our demand for recreational drugs and sex with foreign prostitutes.

very well written and highly recommended.

Alarming and intriging
An excellent expose and account of what is happening in our world today.
We are all culpable and this is the frightening part. Read the book to see why and how. It's very well researched, and has the quality of a first rate thriller.

McMafia - powered by illegal drugs
McMafia is an argument for the legalisation of drugs. Without explicitly demanding such a thing, it gives the best possible argument for legalising all narcotics; that drug money is the engine of the McMafia.
Misha Glenny covers many more McMafia activities; cigarette smuggling, investment scams, slavery, fake goods, intimidation etc, but behind them all lies drugs and the massive profits they engender.
He points out that we in the west are largely to blame. We buy the fake DVDs, hire the slaves and turn a blind eye to the sweatshops. Mainly, we buy the drugs.
The author's point is that so long as the drug barons grow fat on human misery, so will the McMafia thrive.
A riveting read.