This text is an assessment of organised crime in America and of the law enforcement strategies and activities to control it since the Prohibition era. This survey addresses the key questions and analyses the issues that make up the debate historically about the nature of organised crime, its roots, causes, forms, growth, and control, and, above all, its pernicious effect upon the economic, social, political and moral life of the nation. This one-volume reference defines key problems and recent trends, reviews the basic research about organised crime, describes organised crime groups and their operations through the years, and surveys the broad range of government policies and operations to control crime during the 20th century. Interdisciplinary audiences, specialists in criminal justice and deviant behaviour, and general readers should consider it useful reading given the major new challenges that crime poses for Americans in the 1990s. Lengthy bibliographical data and a full index enrich this study for the use of college, university, organisational, and public libraries.