Human Trafficking and Migrant Smuggling in Southeast Europe and Russia ― Criminal Entrepreneurship and Traditional Culture

Through unprecedented access to over 100 court files and sentences and interviews with police and security personnel in both origin and destination countries, this book provides the most comprehensive exploration to date of human trafficking and migrant smuggling in Eastern Europe and Russia.
Human Trafficking and Migrant Smuggling in Southeast Europe charts the development and organization of the complex criminal networks involved in trafficking and smuggling, paying particular attention to: the entrepreneurship of criminals; social control mechanisms; the 'intermediate' structures, (such as transport modalities, safe houses, and embassies); financial modalities, and; the perspectives and agency of victims. Enriched with many case studies informed by police and judicial information, the book draws on interdisciplinary perspectives and will be of great interest to both criminologists and anthropologists studying international organized crime.

Johan Leman is Emeritus Professor in Social and Cultural Anthropology at the Faculty of Social Sciences at KU Leuven, Belgium.

Stef Janssens is an analyst of human trafficking and the smuggling of migrants. He has acted as an advisor to Belgian parliamentary commissions on organized crime and trafficking and to the US Embassy in Belgium. He is currently an associate member of the Leuven Institute of Criminology, KU Leuven, Belgium.