The analysis and containment of organized crime in Europe: an interview with Cyrille Fijnaut

Abstract

This email interview with Cyrille Fijnaut was conducted during 2013 and 2014. It discusses Fijnaut’s background, influences, career and current thinking and activities from his early career in the Dutch police in the 1960s, through to his work as a criminologist for academia and governments. His main research interests are related to organized crime and terrorism, international police and judicial cooperation, comparative criminal procedure and police law, the history of European and American criminology and of policing in Europe, and police and judicial cooperation in the Benelux. In these fields he has written and edited some 75 books and published hundreds of articles in national and international journals and edited books. In 2004 he edited together with Letizia Paoli, Organized Crime in Europe: Concepts, Patterns and Control Policies in the European Union and Beyond. In addition he has worked in the last 20 years as an expert for a number of governmental and parliamentary committees of inquiry in Belgium and the Netherlands with regard to organized and professional crime problems and in relation to security issues. Currently he is working on a book on the future of police and judicial cooperation in the framework of the internal and external security policies of the European Union.