Ep. 136: Are organized crime gangs states? feat. Keith Preston

The Mindcrime Liberty Show discusses with Keith Preston whether organized crime and street gangs are like states/megacorps. What is the relationship between street gangs, organized crime and the formal state? Is Thaddeus Russell right in that crime gangs have provided America (and elsewhere) a steady stream of goods/services that the formal society outlaws and thereby a kind of material freedom? In the US, gangs provided alcohol during prohibition and in certain state socialist countries there was a trade in iconography/religious artifacts. Do certain gangs and organized crime syndicates resemble the state itself? Do they rival the state in certain areas or are they even the de facto “State” such as in parts of Somalia, Russia, Mexico and Lebanon?. In certain areas the police/state might not be the most powerful monopolist in power even in so-called first world countries. What should libertarians and anarchists think about these organizations?