Eating with the Mafia : belonging and violence

This article presents a reading of the place of food in a variety of texts which concern the Mafia. In many organizations, food often seems to be symbolically deployed as a representation of community through commensality. However, in the Mafia, unlike many contemporary organizations, food preparation and consumption appears not to be relegated to liminal times and spaces, but to be a central part of being a Mafiosi. The article explores this idea in terms of the connections between metaphors of community and family in the Mafia and in legal business organizations, and then the tensions between community and violence in the Mafia and in legal business organizations. After a consideration of the partial dislocation of women and food in the Mafia, the article concludes with some reflections on organizations and belonging

Social networking in family businesses in a local economy

Small, family owned businesses make considerable contributions to local economies. The importance of social networks to their development is also well established. This paper explores the different types of distinct, but interlocking, social networks of a rural business family, focussing upon the interaction between family, business and friendship networks. It presents a multi-rational logic framework to consider how the differing logics of each of these network influences the development and behaviour of family businesses. The changes in networks over time and between generations of the family are also analysed and gaps or structural holes within the networks identified. Implications for research and policy are then set out.div_BaM32pub4755pub