Visible fakes, invisible criminals
Counterfeiting and organised crime in Türkiye
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21647124 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Dilara Bural (0000-0003-0998-8636, University of Pennsylvania, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Publication date | 2026-07-09 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Trends in Organized Crime (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1084-4791 • E-ISSN: 1936-4830 |
| Publisher | Springer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1007/s12117-026-09609-4 |
| OpenAlex | W7167791637 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 36 |
Product counterfeiting is a global illicit market with significant economic, regulatory, and consumer-safety implications. Türkiye is consistently ranked among the world’s principal source economies for counterfeit goods and has received growing attention from international law enforcement bodies for its role in supplying European markets. Yet the relationship between counterfeiting and organised crime in the Turkish context remains poorly understood. Drawing on 49 semi-structured interviews with judges, prosecutors, trademark attorneys, law enforcement officials, and organised crime experts, this article examines the conditions under which organised crime becomes involved in counterfeiting in Türkiye. The findings reveal a complex and contingent relationship shaped by legal definitions, market structures, and enforcement practices. Counterfeiting in Türkiye cannot be characterised either as uniformly controlled by organised crime or as entirely disconnected from it. Rather, it operates along a continuum of organisation ranging from informal entrepreneurship to coercive, clan-based, and transnational criminal arrangements. The article supports enterprise and network-based models of organised crime and has implications for both enforcement policy and criminological theory on illicit markets
Counterfeit · Enforcement · Entrepreneurship · Grey market · Informal sector · Law enforcement · Organised crime · Crime Patterns and Interventions · Crime, Illicit Activities, and Governance · Cybercrime and Law Enforcement Studies
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Con Air
Using thematic analysis in psychology
| Highly cited | No |
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