IKOC Improving Knowledge on Organised Crime

Project IKOC is financed by the European Commission, DG Research, under the VI Framework Programme for Scientific Research and Technological Development.
Project IKOC started on 1 May, 2004 and will last 2 years, the deadline being 30 April, 2006.

• The demand for a knowledge-based European approach

Despite forceful demand for a sound knowledge-based common European approach to combating organised crime, research on the matter is highly fragmented. The intention of the IKOC Project is to piece the fragments together and to introduce value added by elaborating a methodology to measure the volume and impact of organised criminal activities.

• Goal of the Project

The goal of this Project is twofold:

• to update knowledge of organised crime, with specific regards to 1) the organised criminal groups operating in EU Member States (types of groups, their organisational structure, and the socio-economic and cultural framework in which they operate), and 2) the activities they carry out in both legal and illegal markets and their related modi operandi;
• to elaborate a methodology to develop a knowledge-based common European approach to organised crime and to examine its feasibility.

• Objectives of the Project

In order to achieve this general goal, the Project has two main objectives:

Objective n. 1: to update knowledge of organised crime, with specific regards to 1) the organised criminal groups operating in EU Member States (types of groups, their organisational structure, and the socio-economic and cultural framework in which they operate), and 2) the activities they carry out in both legal and illegal markets and their related modi operandi.

Objective n. 2: to elaborate a methodology to develop a knowledge-based common European approach to organised crime and to examine its feasibility.