Calogero Vizzini - Legacy

Legacy

Although Vizzini throughout his lifetime acquired extensive land holdings, the Mafia historian Salvatore Lupo considers him to be the undertaker of the large feudal estates rather than the protector of that system. Vizzini also made sure that local peasants (in particular the ones organised in catholic cooperatives) got their share of land, once he had secured his cut. When land reform was finally enacted in 1950, mafiosi like Vizzini were in a position to perform their traditional role of brokerage between the peasants, the landlords, and the state. They were able to exploit the intense land hunger of the peasants, gain concessions from the landlords in return for limiting the impact of the reform, and make substantial profits from their mediation in land sales.

Vizzini was the archetype of the paternalistic "man of honour" of a bygone age, that of a rural and semi-feudal Sicily that existed until the 1960s, where a mafioso was seen by some as a social intermediary and a man standing for order and peace. Although he used violence to establish his position in the first phase of his career, in the second stage he limited recourse to violence, turned to primarily legal sources of gain, and exercised his power in an open and legitimate fashion.

He represented a Mafia that controlled power and did not let power control them, according to German sociologist Henner Hess. To make a good impression, or fare figura, is important: "they enjoy the respect shown them, they enjoy power, but they do not wish to give rise to its discussion. They know very well that behind the veil of modesty power is felt to be all the more uncanny." Italian journalist Indro Montanelli quoted a typical remark by Don Calò: "A photograph of me? Whatever for? I'm no one. I'm just a citizen. … It is strange … People think that I don’t talk much from modesty. No. I don’t talk much because I don’t know much. I live in a village, I only rarely go to Palermo, I know few people…"

"When I die, the Mafia dies," Vizzini once told Montanelli. However, with the death of Vizzini his old-fashioned traditional rural Mafia slowly passed away to be replaced with a more modern, often urban version of gangsterism involved in cigarette smuggling, drug trafficking and laundering their proceeds in construction and real-estate development. While still alive and after his death Vizzini’s stature as an all powerful Mafia boss rose to mythical proportions. Since the 1990s historians have moderated his magnitude.