The problem of organized crime is the concept of organized crime itself. This study argues over what constitutes the substantial relations of connection that are contingently-necessary for the commission of serious crimes and provides a research program with three basic dimensions: abstract research, employing conceptual analysis to isolate in-thought the different causal mechanisms believed to produce certain kinds of serious crime; concrete research into the conjuncture of these mechanisms in definite contexts, to corroborate their existence and identify other mechanisms; and a synthesis of abstract and concrete research findings, with insights from extensive research into crime patterns, to question interrelationships between the commission of different serious crimes. Such synthesis is particularly important in avoiding an event-orientation in criminological research, which can obscure social interrelationships, even interdependencies, between legally discrete activities, such as trafficking in drugs, humans, and armaments, and limiting meaningful causal explanation. Table, notes, and references