In the life of each state there are several layers of society. Russia is no exception. One of these “unofficial” layers is the thieves community. This informal and illegal organization is a kind of state in a state.
Thieves' concepts and laws passed to the USSR from pre-revolutionary Russia. However, over time, they changed several times.
The community lives in accordance with an unwritten set of rules that strictly regulate the life of the underworld. Thieves' concepts and laws describe in detail the rights and obligations of thieves, their behavior. These rules change over time.
According to an unwritten rule that has existed for many years, the whole world for thieves is divided into strangers and ours. Thieves' law applies only to its own, it is a kind of corporate rules. Aliens may not obey the law. They are generally needed solely so that at their expense they can survive their own.
Since the mid-twentieth century, the thieves' law has been gradually modified. It applies to all prisoners, but gives significant relief to the thieves community.
So, for example, a thief in law was obliged to lead a brightly asocial lifestyle until the 80s. A thief in law is a leader of criminals, a person who occupies the highest level of the thieves' hierarchy, dedicated. He had to serve several times in prison. He was forbidden to marry, work, communicate with any representatives of the law.
Today, these rules have almost no effect. Until the 60s, the thieves community was international, united. After the 80s, it broke up into groups on a territorial basis, thieves' laws and concepts changed.
Nevertheless, today the thieves' world successfully competes with civilized business and even surpasses it in many respects.
All members of the community must comply with the thieves law. It is not just invented: it is formed from thieves' orders. This is the name of the new rules that can be adopted in disputes and in new situations that have not taken place before.
Like any society, a thieves' organization has not only its own laws, but also its own language (argo, fenya). Its purpose is the same as that of any language of declassed elements: to identify its own, to transmit information in a practically encrypted form, incomprehensible to others.
Thieves' law does not impose a duty on community members to use it. However, owning it is taken for granted.
Thieves' law for a long time had some positive aspects. Thieves in law carefully monitored the “correctness” of their members. There were certain attitudes, it was strictly determined what was possible and what could not be done. The organization reigned in law and order, to which all its members obeyed.
To date, thieves' law can no longer provide complete submission. In criminal gangs, people appeared who did not recognize any (neither thieves, nor state) laws (the so-called scumbags). Often conflicts arise between territorial groups, and a person who has never been in prison can become a thief in law.
All together, this indicates the degradation of the thieves community.