【正文】 or, who lived from 1799 – 1850. His books belong to the literary genre of realism. He became especially famous for a collection of novels named La Com233。die humaine . Crimes violate human rights, break up families, and unsettle people to a degree, which make them mistrust each other, and therefore derogate the development of the whole human society. All the conflicts arising from criminality should be alleviated in some way. Therefore, people, especially the authorities who govern countries, are supposed to pay much attention to this vital concern. Puzo‘s works with their realistic writing style are reflecting the actual social conditions of the timeframe he lived in. Therefore he gives his readers an exact view on the events he observed while writing his books. In our modern age we have the chance to gain an enthralling insight of the problems of America‘s in 1950‘s. Especially The Godfather with its prosaic style, shows us the onset of a crime culture with nearly Darwinist consistence in a meticulous way. The Author portrays a circle of violence that no one of the parties involved could escape, because it even manifested itself in the shelter of the family. The particular stories of the individuals, who appear in this book, lay bare the nature of capitalist society by uncovering a profound human trait, namely the pursuit for wealth and power. There is no doubt that this novel is still accurate in analyzing modern America, and even other capitalist societies. The struggle to achieve money and power continually overshadows social values like solidarity, considerateness and mutual respect. Recently several novels from modern American authors, give the same diagnosis for society. One example is Back to Blood by Tom 2 Wolfe, which was published recently2. A lack of these values is fertile ground for criminality to sprawl. What is unique about the novel is that it presents the conflicts from the perspective of the intelligent and tactical godfather. There is always someone you can learn from. The godfather, Don Corleone, shows his tremendous abilities by intelligently modifying his behavior during the interaction with different individuals. Everyone feels his accepting and understanding, which makes the ―Don‖ exceptionally successful in leading a group and maintaining his Mafia In this paper, I will illustrate the conflicts and analyze their causes. Afterwards I will present potential ways on how the conflicts can be resolved. 3 I. The Phenomenon of the American Social Conflicts in The Godfather The foundation of social conflicts is the struggle for power in society. Social conflicts or group conflicts occur, when two or more actors oppose each other in social interaction, reciprocally exerting social power in an effort to attain scarce or inpatible goals and prevent the opponent from attaining them. It is a social relationship wherein the action is oriented intentionally for carrying out the actor‘s own will against the resistance of other However, contradictions are universal, absolute, existing in the whole processes of the development of things, and running through all processes from the beginning to the end. Where conflicts are, there will be obstacles. At the same time proper conflicts induce progress. This is at least true as long as the parties of contradictions can e to an agreement under some conditions. If such conflicts and their resolutions are not available, people will create them, if The Godfather tells a story about an Italian American family, with roots in Sicilia. Sicilian anized crime was a dominating manifestation of crime during that timeframe, and is even wellknown There are various levels of conflicts in The Godfather. Clashes are ubiquitous at any time, such as the quarrel between lovers, different interests among opponents and different ethnic groups, as well as various religious believes among people. Yet only a few conflicts also have a criminal dimension. This article deciphers these kinds of conflicts, by describing the phenomenon of criminality, analyzing the causes and gives solutions about how to reduce criminality as effectively as possible. A. The Criminal Activities 4 There are multifaceted criminal activities which are illustrated in the The Godfather. However they can be categorized by differentiating the particular Criminal offenders and the victims. All in all there are three different categories of crime that occur in the novel. The following section gives examples of each category and presents the connections between them. 1. Criminal Actions Committed by Civilians Towards Civilians To a lot of people who lived in that timeframe America seemed to be a paradise, a place with uncountable opportunities and perfect social conditions, where everyone could reach their dreams if they want. It is said that America is a country where quality, fairness, happiness and fortune prevailed. This is the main reason why so many immigrants came to the United States to pursue their American Is it true, that only fairness and fortune can be found in America? There is following example: Two months ago he took her for a drive. He had a masculine friend with him. They made her drink whiskey and then they tried to take advantage of her. She resisted. She kept her honor. They beat her. Like an animal. When I went to the hospital she had two black eyes. Her nose was broken. Her jaw was shattered. They had to wire it together. She wept through her pain. ?Father, Father, why did they do it? Why did they do this to me?‘ And I wept.‖ Bonasera could not speak further, he was weeping now though his voice had not betrayed his 5 This introductory part of the book narrates how an innocent girl suffered from a traumatic experience: Amerigo Bonasera‘s daughter