Existence in the outskirts of Rome, Italy, with gangster moving north (7)
I believe the answer is:
reality
'existence' is the definition.
(reality is a kind of existence)
'outskirts of rome italy with gangster moving north' is the wordplay.
'outskirts of' means to remove the middle letters (only letters on the outskirts).
'italy' becomes 'it'.
'with' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'gangster' becomes 'al' (Al Capone).
'moving north' becomes 'y' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'rome' with its middle removed is 're'.
'it' put after 'al' is 'alit'.
're'+'alit'+'y'='REALITY'
'in the' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for reality that I've seen before include "as some TV programmes purport to show" , "Actual existence" , "Type of television" , "The way things are, no illusions" , "Fact" .)