Global Crime and Deviance PDF

**Crime and deviance:** **globalisation and crime** **Corporate crime** Corporate crime often operates on a global scale across national boundaries. It involves a range of, often complicated activities, such as **false accounting**, **price fixing** and **tax evasion** as well as environmental da...

**Crime and deviance:** **globalisation and crime** **Corporate crime** Corporate crime often operates on a global scale across national boundaries. It involves a range of, often complicated activities, such as **false accounting**, **price fixing** and **tax evasion** as well as environmental damage known as **green crime**. Ian Taylor argues that **TNCs** (**transnational corporations**) engage in a range of different corporate crimes which take place across national borders. Manufacturing organisations often move production to less economically developed countries such as India, China, the Philippines and Bangladesh to reduce labour costs. They then transport the finished goods to markets in Europe and North America. But they often engage in the **violation of labour laws** in these poor countries by employing workers for long hours, in dangerous conditions and they sometimes employ children. **Deregulation** of trade has also opened up opportunities for financial crimes such as **insider trading**, **corruption** and **money laundering**. **Marketisation** as a broad economic policy throughout the developed world has created i**ndividualisation** and rapacious wealth accumulation. This has undermined **social cohesion** and increased inequality which in turn creates more ordinary street crime and domestic crime. Corporate crime can be explained by a number of theories. Sutherland's theory of **differential association** argues that the more that employees in a corporation or business associate with others that take criminal practices for granted, the more that they will also consider those practices as normal and acceptable. So, a deviant culture becomes institutionalised. Marxist theories claim that corporate crime is part of the **logic of capitalism**; meaning that according to Steve Tombs and Laureen Snider it's the drive to cut costs and increases profits. If profit margins fall, then there is a temptation to break regulations and laws to increase profits. Marxists such as Stephen Box argue that the capitalist class then avoid the attention of the police and authorities as a result of the media's the use of complex language to explain vast and complicated criminal activities. He calls this the **mystification of corporate crime** and argues that it's designed to desensitise the wider population to the global extent of the problem. Rothe and Friederichs argue that the activities of global financial organisations such as the **IMF** (International Monetary Fund) and the **World Bank** create the conditions which increase crime. They offer capital investment to developing countries, but on the condition that they accept **structural adjustment programmes**. These stipulate that the country must marketise their economy to get the investment. This may mean cutting public spending on healthcare, housing and education in addition to privatising public services such as water and energy. These policies may attract foreign investment but often result in cuts to workforces which increase unemployment and the cuts in funding to health and social care create further hardship. Subcultures thrive in these conditions; so, problems such as drug related crime, prostitution, gang membership and violent crime all increase. **Organised crime** Organised crime such as the mafias and the drug cartels have scant regard for national borders and operate through vast global networks. It's referred to in criminology as **TOC** (**Transnational Organised Crime**). According to the United Nations TOC generates over \$900 billion a year; this amounts to 1.5% of global Gross Domestic Product (GDP). However, others such as Misha Glenny claim that, in reality, this figure is about ten times higher. The main activities of TOC are the drugs trade, human trafficking for sexual exploitation or labour exploitation as well as a range of trading activities including firearms, natural resources (e.g. precious metals), medicines, animals and animal products (e.g. ivory) and human organs. More recently, they've also become involved in **cyber-crime**. Hobbs and Dunningham argue that although TOC operates on a global scale, to be effective it must also be rooted in local communities. This is because the crime organisations must be very much in tune with and aware of changing local markets. If a product is no longer wanted on the streets or a new product is in demand, the organisation must have flexible, entrepreneurial operatives who will adapt to the changing market. They therefore call this **glocal crime** because of the relationship between global organised crime and the local operatives. The sex industry is an example of how criminal organisations have to have an understanding of local markets. But they need the global networks to organise the **human trafficking** of vulnerable women. Ehrenreich and Hochschild explain that these organisations prey on poor women in less economically developed countries. They lure them or trick them into going to wealthy urban centres in the west to be used as care workers and domestic workers but often to be sold into prostitution. One tactic behind human trafficking is **debt bondage**. This is done by loaning a struggling person money and then charging them extortionate interest on the repayments. When they can't repay the loan, they're trapped and desperate. So, they're told the only way to pay off the debt is to go and work abroad or send their sons and/or daughters to work abroad. Thousands of people from the **developing world** *are trafficked into wealthy countries where they're exploited in a range of workplaces such as construction sites, hotels, kitchens, shops and even trapped in peoples' homes in **domestic servitude** (unpaid labour) which is a form of **modern slavery**.* Misha Glenny examined how TOC grew as a result of the collapse of the Soviet Union (Communist Russia and its satellite states in Eastern Europe). After the collapse of centralised state control of the economy, the new Russian government allowed for a chaotic and lawless process of marketisation and privatisation. The new capitalists needed tight security in the midst of this lawlessness and so turned to the organised crime networks. They seized the opportunity to grow in power and influence and ultimately became global powers. Most global organised crime networks are based on a '**zones of production, distribution and consumption' model.** For example, the Russian mafias control the zone production of heroin in central Asia, the zone of distribution is through Eastern Europe and the zone of consumption (where the drug is sold) is on the streets of European and American urban centres. Glenny also notes how flexible and adaptable TOC is. They will often switch to whatever product or whatever activity will ensure the flow of income. So, they may smuggle cigarettes, manufacture synthetic drugs, trade precious metals and increasingly turn to cyber-crime such as financial scams. There is also evidence that corporate criminals collaborate with TOC networks by laundering the profits of organised crime. **Money laundering** is the processing of illegitimate money through legitimate banks so that the money will then appear perfectly legal. To achieve this there must be co-operation between criminal organisations and commercial banks. The accusation is that legitimate and often well-respected banks allow this to happen in the full knowledge that the source of the money is criminal. Financial centres such as Dubai are notorious for this, but more recently both New York's and London's financial centres have been accused of facilitating money laundering. **Green crime** Green crimes include a range of activities such as the release of greenhouse gases, dumping toxic waste, deforestation and water pollution. Most of this is done by corporations; so is often a form of **corporate crime**, but organised crime is also involved. Green crime is a form of global crime because emissions and waste do not just damage the immediate locality but spread throughout the globe. However, most of these activities are not illegal. So many green criminologists take a **transgressive approach** to green crime. This is the view that many legal activities should be regarded as crimes. In other words, they transgress the boundary between what is officially considered a crime and what is not. So, car manufacturing is perfectly legal but it's one of the most environmentally destructive human activities. Although some green criminologists consider only environmental harm that breaks the law to be a green crime, most such as Rob White and Nigel South adopt the transgressive approach. They take a critical/Marxist approach and consider the capitalist drive to increase production and to increase profits as the cause of much environmental damage. So rather than accepting the laws of the capitalist state they take the transgressive approach of using **zemiology** which is simply the study of harm. So, the question is simply; does a human activity harm the natural environment? If so, then it should be considered a crime. Rob White argues that there are broadly three views of environmental harm. First is the **environmental justice** approach which he describes as **anthropocentric**. This is because it's concerned with the impact of environmental harm on human beings and is often the approach taken by governments and corporations. But he argues it's flawed because it fails to see the significance of harm to the entire ecosystem. The second approach is **ecological justice** which he describes as **ecocentric**. This means that it sees harm to any section of the ecosystem, be it the soil or the rivers or the rainforests as detrimental to the entire ecosystem and indirectly to human beings as well. For example, the acidification of the oceans may not appear to impact on humans because we don't live in the oceans. But the oceans are losing the ability to absorb carbon dioxide which contributes to the increase in global temperatures and desertification which reduces the capacity to produce food for human beings. The third approach is **species justice** which focuses on the abuse of animal species and their habitats. It's argued that the planet is experiencing a phase of mass extinction which most governments and corporations are oblivious to. Nigel South has also noted that there is **environmental discrimination** meaning that while wealthy countries and wealthy individuals are mostly protected from the impact of crimes against the environment, poor countries and poor communities are the worst affected. He divides green crimes into two distinct categories. The first are **primary green crimes** which are activities that have an immediate impact on the environment. Within this category there are broadly four activities. These are air pollution (the release of the greenhouse gases; carbon dioxide and methane), water pollution (the release of toxic chemicals, nuclear waste and plastics into the rivers and oceans), deforestation (the clearing of the rainforests for agriculture) and species decline (millions of species have become extinct due to recent human activity). The second are **secondary green crimes** which are activities that are indirectly linked to green crime. These include the violent suppression of environmental campaign groups such as arresting and even killing campaigners. In 2019 over 200 activists were killed by agents for business and, in some cases, by government agencies. Most were killed in campaigns against deforestation in South America. There's also the problem of companies giving waste disposal contracts to **eco-mafias** which, instead of undertaking the costly process of safely disposing of toxic waste, find somewhere convenient to dump it thus contaminating the local environment. Ulrich Beck argues that globalisation has contributed to the creation of what he calls **risk society**. There is an increasing sense that there are a range of unseen and uncontrollable threats that are placing both individual human life at risk and the planet's existence at risk. These include the risk of diseases from asthma due to air pollution to life-threatening epidemics as a result of animal use and abuse. But also, the risk of bush fires, flooding, coastal erosion and food shortages due to depletion of soil nutrients. All of these have contributed to an unsettling awareness of the dangers that Beck calls **global risk consciousness**. He also makes that point that while so much industrial and technological innovation has contributed to the wellbeing of humans, such as cars, aeroplanes, fridges and convenience foods they've also contributed to climate change and so he describes these as **manufactured risks**.