Reducing the Risk of Corporate Irresponsibility: The Trend to Corporate Social Responsibility (original) (raw)

Criminal Sanctions for Corporate Misbehavior: A Call for Capitalist Punishment

Humanity & Society, 1982

This paper probably had its earliest beginnings in the days when I was a newspaper reporter, and first noticed that corporate or white collar offenders were penalized only with the greatest reluctance and only after the greatest deliberation. At the same time, the American criminal justice system developed the most callous disregard for lengths of time in the sentencing of street criminals, achieving the longest prison terms in the world while constantly decrying the leniency of judges. As a conscientious objector during the Vietnam War, I first began to ponder the meaning of violence, and the American ability to be so retributive to some forms of it, while ignoring completely acts which could completely destroy human hope, security, and emotion. Only a small piece of the picture is discussed here. Temporarily ignoring individual offenders, if we choose to use the criminal law to prosecute corporate entities for their acts of violence and destruction, how can we develop penalties for these organizations which are suitable, but which do not simply spread the net of unhappiness by predating even more innocent workers and citizens? (MDS)

Beyond Criminal Sanction and Negotiation: Public Governance as New Corporate Deterrence

There is significant debate over the best strategy for dealing with white collar offenders and corporate criminals. Some would argue that the best way forward involves better industry and corporate regulation while others argue that the problem is that punishments are too mild and lack stigma. Given the domination of neo-liberalism and some corporations are ‘too big to fail’, any innovative thoughts in crime prevention need to break the ice of such political and ideological power. Beyond state intervention, what the compliance school so far ignores is the role of public governance in corporate deterrence. This article argues that public governance could be a more effective preventive and deterrent mechanism for corporate or white-collar crime. The state should legally and financially empower individuals, communities, and non-governmental organisations in investigating and deterring corporations.

The Conventional Problem with Corporate Sentencing (and One Unconventional Solution)

New Criminal Law Review, 2021

A recent wave of expressive accounts of corporate criminal law operate on the promise that corporate punishment can express a unique form of condemnation not capturable through civil enforcement. Unfortunately, the realities of corporate sentencing have thus far failed to make good on this expressive promise. Viewed in light of existing conventions that imbue meaning into our practices of punishment, corporate sentences rarely impose hard treatment in a manner or degree that these conventions seem to require. Accordingly, standard corporate sanctions turn out to be ill-suited to deliver—and, often, will likely undermine—the stigmatic punch upon which expressive defenses of corporate criminal law depend. A common response to this conventional problem with corporate sentencing has been to propose more, and harsher, corporate punishments. However, this approach overlooks the extent to which corporate punishment derives its stigmatic force from preexisting norms and conventions concerning individual punishment. If trying to improve corporate punishment, then, expressivists might instead seek either to leverage or to dismantle the underlying conventions that give existing sanctions meaning. An example of the former strategy would be to revitalize long-neglected proposals for corporate shaming by adopting a criminal convention currently absent from the corporate space—namely, the pervasive, stigmatic application of epithets like “thief” or “felon.” An example of the latter would be to join criminal justice reformers in targeting conventions that, in recent decades, have enabled increasingly draconian sentencing practices. On this view, dissolving corporate sentencing’s conventional problem may represent a further, incidental benefit of systemic criminal justice reform.

Redefining criminality: Public attitudes to corporate and individual offending

This briefing by David Ellis and David Whyte is the second of two briefings the Centre has published on public attitudes to questionable conduct by the state, corporations and individuals. The first briefing – Redefining corruption – revealed deep public concern at the collusive relationship between successive governments and powerful private interests. This included strong support for a ban on 'revolving door' appointments, where former ministers and civil servants join private companies they have worked closely with while in government. In this briefing, the authors compare public attitudes to corruption committed by people in positions of power, with attitudes towards petty offending such as joyriding and shoplifting. The results are striking. When asked to compare police manipulation of evidence with shoplifting, 96 per cent said they considered police manipulation of evidence as on par with, or more serious than, shoplifting. Only one per cent considered shoplifting a more serious offence. Ninety-five per cent considered a pharmaceutical company overcharging the NHS as on par with, or more serious than, joyriding. Only two per cent considered joyriding the more serious offence. Despite the seriousness with which the public view such state and corporate offending, it is those suspected of petty offences such as shoplifting and joyriding who are far more likely to face arrest, prosecution and punishment. And as the authors point out, 'even in the unlikely event that corporations or their executives are punished for criminal or regulatory offences, those convictions are rarely followed by the type of stigma and social disadvantage that affects other types of offenders'. The authors are not arguing that corporate criminals should be subjected to long prison sentences. But they do propose sanctions for corporate and state crime that might be more in keeping with the seriousness with which the public view such offences. These range from public shaming – an advert in a newspaper for instance – to a 'corporate death penalty', in which major corporate malfeasance might result in forced nationalisation or company closure. This briefing therefore raises a number of important questions for anyone interested in how harmful practices – whether perpetrated by individuals or collectively by corporate or state bodies – might best be responded to and reduced.

Accountability and the Control of Corporate Crime: Making the Buck Stop

Within modern industrialised societies corporate crime tends to be dealt with by applying public sanctions to the corporation, on the assumption that the organisation can then be left to discipline the individuals responsible. However, the law makes little or no auempt to ensure that this happens. This has led some to argue that sanctions should be directly applied to responsible individuals in the case of corporate criminal activities. There are a number of problems with this position. Considerable practical difficulties confront outside investigators in sheeting home responsibility to individuals within large and complex organisations, where the cooperation of the corporation itself is not forthcoming. Moreover, it may not always be a just and effective means of social control. T he more promising approach would seem to be in structuring public enforcement systems in such a way as to activate and monitor the private justice systems of corporate defendants. A number of the ways in which this can be achieved are discussed.