Regulation and governance versus criminology: Disciplinary divides, intersections, and opportunities

Abstract

This paper seeks to bridge the disciplinary gap between regulation and governance studies, and criminology. Based on a review of theoretical and empirical work on corporate crime, this paper argues that divergent approaches to questions of individual agency, localized variety, and political context, have drawn these two disciplines in different directions. Regulatory governance scholarship has thrived as a discipline, but has also narrowed its focus around these issues. Corporate criminology offers a means of broadening this focus by drawing attention to the normative theorizing behind the regulatory project. At the same time, however, insights drawn from regulatory governance scholarship can prompt corporate criminology to innovate by broadening the scope of its engagement beyond the sphere of traditional criminal justice. The paper argues for the development of a research agenda to sit at their intersection, to engage with the challenges that exist at the interface between criminal and regulatory law.

Criminological reflections on the regulation and governance of labour exploitation

“…Examining a wider range of regulatory options helps to address the lack of attention given to non-criminal sanctions within (corporate) criminology. Given that criminology tends to be sceptical of criminal punishment and punitive sanctions in other areas of crime control such as sentencing, prisons, and probation, this article demonstrates a wider point made by Almond and van Erp (2018) that crimes and harms facilitated by corporations should be subject to the same rigour, i.e. that the state is not necessarily the (best) solution to all these problems.…”

“…These points are reflected in the regulatory 'pyramid' developed by Ayres and Braithwaite (1992: 35), which assumes that a significant amount of non-criminal regulation depends on persuasion and restorative options, whereas a smaller number of cases are subject to harsher tactics based on coercion and deterrence. Almond and van Erp's (2018) key argument is that the disciplines of criminology and regulation can each broaden and complement the other if they reach beyond their traditional responses to regulatory concerns.…”

“…Examining these forms of regulation and governance is not new, neither in themselves nor in relation to labour exploitation. However, regulation and governance warrant particular concern for corporate criminology, which tends to advocate criminal justice responses based on deterrence and coercion (Almond and van Erp 2018). These responses are important but limited, because they neglect a wider range of exploitative practices and strategies to address them.…”

Market dynamics of harm and labour exploitation

“…At the bottom-end of this pyramid, oversight is based on persuasion and negotiation between regulators and businesses, whereby responses gradually get harsher towards the top-end, progressing from warning letters to civil and criminal law intervention. As Almond and van Erp (2018) argue, it is here that interdisciplinary problems are apparent, because criminology tends to emphasise only the 'top-end' of this regulatory pyramid by focusing on criminal law responses to deviance. On the other extreme, regulation tends to focus on the 'bottom-end' by emphasising meditation rather than punishment as the most constructive way forward.…”

Is there a ‘European’ corporate criminology? Introduction to the Special Issue on European corporate crime

“…These opportunities are connected to underlying European principles of 'open societies' and the development of an area of freedom, security and justice in various ways: the complexity and lack of transparency of modern markets and production/distribution networks; the use of technology; the increasing transnational character of business; the geographical dispersal of the production and consumption of goods; and the separation between individual and corporate legal liability and societal responsibility. However, current scholarship on corporate, organizational and white-collar crime is theoretically underdeveloped, in particular in comparison with theories on organized crime and street crime (Almond and Van Erp, 2019). Moreover, it is primarily focused on the US context, which makes theories less relevant for European states (Barak, 2015;Friedrichs, 2015;Van Erp et al, 2015).…”