NCJ Number
152259
Date Published
1992
Length
181 pages
Annotation
This book analyzes the nature, consequences, motives, and criminal justice responses to corporate crime.
Abstract
Examples are presented to illustrate that corporate crime is "organizational crime," and understanding it requires identifying the factors that produce and reproduce it. Examples presented include the Ford Pinto car, the asbestos industry, the Ocean Ranger, the Challenger space shuttle, Love Canal, the destruction of Native communities, the Dalkon Shield, and tax and pension frauds. Factors that fuel corporate crime are the workings of the economy, the corporate bureaucracy, the law, and the state. One chapter defines the terms of reference of the book and illustrates the scope and impact of corporate crime, including the amount of violence, the harms and injuries, and the economic and social costs. The author develops a typology of corporate crime. Another chapter considers facets of corporate crime, including the dynamic of capital accumulation and the corporate organizational context. Significant factors are the role of profits; product goals; gender and corporate rules; and structures and beliefs in creating corporate theft, harm, and homicide. Another chapter considers what can counter corporate crime and the role of the law and the state in remedying the potential for corporate abuse and crime. Some remedies are suggested, and the importance of a social movement against corporate crime is emphasized. 300 references