3.3 state crime Flashcards
1
Q
How do Green and Ward define state crime?
A
- they are illegal/deviant activities, perpetrated by, or with the complicity of, state agencies to further state policies
2
Q
How does Michalowski define state crime?
A
- includes not only illegal actions BUT also those legally permissable actions that have similar harmful consequences as illegal actions
- the focus is on the impact of state actions rather than the actions themselves
3
Q
What kind of offences a state crimes generally?
A
- state sponsored terrorism
- corruption
- war crimes
- assassination
- genocide
- torture
- the illegal treatment, imprisonment, or punishment of citizens
- corrupt or criminal policing
4
Q
What is the problem with defining state crime?
A
- the state is the source of law and itself defines what a crime is
- it therefore has the power to avoid defining its own acts as criminal
5
Q
What is meant by the transgressive approach?
A
- involves going outside the usual boundaries of defining crime as simply law-breaking
6
Q
What do Schwendinger and Schwendinger(1975) and Green and Ward(2012) suggest state crimes should be considered as?
A
- violations of human rights
7
Q
What are human rights?
A
- the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) established a legal framework for defining and enforcing universal human rights
- everyone, because of their common humanity is entitled to the same fair and just treatment wherever they may be in the world
8
Q
How can human rights be used to describe state crime?
A
- human rights involves a wider package of basic social harm rather than as simply law-breaking
- things like state-induced famine, the denial of basic welfare services as a result of state corruption and other deliberate denials of basic human rights are state crimes
9
Q
What is meant by genocide?
A
- the attempted elimination by mass murder of people belonging to a particular group
10
Q
What is an example of genocide?
A
- Holocaust = Hitler murdered 6 million Jews in an attempt to eliminate them
- Rohingya Muslims genocide in Myanmar = since 2017, there has been ongoing persecutions of the muslim Rohingya people by the military of Myanmar
11
Q
What is meant by corruption?
A
- involves the organised plunder of national resources by a ruling elite
12
Q
What is an example of corruption?
A
- the former Egyptian dictator Mubarak, who was allegedly worth around $70 billion, embezzled from Egyptian state coffers
13
Q
What is meant by war crimes?
A
- illegal acts committed during wars, like the murder, ill-treatment, torture or deliberate targeting or enslavement of civilian populations of prisoners of war, and the plundering/looting of property
14
Q
What is an example of war crimes?
A
- My Lai massacre = American soldiers brutally killed more than 500 women, children and elderly men in 1968 - it was covered up for a year before it was reported in the American press
15
Q
What are some examples of the torture and illegal treatment/ punishment of citizens?
A
- the US still holds prisoners at the Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, who have been subjected to torture, and haven’t been charged with any offence or given a trial
- Gaddafi regime in Libya = systematic torture, disappearances and mass murder of thousands of political opponents of the regime
16
Q
What is meant by state-sponsored terrorism?
A
- involves the state itself carrying out terrorist acts/supporting others that do
17
Q
What is an example of state-sponsored terrorism?
A
- the US has a long history of supporting illegal rebel groups against elected regimes it regards as unfriendly, particularly in Central and South America
18
Q
How did Green and Ward explain why state crime happens?
A
- integrated theory = suggests that state crime arises from similar circumstances to those of other crimes, like street crimes
- it involves integrating the 3 elements of:
1. the motivations of offenders
2. opportunities to commit crime
3. failures of control
19
Q
What are the stages outlined in the crimes of obedience model?
A
- authorisation
- dehumanisation
- routinisation
20
Q
What is meant by authorisation?
A
- making it clear to individuals they are acting in accordance with official policy, and with explicit state authority and support
21
Q
What is meant by dehumanisation?
A
- involves the state’s promotion of a monolithic identity
22
Q
What is meant by routinisation?
A
- involves organising the actions in such a way that they become part of a regular routine and can be performed in a detached way that denies perpetrators the need/opportunity to raise moral questions
23
Q
How do Kelman and Hamilton (1989) develop the crimes of obedience model?
A
- they emphasise conformity to rules not rule-breaking
- they suggest violent states encourage obedience by those who actually carry out state-backed systematic human rights abuses
24
Q
How can techniques of neutralisation be used to explain state crimes?
A
- Cohen (2001) argues that states deny by neutralising their crimes by re-labelling them as something else
- denial of victim e.g. they are terrorists
- denial of injury e.g. they started it
- denial of responsibility e.g. I was obeying orders
- condemning the condemners e.g. they are picking on us because they are racist,etc
- appeal to higher loyalty
25
What are the four categories of state crime that **McLaughlin** identifies?
1. **political crimes** e.g. corruption or censorship
2. **crimes by security** e.g. genocide, torture and disappearance of dissidents
3. **economic crimes** e.g. violation of health and safety laws
4. **social and cultural crimes** e.g. institutional racism
26
How does **Bauman** (1989) explain state crime?
- the social conditions which produced the Holocaust included many of the feature of modern society - such as science and technology and the division of labour
- to understand the Holocaust one must understand the ability of modern society to turn mass murder into a routine administrative task
27
What is the cultural relativist argument?
- many post-colonial nations have been unhappy with international acceptance of norms such as the UDHR; they are too heavily influence by western values and represent **Western Imperialism**
28
What are some critiques of the cultural relativist argument?
- cultural relativism may protect less powerful states and cultures from being judged by Western standards, but it may equally protect criminal states from international condemnation and action
- marxists = cultural relativists don’t see the impact of state crime on marginalised groups
29
What do realists argue about state crime?
- states are more heavily committed to **self-interest than to universal morality and law**
- states may commite crimes/human rights abuses because of self-interest
30
How do feminists explain state crime?
- claim that men use terror, violence and genocide against women to undermine whole cultural groups
31
What do **MacKinnon (1994) and Allen (1996)** argue about state crime and women?
rape was used as a military policy for genocidal purposes; it leads to:
- the psychological (if not physical) death of the woman
- the social death of the woman, as she may be shunned by community
- the undermining os social bonds within a group
- ethnic cleansing
32
What are some criticisms of the feminist perspective?
- In Congo, UN peacekeepers were criticsed for failing to prevent rapes during teh conflict and some were ‘disciplined’ for rape and sexual assault of women and children they were supposed to be protecting
- Is rape ‘state crime’ or a **male crime**
33
