State Crime Flashcards
Eugene Mclaughin
4 categories of state crime:
1) political crimes, such as corruption
2) Crimes by police, such as genocide and torture
3) Economic crimes, such as breaking health and safety laws
4) Social and cultural crimes, such as institutional racism
> the biggest problems in analysing state crime is how states/governments themselves define what constitutes a ‘crime’ in their country
> crime is therefore a ‘social construction’ - shaped and defined by states/governments.
EXAMPLE - Civil war in Syria - Bashar al-Assad elected as President of Syria in 2000. He promised for democratic reform, however did not succeed, therefore fighting broke out resulting in may groups battling the government, these groups are referred to as ‘terrorists’ - this shows how power decides what is ‘terrorism’ and what isnt.
Herman and Julia Schwendinger (1975)
problems with defining ‘state crime’ - demanded that sociologists must lead the way in holding states accountable when they easily inflict pain and suffering on their people, but escape justice.
> the researchers called for a replacement of the term ‘state crime’ with a focus instead on ‘human right violations’
> the concept ‘human rights’ has international significance
> the Universal Declaration of Human Rights identifies the following as basic rights:
*freedom to life
*freedom from torture
*right to fair trial
*freedom of speech
EXAMPLE - Jamal Khashoggi - March 2018, Jamal Khashoggi a critic of the Saudi government was assasinated inside the Saudi consulate in Turkey, international investigation found that Saudi authority was to blame, but they deny any claims.
EVAL - right to a fair trial is selectively enforced - many are left in detention for years before they get their ‘fair trial’ - for example Andrew Tate.
EVAL - countries interpret ‘right to life’ differently - some countries outlaw abortion however in the UK it is legally ac
Penny Green and Tony Ward
For nation-states to commit crime on a mass scale against their own people they need agencies to support them.
> state-control is more likely to succeed if people’s freedoms have historically been restricted.
> this, together with state propaganda, convinces people that they face a ‘common enemy’ - which justifies the state’s tough treatment of them resulting in little resistance from population
EXAMPLE - new reporting has repeatedly highlighted the targeting and detaining of Imams and other Muslim religious figures since 2014 in China - ‘re-education camps’are implemented by china government to ‘crack down on religious extremism’ but it really is an attempt to stamp out religion.
Stan Cohen
looks at ways state conceal and cover up issues of human rights - he argues that dictatorships are more likely to deny human rights abuses, whereas it is much harder for developed countries - instead when developed countries commit human rights crimes, they legitimate them - this is called the ‘spiral of denial’:
STAGE 1: state denies human rights abuse has taken place
STAGE 2: if denial is too difficult, state try to conceal the full extent of the issue e.g. “it’s not what it looks like”
STAGE 3: if that is too difficult, state justifies actions by pulling on heart strings. e.g. “its justified, were protecting national security”
EXAMPLE - Russia - poisoning of ex spy, Sergei Skripal - Russian government deny all allegations made against them which applies to ‘stage 1’ of Cohen research.
