White Collar Crime Flashcards
What is White Collar Crime?
A crime committed by a person of a high social statue in the course of his occupation
Who said the definition of white collar crime?
Sutherland (1949)
Examples of WCC?
Fraud, tax violations, bribery and embezzlement
What is the problem of criminology and white collar crime?
Criminological theories ignore people in positions of power engaging in crime and focus on explaining lower class criminality
Why do we assume that only poor and disadvantaged commit crime?
The media
The judges
The state and law
How much of criminologists time do they spend researching, teaching and writing about white collar crime?
5%
What is crimes of the powerful?
It is about power and the institutionally powerful who have become the central agents of power in contemporary societies (Whyte, 2009)
What criminologists associate crime with the lower class?
Marx & Engels
Beccaria (1764)
Lombroso
How does the media affect the assumption that only poor people commit crime?
The media have vested an interest not to expose shady advertisement practices i.e. they rely on advertisers for fund
How do judges affect the assumption that only poor people commit crime?
Judges belong to the same noble ‘ranks’ as criminal elites by attending the same colleges, churches and live in the same neighbourhoods, white collar crime becomes unnoticed
How does the state and the law affect the assumption that only poor people commit crimes?
Soft on wealth producers
Treat elite deviance as civil rather than criminal
What is the main problem Sutherland (1949) states?
Criminological theories ignore big businesses who engage in criminal activity and focus on explaining lower class crime.
What did Sutherland (1949) collect data on?
Crime by respectable individuals, especially embezzlers, throughout the 1930s.
What did Sutherland concluded from his data?
People in position of power were engaging in forms of organised crime but not treated as such.
What is the most basic and practical reason for the lack of academic attention on corporate crimes?
Lack of funding available for such research (Tombs & Whyte, 2006)
How is the WCC crime definition challenged?
Only convicted people are to be called criminals, so the courts must know you as criminal to be labelled ‘criminal’ (Tappan, 1947)
What do many theories of crime blame for crime?
Poverty, broken homes, absent fathers and poor education
Who suffers from the conditions of poverty, broken homes, absent fathers and poor education?
Law abiding citizens
What was Sutherland (1949) book called?
White Collar Crime
Who was Sutherland (1949) book published by
Dryden press
What does Sutherland book explore?
The specific forms of WCC committed by major corporations.
Why was Sutherlands call for attention of the upper class crimes disregarded and seen as a major problem?
Dryden forced Sutherland to eliminate the name of companies under investigation for the book as Dryden press would be liable for damages because the book called certain corporations ‘criminal’ although they had not he dealt with under criminal statutes.
What did the University of Indiana demand from Sutherlands book?
Names removed as publishing could alienate wealth business contributors.
Can you safely call corporations criminal liability it hasn’t been labelled as such by the courts?
No
