Research Paper on "White Collar Corporate Crime"

Research Paper 24 pages (7947 words) Sources: 24 Style: MLA

[EXCERPT] . . . .

White Collar/Corporate Crime

White Collar crime is a quickly arising topic in the field of criminal justice. Recently, it has just been dubbed very popular with cases that are high-profile like the companies of Enron and Martha Stewart. In the book, Controversies in White Collar Crime by Gary W. Potter, author of the book thinking about Crime Professor James Q. Wilson, "discharges the significance of white collar crime." He makes the point that four different views of why white collar crime is not considered "real" corruption or should be taken as life-threatening as the so called conventional crime that goes on nowadays. The primary concentrate of real crime is, "the stimulation of terror and the incidence of grievance ," the second, "a tearing apart of the social agreement ," third, "the command of acts that are not simply hazardous but more importantly dishonest ," and last, "the commission of activities that are obvious violations of criminal statues" (Potter Pg1). Professor Wilson supposes that these four declarations split "real" crime from white collar crime. White collar criminals normally do not get their hands soiled in their work. Instead of using a little muscle to get what they want, thy use their heads instead. These criminals are considered as being just as dangerous as the rapists and murderers. Now days, even the most apparently well-thought-of people are suspected of white collar crimes. President Clinton and his wife the first lady Hillary Clinton have been twisted up in the Whitewater and Travelgate business schemes. Even though the two have not been properly accused with any bad behavior, there is a group at present examining their transactions and charges are not out of the subject for any of them. In Michael Isikoff's and Mark Hosenball's Newsweek article "Cracks in the Wall," they define the Clintons' connections with Whitewater and the likely effects of them: "The Senate Whitewater committee is contemplating asking for lying under oath charges against Susan Thomas and Maggie Williams, Mrs. Clintons' chief of staff, in association with her statement regarding the removal of documents from Vince Foster's office" (Isikoff 29). This case goes to show that there presently a growing problem with our country, and it is called white collar crime.

Historical background

The term white-collar crime goes all the way back to 1939. Professor Edwin Hardin Sutherland was the first to come up with the term, and theorize white-collar criminals credited various characteristics and reasons than the common street thugs. Mr. Sutherland initially gave his theory in a discourse to the American Sociological Society in effort to study two arenas, crime and high society, which to him had no prior experiential association. He described his impression as "crime that was committed by people that had some kind of respectability and high social rank in the progression of their workplace" (Sutherland, 1949). Many people denote the discovery of Sutherland's idiom to the detonation of U.S. business in the years succeeding the Great Depression. Sutherland stated that during his time, "less than two percent of people dedicated to prisons in a year belong to those that are in the upper-class." His objective was to show a connection concerning money, social status, and probability of going to jail for a white-collar crime, likened to more visible, crimes that are typical. Even though the percentage is a just a little more higher today, numbers still display a great bulk of those in jail are poor people, "blue-collar" criminals, in spite of exertions to clamp down on white-collar, and corporate crime. The outline of white-collar crime was a comparatively firsthand subject to criminology at that time. He was advising other criminologists to end concentrating on the informally and inexpensively deprived. The types of people who committed these types of crimes resided positively and were valued by humanity in overall -also criminologists; for the reason that these offenders were held to such a high esteem, these persons had basically turned their back on the crimes. Additional fiscal laws were approved in the years proceeding to Sutherland's studies comprising antitrust laws in the 1920s, and social welfare laws in the 1930s. After the Depression, a lot of people went to did whatever it took to restructure their financial security, and it is hypothesized that this led a lot of workers that worked hard, who felt they were poorly paid, to take advantage of their situations.

A lot of Sutherland's effort was to isolate and describe the differences in blue collar street crimes, such as arson, theft, robbery, beatings, rape and destruction to property, which are usually put the blame on psychological, associational, and important factors. In its place, white-collar criminals are speculators, who in due time discover they can take advantage of their conditions to pile up financial improvement. They are cultured, intelligent, rich, confident individuals, who were capable enough to get a job that gives them the UN observed access to frequently large calculations of money. A lot of these people also use their intellect to trick their victims into thinking and trusting in their credentials. A lot are self-deceived because they do not start out as criminals nor do they see themselves as such.

The present description of white collar crime has come about in regards to a commingling of actions, variables, arrangements and theories. Not like conventional crimes, white collar crime can be pledged by a person, a company, a profession, or a society (Coral 1992). The illegal component of aim has become a smaller amount significant as product accountability and other business malfeasance have become to be recognized as white collar crime. An uncertain gathering of behaviors has developed in an merging of simple aberrations from social standards, openings of civil law, and violations that are criminal, therefore distorting the line between civil and criminal law (Punch 1996). For the direction of this paper, it is essential to constraint the range of the term white collar crime in the corporate arena.

The origin of the term is accredited to Sociologist Edwin Sutherland in 1939 and modestly conditions that white collar crime is the misuse of influence by a person, positioned in a high place, where as virtue of that location are delivered with occasions for such abuse. This paper will mention to crimes of professional occupations as a behavior having been statutorily defined as criminal, committed by an individual who have gotten a professional occupational status where the trust intrinsic to that location allows the commission of this crime. Professional will mention to occupational respect or corporate instead of their career misconduct. This paper will also endeavor to give a reason as to why a professional consultant may pledge a criminal act eased by profession after living a life of comparative conformism to norms that are societal. Methods, reason, and chance will be examined. Basic perspectives and learning theories of deviation will be used to differentiate conservative and white collar crime.

As mentioned earlier, in a 1939 conference of the American Sociological Society, Edwin Sutherland offered the word white collar criminal. He used the word to denote any person of high socio-economic rank who pledges a lawful defilement in the course of their business doings. Sutherland's meaning highlighted the criminal over the crime committed, and the position of confidence and power in delivering the methods and chance to obligate different acts (Sutherland 1940). For half a century since, Sutherland's definition of the white collar criminal has been the subject of a lot of controversy and debate (Vold and Bernard 1986). Particular disapprovals show his use of random expressions that cannot be itemized, such as "high socio-economic position ," "well-thought-of ," and "business doings ." It is extensively contemplated all through the sociological public, that Sutherland's 1939 meaning of white collar crime was envisioned to attract attention to the notion of their having no dissimilarity that is among the elite and street crime; as well as highpoint the inconsistencies in the request of law and justice among those that are rich and poor. In following writings, Sutherland explained his use of high socio-economic position that will involve people of middle and upper classes (Sutherland 1949). Sutherland's clarification had little to no influence in suppressing the influences connected to his unique work.

A study that was done based on the interviews of federal prisoners that were convicted of theft determined that even though nobody of the subjects were poor, only a slight few could be contemplated as being of a high socio- financial position (Cressey 1953). Cressey's discoveries led to other criminologists cross-questioning whether a wrongdoing like embezzlement could even be measured as a white collar crime considering the Sutherland definition (Green 1990). Even the word "commercial activity" was the subject of discussion with Quinney hypothesizing the expression should pertain to all persons, in all professions, lacking respect to socio-economic position (Quinney 1964). Quinney questioned whether a person deceiving welfare would be obligating a white collar crime for the reason that the welfare system is the basis of their source of revenue. In spite of… READ MORE

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