Corporate crime

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Criminology and penology
Theory Anomie Biosocial criminology Broken windows Collective efficacy Crime analysis Criminalization Differential association Deviance Expressive function of law Labeling theory Psychopathy Rational choice Risk & actuarial criminology Social control Social learning Strain Subculture Symbolic interactionism Victimology
Major theorists Émile Durkheim Hans Eysenck Enrico Ferri Michel Foucault Alexandre Lacassagne Cesare Lombroso Archibald Reiss
Types of crime Against Humanity Person State Class Blue-collar White-collar Cold case Perfect Corporate Hate International Juvenile Organized Political Public-order State State-corporate Transnational Victimless War
Methods Comparative Profiling Critical theory Ethnography Uniform Crime Reports Crime mapping Crime statistics Positivist school Qualitative Quantitative BJS NIBRS
Penology Denunciation Deterrence Incapacitation Trial Prison abolition open reform Prisoner Prisoner abuse Prisoners' rights Rehabilitation Recidivism Justice in penology Participatory Restorative Transformative Retributive Utilitarian Solitary confinement
Schools Anarchist Chicago Classical Conflict Critical Environmental Feminist Integrative Italian Marxist Neo-classical Positivist Postmodernist Realism Left Right
Subfields American Anthropological Biosocial criminology Conflict Criminology Critical Culture Cyber Demography Development Environmental Experimental Organizational Political Public Radical criminology
Browse Index Journals Organizations People
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In criminology, corporate crime refers to crimes committed either by a corporation (i.e., a business entity having a separate legal personality from the natural persons that manage its activities), or by individuals acting on behalf of a corporation or other business entity (see vicarious liability and corporate liability). For the worst corporate crimes, corporations may face judicial dissolution, sometimes called the "corporate death penalty", which is a legal procedure in which a corporation is forced to dissolve or cease to exist.

Some negative behaviours by corporations may not actually be criminal; laws vary between jurisdictions. For example, some jurisdictions allow insider trading.

Corporate crime overlaps with:

• white-collar crime, because the majority of individuals who may act as or represent the interests of the corporation are white-collar professionals;
• organized crime, because criminals may set up corporations either for the purposes of crime or as vehicles for laundering the proceeds of crime. The world's gross criminal product has been estimated at 20 percent of world trade. (de Brie 2000); and
• state-corporate crime because, in many contexts, the opportunity to commit crime emerges from the relationship between the corporation and the state.