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Criminogenic asymmetries (Passas)

Structural mismatches and inequalities in law, economy, politics, culture, and power that create opportunities for illicit profit, fuel demand for illegal goods, give actors incentives to offend, and reduce authorities' ability to control crime

Criminogenic asymmetries, what makes them crime producing

They produce opportunities, motives, and weaker controls. The potential is not always activated, and globalization multiplies asymmetries and intensifies their effects

Types of asymmetries (Passas)

- Legal, law enforcement, cultural, economic, political, power, technological, and environmental

Criminogenic asymmetries example

US toxic waste - After the 1976 Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, US states defined hazardous waste differently and disposal costs varied widely, with too few proper facilities. Waste moved to permissive states, and organized criminals with state licensed companies dumped it illegally for the chemical industry, which saved up to 80 percent of disposal costs. Industry lobbied against regulating production methods, avoided liability through cheap hauling contractors, and underfunded or corrupt agencies did little

Global anomie (Passas)

- Globalization breaks societal barriers and raises new needs, desires, and expectations, and it spreads awareness of inequality. People adopt non membership comparison groups and feel relative deprivation, which weakens the guiding power of norms and makes deviance thinkable

Global anomie example, migration and trafficking

- Globalization shows people the goodies available in wealthy places and promises prosperity and equality. People from deprived areas are motivated to emigrate, and many naively trust fraudsters who promise decent jobs, only to end up in forced prostitution. When quotas limit new immigrants, exploitative smuggling operations develop. Oxfam data on inequality shows how large and visible the gap is

Dysnomie (Passas) -

The absence of a widely accepted transnational normative framework to regulate cross border activities, plus many different, inconsistent, conflicting, or discriminatorily applied legal frameworks. It also involves weak capacity or willingness to enforce and a race to the bottom

Dysnomie example, pharmaceuticals

- Drugs can be tested in the Third World where safeguards are lower and lawsuits are unlikely, and approved first in countries with lax standards. Components of banned drugs can be made where it is allowed and marketed where they are not banned. Side effect lists get shorter the farther south drugs go, and the Dalkon Shield IUD was sold abroad despite a ban at home

Crimes without lawbreaking (Passas)

- Harmful, usually cross border conduct that breaks no law because corporations structure activity to exploit gaps between jurisdictions. The harm is comparable to crime, but no country's laws are violated

Crimes without lawbreaking examples

- Toxic waste export to countries with weak rules, bribes that were tax deductible in some countries but criminal in others, transfer pricing to book profits where there is no income tax, and lawyers and accountants structuring transactions so no country's law is broken

How asymmetries, global anomie, and dysnomie connect

- Global anomie is the motive side (raised expectations and comparisons), asymmetries are the opportunity side (gaps between legal systems), and dysnomie is the control side (no shared rulebook). Together they produce crimes without lawbreaking