Reasons for Global Crime

Features of Globalisation:

  • Globalisation has led to increased volumes of international crime due to features of globalisation that make crime easier to commit

  • Increased air travel, cultural homogeneity, deregulation of financial markets and advances in information technology

Globalisation:

  • Taylor (1997)- Globalisation has led to the expansion of capitalism and the exploitation of people

  • Castells (198) global criminal economies account for $1 trillion of economic activity

Global Inequality:

  • Increased global inequality- this has led to less affluent nations having large percentages of the population engaged in illegal activities

  • Increased trade in opium from Afghanistan post 9/11; high levels of employment in cocaine production in Columbia

Global Conflicts:

  • Increased conflict- This has led to more international migration and a rise in human trafficking

  • War on Terror- Increased levels of terrorism in post 9/11 era particularly in Western Europe- France, Germany and the UK have seen a rise in activity

Globalisation and ‘risk’:

  • Global risk consciousness- increased fears about migration

  • Media reporting of migrant activities is often unbalanced and heightens this fear

  • Greater awareness due to 24-hour rolling news coverage

Urbanisation and Industrialisation:

  • Green and corporate crimes as production moves from Western nations to the developing world

  • Growth of urban ‘megacities’ leads to air and water pollution

  • Overproduction of goods leads to desertification

  • Deforestation to cope with increased demand for goods and grazing for livestock

Are global crimes new?

  • Many crimes existed pre-globalisation- trafficking of arms, fraud, international corporate crimes

  • Greater awareness of these crimes in the global era due to the internet and its impacts on the UK as a global society

  • Green crime shifted- but is transgressive- we may have cleaner air in the UK, but air pollution still exists

  • Fraud has moved online rather than face to face- global nature to fraud