1. Name:
Crime and Deviance:
Globalisation, green crime,
human rights and state crimes
Globalisation has brought with it the spread of transnational organised crime,
for example trafficking drugs and people. Globalisation also brings de-
industrialisation and insecurity, which lead to increased crime. It has also led to
new forms of ‘glocal’ criminal organisation, with fluid networks and ‘franchises’
rather than the old mafia-style fixed hierarchies.
We now live in ‘global risk society’ where human-made threats include massive
environmental damage. Green criminology adopts an ecocentric view and starts
from the notion of harm rather than criminal law. It identifies both primary and
secondary green crimes.
State crimes include genocide, war crimes and torture. The state has the
power to commit massive human rights abuses and to legitimate its crimes using
neutralisation techniques such as denial of responsibility. Human rights abuses
are much more likely to occur eg when the enemy is portrayed as sub-human.

2. Learning objectives:
After studying this topic you should:
• Understand the ways in which globalisation and crime are related and be
able to evaluate explanations of this relationship;
• Understand the different types of green crime and be able to evaluate
sociological explanations of environmental harm;
• Understand the relationship between state crimes and human rights and
be able to evaluate explanations of such crimes.
Key questions: Key information
1. Has crime become global? • Globalisation and
crime
2. How does the media report criminal
activity? • Mass media and
crime
3. What are green crimes and how are
• Green crime
they dealt with?
• Human rights
4. What rights due all human beings
have? • State crimes
5. How can we stop state crimes when
we have no world police?

4. Crime and globalisation
1. Use the glossary at the back of the book to look up the definition of
globalisation, green crime and zemiology. Write your own definitions for
each word below.
2. What causes globalisation?
3. How can crime be described as globalised?
4. Manuel Castlells (1998) argued that there is now a global criminal
economy worth over £1 trillion per annum. What forms does this take?

5. 5. Explain, with examples, how the global criminal economy functions both
as a supply and demand economy.
6. Define, with examples, how globalisation creates new insecurities and a
mentality of ‘risk consciousness’.
7. In less than 150 words explain how Ian Taylor (1997) argues that
globalisation has led to changes in the pattern and extent of crime.

6. 8. What advantages might there be for large companies in switching their
production to a less developed country?
9. Summarise the findings of Hobbs and Dunnington. Make sure you use
the word ‘glocal’.
10. Explain with examples what Misha Glenny (2008) means by ‘McMafia’?

8. Green Crime
1. What is meant by ‘global risk society’?
2. Explain the differences between traditional criminology and green
criminology.
3. What criticisms can be made of both traditional and green criminology?
4. Identify, with reference to the Bhophal disaster, examples of green
crime in both the primary and secondary instances.

9. 5. What rights if any do a) animals and b) the physical environment have?
6. Do humans have more rights than animals and the environment? If so
what are they?

12. State crimes
1. How do Green and Ward (2005) define state crime?
2. What are the four catagories of state crime as defined by Eugene
McLaughlin in 2001.
3. Explain, with examples, how the state is able to commit crimes on such a
large scale.
4. What is meant by ‘human rights’?

13. 5. Critical criminologists such as Herman and Julia Schwendinger (1970)
argued that we should define crime in terms of the violation of human
rights, rather than the breaking of legal rules. What did they mean by
this?
6. What criticisms did Stanley Cohen (1996;2001) make of the
Schwendingers’ view?

14. 7. Explain what Cohen meant by the ‘spiral of denial’.
8. Explain, with examples, what is meant by ‘neutralisation techniques’.
9. Kelman and Hamilton identify three features of crimes of obedience,
what are they?

15. 10. How does Zygmunt Bauman (1989) explain why the Nazis were able to
commit mass murder?