May 16, 2018 / C H Thompson

Globalisation and crime – with evaluative points

Features of globalised crime:

globalisation has created new more diverse opportunities for criminal activity, particularly through the anonymity of the internet
for example, it’s hard to police internet based crimes because they cross so many international borders, for example email phishing
because it crosses so many borders it becomes difficult identify which country’s police force is responsible
another difficulty is global criminal organisations have thousands of members located in different countries
the global criminal economy is worth hundreds of billions of pounds a year
Held, 1999, argued the features of globalistion have allowed transnational organised crimes to flourish

These features are evident in Hobbs and Dunningham (1998) concept of ‘glocal’ crime. The term glocal describes transnational organised crime.

Glocal crimes describe the way global criminal networks operate with local networks in countries thousands of miles away.

These has meant the old fashioned criminal gang top-down hierarchy has been replaced by global networks of criminal gangs – glocal criminal gangs
The term glocal describes the interconnectivity between the local and global networks
local criminal networks with links to criminal gangs in other countries
For example international drugs trade requires the harvesting of opium from local farmers such as those in Afghanistan, by local criminal gangs to supply the orders placed by Columbian drugs barons – those orders can be placed using global telecommunication systems – interconnectivity a key feature of globalisation globalisation

Evaluation

the complexity and secrecy of global crimes makes it difficult for sociologists to research and test the validity of research findings in this area
the role of globalisation could be an exaggeration of other causes for global or international crimes for example citizens of developing countries could be taking advantage of their new found wealth
globalisation’s interconnectedness has seen the emergence of more global law enforcement agencies sharing information about, for example, terrorism

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