Reimagining Sutherland 80 years after white‐collar crime*

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9125.12206
• Author: Sally S. Simpson
• Published date: 01 May 2019
• Date: 01 May 2019

Received: 18 January 2019 Accepted: 21 January 2019

DOI: 10.1111/1745-9125.12206

THE 2018 SUTHERLAND ADDRESS

Reimagining Sutherland 80 years after

white-collar crime*

Sally S. Simpson

Department of Criminology and Criminal

Justice, University of Maryland, College Park

Correspondence

SallyS. Simpson, Department of Cr iminology

andCr iminal Justice, 2165C Samuel J. LeFrak

Hall,7251 Preinker t Drive, Universityof Mary-

land,College Park, MD 20742.

Email:ssimpson@umd.edu

∗Thisaddress was delivered at the 2018 annual

meetingof the Amer ican Society of Criminol-

ogyin Atlanta, GA, on November 14, 2018.

Ithas been adapted here for publication. I

amindebted to Michael Benson, Peter Yea-

ger,Miranda Galvin, Wim Huisman, William

Laufer,and Thomas Loughran for their insight-

fulcomments on an earlier draft. Thanks also to

Cristina Layanaand Miranda Galvin for their

assistancelocating information and analyzing

data forthis work.

Abstract

Eighty years ago, Edwin H. Sutherland conceptualized and

defined white-collar crime. In this article, I engage retro-

spectively with Sutherland’s ideas and work to emphasize

important aspects that continue to guide research today; to

note where he was prescient as well as shortsighted. I cen-

ter this discussion around “corporate crime” or crimes by

business. Four main themes are discussed: 1) law and offi-

cial responses to corporate offending—the data problem,

2) corporate crime and the life cycle of organizations,

3) psychological and trait-based explanations, and 4) con-

sequences of definitional ambiguity.

KEYWORDS

corporate crime, definitional ambiguity, managerial decision making,

organizational life cycle, psychologicaltraits, Sutherland address

1INTRODUCTION

In his presidential address before a joint meeting of the American Sociological and American Economic

Societies,1Edwin H. Sutherland (1939) compared and contrasted “crime in the upper or white-collar

class composed of respectable or at least respected business and professional men” (emphasis added)

with “crime in the lower class, committed by persons of low socioeconomic class” (Sutherland, 1940

p. 1). In particular, he was concerned with crimes “in relation to business.” Although Sutherland was

by no means the first scholar to call attention to crimes of the powerful (Bonger, 1916; DuBois,

1899/19672; Ross, 1907; van Erp, 2018), he was the first to call such offenders “white-collar”

1American Sociological Society changed its name to American Sociological Association in 1959.

2DuBois, for instance, argued “[I]n convictions by human courts the rich always are favored somewhat at the expense of the

poor, the upper classes at the expense of the unfortunate classes, and whites at the expense of Negroes. We knowfor instance

that certain crimes are not punished in Philadelphia because the public opinion is lenient, as for instance embezzlement, forgery,

and certain sorts of stealing; on the other hand, a commercial community is apt to punish with severity petty thieving, breaches

of the peace, and personal assault or burglary” (1899/1967, p. 249).

Criminology. 2019;57:189–207. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/crim © 2019 American Society of Criminology 189

190 SIMPSON

criminals. What was initially a descriptive phrase was refined several times into the nowfamiliar defi-

nition of white-collar crime: “Crime committed by a person of respectability and high social status in

the course of his occupation” (emphasis added, Sutherland, 1949, p. 9).

As white-collar crime scholars know,Sut herland’s(1949) view of white-collar crime far from settled

the conversation about the phenomenon. Indeed, as I discuss later, the debate about what constitutes

white-collar crime and how to measure it is more than a definitional distraction. It has profound epis-

temological consequences. Yet, much of what Sutherland (1939, 1940, 1949, 1973, 1983) had to say

about white-collar crime 70–80 years ago is still true today. In many ways, the road from Sutherland

to present-day knowledge and thinking about crimes by business is surprisingly straight.

In this address, I use our current knowledge about white-collar crime to engage retrospectively with

Sutherland (1939, 1940, 1949, 1973, 1983). Because his influence is so broad and comprehensive,

I narrow the focus to corporate crime specifically. Corporate crime is focused on the proscribed and

punishable conduct of a corporation or of its representatives acting on its behalf to achieve organiza-

tional goals (Braithwaite, 1984, p. 6). Sutherland set the standard for empirical research on corporate

offenders while providing a critical lens with which to view legal processes and state response to

offenders.

As I engage with Sutherland’s (1939, 1939, 1940, 1949, 1973, 1983) ideas and observations, it is

important to emphasize the aspects of his work that have survived the test of time (see, e.g., Friedrichs,

Schoultz, & Jordanska, 2018). Some of what he reported on was prescient. For instance, he used a life

history approach to study corporate violators that presaged developmental and life-course criminology.

Yet, there were also instances when Sutherland was shortsighted—when he faltered in his vision and

conceptual analytics. For instance, some important developments in the field he did not (and could

not) anticipate. I highlight these points to emphasize both Sutherland’s centrality to this field of study

and to note the dynamic symbiosis that is moving it in exciting new directions. I also hope that in

this assessment, I may break down the disciplinary resistance and ambivalence to the investigation of

corporate crime. The questions asked and approaches adopted by corporate criminologists are, frankly,

at the center of criminology. They are used to speak to questions of power, social organization, justice,

and fairness (Laufer, 2018). Finally, the white-collar and corporate crime field is beleaguered with

definitional imprecision. I conclude this address with my thoughts about the pernicious consequences

of this definitional ambiguity.

2REVIEW AND ASSESSMENT

2.1 Spot-on Sutherland: Bridging data sources

One of Sutherland’s most important contributions to the study of corporate crime lies with his critique

of official crime data (1949). In his view, the data did not capture crimes by business and, as such,

resulted in biased statistics. The source of bias rested in the political and economic power of elites “to

influence the administration of justice in their own favor” and to create laws that “apply exclusively

to business and the professions and which therefore involve only the upper socio-economic classes”

(Sutherland, 1949, p. 8). In other words, business crimes differ from ordinary crimes “principally in

the administrative procedureswhich are used in dealing with the offenders” (emphasis added, p. 8) and

not in the nature of the offending behavior itself. For Sutherland, white-collar crime was a violation of

law and substantively the same as other criminal violations. As clarified by Cressey in his introduction

to the 1983 edition of White Collar Crime, “The procedural differences have no effect on the essence

of the behavior” (Sutherland, 1983, p. iv).