Zero Tolerance, Naming and Shaming: Is There a Case for it with Crimes of the Powerful?

Abstract

Zero tolerance and public shaming are increasingly advocated for both crimes of the powerless and crimes of the powerful. In this essay we argue against zero tolerance with respect to both kinds of crime. However, we defend naming and shaming with respect to crimes of the powerful. Part I of the paper begins from the assumption that both zero tolerance and naming and shaming are policies that do not merit serious consideration with crimes of the powerless. It then goes on to consider harder questions: first whether zero tolerance and then naming and shaming have a place with crimes of the powerful. Drug abuse is used in Part II as a case study to explore these distinctions. It will be contended that zero tolerance is a prescription for increasing drug abuse, but that naming and shaming is essential to the prevention of drug abuse. This conclusion is reached by viewing the drug problem differently from conventional criminological analyses in a radically reconfigured context as a corporate crime and organisational regulation problem.