On Criminal Law Risks and the System of Crimes in the Field of Anti-Corruption Compliance

Abstract

Using a broad understanding of criminal law risks, their classification, and issues examined within the recently proposed theory of criminal riskology, the authors conclude that it is necessary to apply this theory to the research of public relations in the field of counteracting corruption, and specifically, to assess criminal law risks of corruption in the private sector, or commercial corruption. In this connection, alongside the group of corruption-related crimes, corruption crimes that are included in the Russian doctrine of criminal law and criminology, they propose specifying an independent group of crimes in the field of anticorruption compliance, which are based on criminal breach of contracts of service in commercial or other organizations and, primarily, crimes connected with commercial bribery. The authors also use their assessment of Russian and German criminal legislation and the practice of its enforcement to conduct a general analysis of crimes that could be classified as crimes in the field of anticorruption compliance. According to the authors, such crimes include corruption-related crimes proper if they are characterized by specific crime-indication features as well as so-called accompanying crimes (mainly, economic ones). Although a compilation of a full list of corresponding crimes is not included in the scope of this article, the authors believe that it will directly depend on the maximally precise understanding of the «picture» of criminal law risks of corruption in the private sector. They come to the conclusion that the system of crimes in the field of anticorruption compliance differs in its quantitative and qualitative characteristics from the systems of corruption-related crimes and corruption crimes. Separating crimes in the field of anticorruption compliance as a separate group alongside corruption-related crimes (corruption crimes) will make it possible to examine the mechanisms of committing such crimes more thoroughly, to work out special measures of their prevention, to conduct a detailed analysis of their criminological features and, in general, will contribute to the improvement of the system of counteracting corruption within the frameworks of not only Russian, but also German practice of law enforcement.