The underlying cause of cheating is a changing ethical standard of right and wrong. Today, our actions are viewed through the lens of ethical relativism. Everything is relative to the situation. Cheating occurs because other students cheat and there is a need to keep up. People lie on their resumes to get a better job. Politicians cheat and may even divert funds. Financial executives cheat and even commit fraud with little or no consequences if they get caught. Utilitarian base their reasoning on the claim that actions, including lying, are morally acceptable when the resulting consequences maximize benefit or minimize harm. A lie, therefore, is not always immoral. In fact, when lying is necessary to maximize benefit or minimize harm, it may be immoral not to lie. Lies are most beneficial when they are not selfish. For example, telling your partner he or she looks great before a date to boost his or her self-esteem.
ambiguity of definitions of these crimes has made this topic difficult to study empirically (Nash, 2017). The definitions that are in place do not really make a distinction between crimes of the individual and crimes of the organization as a whole (Maguire et al., 1994; Reurink, 2016). Penalties and theories of control do not apply to these crimes like they do to others, since one cannot imprison a corporation (Gottschalk, 2016). Finally, deterrence and punishment rely on the idea that people are ashamed of crime, and research shows that powerful offenders typically do not feel shame for their offenses as ordinary citizens might (Braithwaite & Drahos, 2002).
Contributions
Criminology.
Due to the ambiguous definitions and wide scope of crimes of the powerful, the contributions that will be discussed will focus on white collar crime, as that seems to be where more of the research focuses. The term “white collar crime” was coined by Sutherland in 1939, which he defined as a “phenomenon of lawbreaking by respectable persons of the upper reaches of society” (Reurink, 2016, p. 387). These are crimes of convenience rather than passion, with the powerful using their position to save time and effort to reach their greedy ends (Gottschalk, 2016). Theoretical contributions to white collar crime conceptualization have been drawn from sociology and psychology, starting with Freud and his discussions of conflict of desires and needs that cause people to commit crime (Friedrichs, 2010). According to this framework, white collar criminals desire conventional success, and they need to achieve this success by any means necessary. With this, Sutherland discusses personality traits of white collar criminals, claiming that they have normal personality types with more tendency toward risk- taking, ambition, and egocentrism, which would explain their “subtle” criminality that doesn’t follow typical norm infractions (Friedrichs, 2010). White collar crimes are often not included in official statistics, and most victims are unaware of their victimhood, as these “subtle” crimes occur in private and are typically covered up (Maguire et al., 1994). Next, Gottfredson and Hirschi offer sociogenic explanations, that criminals have lower self-control and therefore make conscious choices to commit crimes (Friedrichs, 2010). White collar crimes are not crimes of passion; they are calculated, conscious decisions people make as a means to an end.
Sutherland, Clinard, and Yeager finally make the important distinction between crimes o
