Corporate environmental responsibility and criminology

Abstract

This article addresses corporate environmental responsibility (CER) and aims to present a criminological analysis of it. We studied the opinion of a number of principle actors involved in CER in Europe in order to determine how they perceive it in terms of its definition, aetiology and approaches. For each of these dimensions we relate back to a criminological framework to ascertain how it is positioned in the green criminological debate. We start out by providing information on what corporate environmental responsibility is and how it relates to corporate social responsibility and sustainable development. Then we outline the theoretical framework in accordance with the three central themes for the criminological analysis of CER: definition, aetiology and approaches. We also explain the method that was used (semi-structured interviews). Next, we present the results according to the same threefold structure. Finally we discuss these results in a last part, which is divided in two. First, we look at the challenges that the criminological perspective poses for CER in terms of definition, aetiology and approaches. The second part of the discussion turns the question around and wonders how CER could contribute to greening criminology.