Trivializing Elite Political Criminality: Psychopathic Power and the War Against White-Collar Crime

• In Event: Predicting and Explaining White-Collar and Corporate Offending

Abstract

This paper examines research and theory on white-collar and political criminality as they relate to the legal travails and behaviors of former president and criminal defendant, Donald Trump. Legal analyses of his unprecedented criminal and civil cases, and those of his associates and company, while important in and of themselves, also illuminate significant issues regarding the role of power in defining the social realities of elite political criminality. Using Lemert's concept of the "unstable equilibrium in the societal reaction to deviance," neutralization theory, and the notion of "psychopathic power" and its institutionalization in American politics, this paper examines the ongoing war against white-collar crime and the dangers to democracy, public and private assets, and the rule of law.

Author

• Henry N. Pontell, John Jay College of Criminal Justice / University of California, Irvine