Editorial: Frameworks to address other issues could help us better tackle financial crime
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JFC-10-2022-278 |
| Published date | 30 September 2022 |
| Date | 30 September 2022 |
| Pages | 1133-1136 |
| Subject Matter | Accounting & finance,Financial risk/company failure,Financial crime |
| Author | Ingrida Kerusauskaite |
Editorial: Frameworks to address
other issues could help us better
tackle financial crime
COP26 and recent increases in incidences of environment disasters have brought
environmental concerns high up on governments’, businesses’, civil societygroups’and the
media’s agendas. Despite uneven progressin achieving set targets and goals, organisations
have made progress and adopted frameworks to measure and reduce their environmental
footprint. Similarly,gender considerations have shot to the forefront of developmentwork in
countries like the UK, where recent statements of the focus of the country’s Overseas
Development Assistancestresses supporting women and girls as a strategic focus [1].
This article argues for shopping around in other disciplines’aisles and adapting existing
frameworks to counter environmental damage or ensure gender equality and social
inclusion (GESI) to fight financial crime. Some frameworks, such as the GESI framework
discussed below, could help not only minimise the risks of financial crime within
organisations’own operations but also provide a useful approach to identifying and
reducing financialcrime risks within the broader environment the organisations operatein.
Mainstreaming financial crime beyond compliance
We should consider sharing responsibility within organisations for mitigating against
financial crime similarly to how we mainstream support for disabilities and gender-equity-
related responsibilities. Practically, this means that someone in human resources, or in this
case, compliance, might have overall official responsibility, but in practice, it is all
employees’responsibility to make sure that the business operates with integrity. This also
means that employees, beyond those in compliance-focused roles and those working in
regulated industries, need to be involved in identifying risks and empowered to act upon
cases of potential economiccrime.
This follows from the fact that a majority of professions have an element of preventing
financial crime –whether it is a lawyer or a banker who is required to understand their
clients’source of wealthand funds; a businessman who files taxes and oversees the integrity
of the businesses’and associates’operations; a teacher that works to instil values or a
shopkeeper or programmemanager who processes payments.
Frameworks for ensuring mainstream thinking on a particular topic can help organise
our approach to tackling an issue. For example,in international development, some donors
have required programme business cases to consider the environmental as well as GESI
effects of the considered programme –both intended and unintended. Mainstreaming of
such frameworks would be beneficial in broader contexts, with the addition of financial
crime risk considerations.They can help ask the key questions to identify red flags as early
as possible in project, procurementand other processes.
Gender and social inclusion framework
An interesting framework to consider is the FCDO Prosperity Fund’s Gender and Social
Inclusion Framework [2]. The framework requires a programme to ensure it, at the
minimum, does not worsenentrenched inequalities and, where possible, that it supportsand
empowers socially excluded groups. It requires an understanding and a risk assessment of
Editorial
1133
Journalof Financial Crime
Vol.29 No. 4, 2022
pp. 1133-1136
© Emerald Publishing Limited
1359-0790
DOI 10.1108/JFC-10-2022-278
To continue reading
Request your trial