Gender and white‐collar crime: only four percent female criminals
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/13685201211238089 |
| Published date | 06 July 2012 |
| Date | 06 July 2012 |
| Pages | 362-373 |
| Author | Petter Gottschalk |
| Subject Matter | Accounting & finance |
Gender and white-collar crime:
only four percent female
criminals
Petter Gottschalk
BI Norwegian Business School, Oslo, Norway
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present an empirical study of white-collar crime to create
insights into perceptions of potential offenders with a gender perspective.
Design/methodology/approach – Media coverage of individual criminals was used as
identification for crime cases, which were then found in court rulings.
Findings – The paper is based on empirical research of convicted wh ite-collar criminals.
Out of 161 convicts presented in newspaper articles, there were 153 male and eight female criminals,
i.e. 4 per cent.
Research limitations/implications – It is indeed hard to believe that Norwegian men commit
25 times more white-collar crimes when compared to Norwegian women. Therefore, it is a question of
whether the detection rate for female white-collar criminals is lower than for male white-collar criminals.
Practical implications – More attention might be paid to characteristics of female white-collar
crime in the future.
Originality/value – Rather than presenting some cases and anecdotal evidence, the paper presents
substantial statistical evidence to conclude on gender differences in white-collar crime.
Keywords Norway, Criminals,Gender, Fraud, Manipulation,Crime detection, Newspaper coverage,
Empirical study
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
The most economically disadvantaged members of society are not the only ones
committing crime. Members of the privileged socioeconomic class are also engaged in
criminal behavior (Brightman, 2009). The types of crime may differ from those of the
lower classes, such as business executives bribing public officials to achieve contracts,
chief accountants manipulating balance sheets to avoid taxes, and procurement
managers approving fake invoices for personal gain.
Criminal behavior by members of the privileged socioeconomic class is labeled
white-collar crime (Benson and Simpson, 2009). It is often argued that women commit
less white-collar crime when compared to men (Haantz, 2002; Holtfreter et al., 2010;
Huffman et al., 2010). Suggested reasons for possible gender differences in white-collar
crime include lack of opportunity and risk aversion.
This paper reports findings from a study of white-collar criminals. It is based on the
following research question:
RQ. What differencescan be found between male and femalewhite-collar criminals?
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/1368-5201.htm
This research article was submitted to the Journal of Money Laundering Control on
3 December 2011.
JMLC
15,3
362
Journal of Money Laundering Control
Vol. 15 No. 3, 2012
pp. 362-373
qEmerald Group Publishing Limited
1368-5201
DOI 10.1108/13685201211238089
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