Mediating Punitiveness: Understanding Public Attitudes towards Work-Related Fatality Cases
| Author | Sarah Colover,Paul Almond |
| Published date | 01 September 2010 |
| DOI | 10.1177/1477370810373728 |
| Date | 01 September 2010 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
Corresponding author:
Paul Almond, School of Law, University of Reading, Foxhill House, Whiteknights Road, Reading RG6 7BA, UK.
Email: p.j.almond@reading.ac.uk
Mediating Punitiveness:
Understanding Public
Attitudes towards Work-
Related Fatality Cases
Paul Almond
University of Reading, UK
Sarah Colover
University of Reading, UK
Abstract
This paper concerns an empirical investigation into public attitudes towards work-related fatality
cases, where organizational offenders cause the death of workers or members of the public.
This issue is particularly relevant following the introduction of the Corporate Manslaughter and
Corporate Homicide Act 2007 into UK law. Here, as elsewhere, the use of criminal law against
companies reflects governmental concerns over public confidence in the law’s ability to regulate
risk. The empirical findings demonstrate that high levels of public concern over these cases do not
translate into punitive attitudes. Such cases are viewed rationally and constructively, and lead to
instrumental rather than purely expressive enforcement preferences.
Keywords
Corporate Crime, Corporate Manslaughter, Public Attitudes, Punitiveness, Seriousness.
The relationship between the substantive criminal law and public attitudes has long
proved to be a controversial issue. In particular, theoretical characterizations of contem-
porary law and order have emphasized the ways in which political actors interpret, and
respond to, trends in public opinion (Bottoms 1995; Garland 2001; Pratt 2002; Simon
2007). Public opinion on crime and justice, it is suggested, drives the adoption of harsher
and more emotive criminal justice policy via a process of ‘penal populism’, whereby
‘punishment policy [is] developed primarily for its anticipated popularity’ rather than its
utility (Roberts et al. 2003: 65). On this reading, policy-making is driven by the interpre-
tation of public opinion and by the willingness of politicians to respond uncritically to it.
European Journal of Criminology
7(5) 323–338
© The Author(s) 2010
Reprints and permission: sagepub.
co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav
DOI: 10.1177/1477370810373728
http://euc.sagepub.com
324 European Journal of Criminology 7(5)
The risks associated with this dynamic give a new relevance to research into public atti-
tudes towards crime.
This paper presents the findings of an ESRC-funded investigation into public atti-
tudes towards work-related fatality cases (WRFs), situations where the activities of a
corporation or organization have caused the death of a worker or member of the public.
This is timely given the introduction into UK law of the Corporate Manslaughter and
Corporate Homicide Act 2007, which seeks to criminalize the worst WRFs, and so main-
tain public confidence in the law. These legislative developments mirror the redefinition
of the parameters of corporate criminal liability within other European jurisdictions,
including Italy (Gobert and Mugnai 2002) and France (Orland and Cachera 1995), and
renewed debate in Germany and elsewhere (Eser et al. 1999; Weigend 2008). The com-
mencement in early 2010 of manslaughter prosecutions against Continental Airlines in
France following the Paris Concorde air crash of 2000, which resulted in 113 deaths,
demonstrates the ongoing significance of debates about corporate homicide liability.
Issues of corporate regulation are often regarded in rather ambivalent terms by the
public (Livingstone and Lunt 2007; Walls et al. 2004); the assumption that there is a
‘punitive’ demand for retributive justice in such cases has never been empirically tested.
Following an earlier study (Almond 2008), this investigation utilized a qualitative inter-
view methodology to probe the normative attitudes expressed by the public in relation to
real-life WRFs. Public attitudes in this area are not as harsh as might be expected, indicat-
ing that the new offence is only a partial reflection of wider trends towards ‘populist
punitiveness’. In fact, public attitudes are primarily characterized by rationality and care-
ful thought, and do not demonstrate the emotive and retributive features associated with
this concept. Although tougher sanctions are preferred, they are not excessive and so are
not truly punitive (Matthews 2005). Crucially, punishment is envisaged as a way of bring-
ing about better regulatory outcomes, not as a method of simply achieving vengeance.
The legal context: Corporate manslaughter in the
United Kingdom
The last 20 years have seen a movement towards imposing criminal liability upon orga-
nizations that cause the death of workers or members of the public. The introduction of
a specific corporate homicide offence in the UK and the reform of corporate liability
principles so as to facilitate corporate manslaughter convictions in other common law
jurisdictions (Sarre and Richards 2005) reflect concern over the problem of regulating
WRFs. Although a number of European jurisdictions have introduced general principles
of corporate criminal liability (such as France, Austria, Italy and the Netherlands), in
many cases these principles do not extend to ‘core’ criminal offences such as manslaugh-
ter. To date the UK remains the only European jurisdiction to respond to the problem of
WRFs via a specific homicide offence,1 although jurisdictions such as France have
explicitly mandated corporate manslaughter liability via Penal Code reforms. Current
Health and Safety Executive (HSE) statistics place the WRF rate in the UK at 595 per
annum (HSE 2009), although this probably underestimates the true incidence of this
form of offending (Tombs and Whyte 2007).
To continue reading
Request your trial