environmental crimes research paper

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• Published: 31 October 2017

Green criminology: shining a critical lens on environmental harm

• Angus Nurse 1  

Palgrave Communications volume  3 , Article number:  10 ( 2017 ) Cite this article

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Green criminology provides for inter-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary engagement with environmental crimes and wider environmental harms. Green criminology applies a broad ‘‘green’’ perspective to environmental harms, ecological justice, and the study of environmental laws and criminality, which includes crimes affecting the environment and non-human nature. Within the ecological justice and species justice perspectives of green criminology there is a contention that justice systems need to do more than just consider anthropocentric notions of criminal justice, they should also consider how justice systems can provide protection and redress for the environment and other species. Green criminological scholarship has, thus, paid direct attention to theoretical questions of whether and how justice systems deal with crimes against animals and the environment; it has begun to conceptualize policy perspectives that can provide contemporary ecological justice alongside mainstream criminal justice. Moving beyond mainstream criminology’s focus on individual offenders, green criminology also explores state failure in environmental protection and corporate offending and environmentally harmful business practices. A central discussion within green criminology is that of whether environmental harm rather than environmental crime should be its focus, and whether green ‘‘crimes’’ should be seen as the focus of mainstream criminal justice and dealt with by core criminal justice agencies such as the police, or whether they should be considered as being beyond the mainstream. This article provides an introductory overview that complements a multi- and inter-disciplinary article collection dedicated to green criminological thinking and research.

Introduction

Green Criminology as a field operates as a tool for studying, analyzing, and dealing with environmental crimes and wider environmental harms that are often ignored by mainstream criminology. It provides for an inter-disciplinary, and multi-disciplinary, engagement and approach, which redefines criminology as not just being concerned with crime or social harm falling within the remit of criminal justice systems. Green crime is a fast-moving and somewhat contested area in which academics, policymakers and practitioners frequently disagree not only on how green crimes should be defined but also on: the nature of the criminality involved; potential solutions to problems of green crime; and the content and priorities of policy (Nurse, 2016 ). Within ecological justice discourse, for example, there may be agreement that harms to the environment and non-human animals must be addressed (Benton, 1998 ). But debates continue over whether green crimes are best addressed through criminal justice systems or via civil or administrative mechanisms. Indeed, a central discussion within green criminology is that of whether environmental harm rather than environmental crime should be its focus, with the environmental harm perspective currently dominating green criminological discourse. In essence, there is ongoing fundamental debate over whether green crimes should be seen as the focus of mainstream criminal justice and dealt with by core criminal justice agencies such as the police, or whether they should be considered as being beyond the mainstream. This article provides an introductory overview to a multi- and inter-disciplinary thematic collection dedicated to green criminological thinking and research.

Green criminology: a call to arms

Green criminology is not easily categorized given that it draws together a number of different perspectives as well as theoretical and ideological conceptions. Thus, rather than there being one distinct green criminology, it is rather an umbrella term for a criminology concerned with the general neglect of ecological issues within criminology (Lynch and Stretesky, 2014 :1) as well as the incorporation of green perspectives within mainstream criminology. Indeed as Lynch and Stretesky succinctly state:

‘‘As criminologists we are not simply concerned that our discipline continues to neglect green issues, we are disturbed by the fact that, as a discipline, criminology is unable to perceive the wisdom of taking green harms more seriously, and the need to reorient itself in ways that make it part of the solution to the large global environmental problems we now face as the species that produces those problems’’ (2014: 2).

For mainstream criminology, restrictive notions of police and policing by state institutions and of crime as being solely that determined as such by the criminal law dominate. Yet Lynch and Stretesky ( 2014 ) highlight that environmental harms constitute a major threat to human survival and that green crimes such as pollution constitute a substantial threat to human life yet are often ignored by mainstream justice systems. Accordingly, green criminology, extends beyond the focus on street and interpersonal crimes to encompass consideration of ‘‘the destructive effects of human activities on local and global ecosystems’’ (South and Beirne, 1998 : 147). In doing so green criminology considers not just questions of crime as defined by a strict legalist/criminal law conception (Situ and Emmons, 2000 ), but also examines questions concerning rights, justice, morals, victimization, criminality, and the use of administrative, civil and regulatory justice systems. Green criminology also examines the actions of non-state criminal justice actors such as Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) and civil society organizations and the role of the state as a major contributor to environmental harm.

Given green criminology’s nature as a broad field encompassing discourse on a range of issues relating to environmental harm, this thematic article collection offers discussion of a range of issues that help to advance green criminological discussion.

State-crime is a concern of green criminology, particularly in respect of state responsibility for protecting the environment and natural resources, and the associated harm when states fail to comply with their obligations. Weston and Bollier identify that according to, Locke’s notion of res nullius , environmental and wildlife resources ‘‘belong to no one and are, therefore, free for the taking’’ (2013: 127). However, the public trust doctrine argues that environmental resources such as water and fisheries are held in trust for the public and so there is a responsibility to use such resources widely in the public interest (Blumm and Wood, 2013 ). As noted by Lynch, Stretesky and Long ( 2017 ), water pollution provides an example of both green victimization and of how green crimes can appear in societies on an everyday level. Scholars such as Johnson et al. ( 2016 ) and Lynch and Stretesky ( 2013 ) have examined how states and corporations have commodified water sources as something that can be owned or leased and subsequently can be exploited. Johnson et al. ( 2016 ) identify how in some jurisdictions, the privatization of water has enabled corporations and corrupt states to exploit a fundamental human right. At a basic level, examining the extent and control of water pollution by legal state water treatment facilities illuminates the extent to which state failings in use of water resources can constitute a state-crime. Publicly Owned Water Treatment Facilities (or POWTs) are usually owned by the state/government and represent a mechanism through which water is used as a public good. To quote, for example, from the California Constitution Article X Section 2:

‘‘It is hereby declared that because of the conditions prevailing in this State the general welfare requires that the water resources of the State be put to beneficial use to the fullest extent of which they are capable, and that the waste or unreasonable use or unreasonable method of use of water be prevented, and that the conservation of such waters is to be exercised with a view to the reasonable and beneficial use thereof in the interest of the people and for the public welfare.[…].’’

Similar provisions will be found elsewhere codifying the principle of efficient use of water resources. Thus, failure to effectively manage state water resources and to eliminate or control pollution that impacts negatively on water resources likely raises regulatory concerns. Waste treatment is often a regulated industry and regulations designed to control the emissions of water pollution into waterways (through such measures as the US Clean Water Act) combine with public trust concerns to ensure that natural resources are effectively used. Yet as the discussion in this collection illustrates, POWts release significant quantities of pollutants into waterways, contributing to environmental harm. Green criminologists interested in these areas may well note that water offenses will not always fall within the remit of the criminal law and may not be dealt with by mainstream policing agencies. Instead they may fall within the jurisdiction of environmental regulators like the Environmental Protection Agency who may choose from a menu of criminal, civil, or administrative sanctions when taking enforcement action. As the POWTs are legal actors operating a legitimate business, enforcement action may be regulatory or administrative, consisting of fines or other administrative action designed to correct the problem and allow the operator to continue their business rather than imposing incapacitating punishment. Such action illustrates a concern of many green criminologists in how neoliberal markets, capitalist systems, and the activities of otherwise legal corporate actors can cause significant environmental harm that arguably constitutes a crime against the environment. The relatively low level of prosecutions for pollution activity arguably illustrates this issue. This issue is explored by Ozymy and Jarrell ( 2017 ) who highlight the diffuse structure of the environmental regulatory regime in the United States and lack of governmental databases, which makes empirical assessment of environmental crimes and enforcement efforts particularly difficult.

Wildlife crime is also a core concern of green criminology (van Uhm, 2016 ; Nurse, 2015 , Wyatt, 2013 , Sollund, 2011 ; South and Wyatt, 2011 ). Much green criminological discourse is concerned with wildlife trafficking and the illegal trade in wildlife, particularly trafficking in endangered species (Schneider, 2008 ). However, the illegal killing of wildlife particularly within farming and ranching areas, has recently caught the attention of green criminological scholars. Killing of large predators such as wolves and lynx has been characterized as a form of resistance by some scholars (von Essen et al., 2016 ; von Essen and Allen, 2015 ) and illustrates the conflict between conservation and animal protection ideologies and the needs of rural communities. While most states have animal protection laws intended to protect wildlife from unnecessary human predation, hunting remains a legal and regulated activity. Thus, illegal killing of wildlife within hunting communities should in principle attract the attention of law enforcement agencies. Yet, such killings sometimes take place with the approval of the community and arguably constitute a form of organized crime. How the state deals with such illegal killings and its attitudes toward hunting communities who do so is of interest to determining how states implement species justice concerns (see Sollund, 2017 ). Sollund ( 2016 ) has previously illustrated how defining animals as ‘‘other’’ and their legal conception as property can help distance animal killing from other forms of violent crime. The case under discussion in this thematic collection illustrates how notions of folk crime and resistance can be employed to minimize the seriousness of illegal killing of endangered species. Yet at the same time, police and judicial responses to wildlife killing can view this as serious crime commensurate with global notions of wildlife crime as serious activity.

Green Criminology also examines mechanisms for disrupting and preventing environmental crime and reducing harms to non-human animals and the environment (Wellsmith, 2010 , 2011 ; Nurse, 2015 ). Traditional reactive policing models of detection, apprehension and punishment (Bright, 1993 ) risk being inadequate in the case of environmental harm where irreparable environmental damage or loss of animal life may have already been caused. Likewise, traditional justice systems are also often inadequate to redress the impact of environmental harm. Hall ( 2017 ) makes a case for the wider utilization of restorative justice and mediation-based approaches as a means of providing alternative or parallel justice mechanisms for both human and non-human victims of environmental crimes and broader environmental harms. Such consideration of alternatives is integral to green criminology’s critical approach, which also seeks to promote preventive or disruptive enforcement activity aimed at preventing environmental harm before it occurs. Collaborative and multi-agency approaches offer scope to disrupt environmentally harmful activity as the waste industry case study in this thematic collection illustrates. As a form of critical criminological discourse, green criminology arguably shines a light on the failure of mainstream and traditional justice approaches to deal with such complex crime and in their discussion of multi-agency collaboration in this collection, White and Barrett ( 2017 ) argue for innovative means to combat the multi-dimensional nature of environmental crimes.

The issues discussed within this thematic article collection help position green criminology as a discipline that considers not just questions of crime as defined by a strict legalist/criminal law conception (Situ and Emmons, 2000 ), but also questions concerning rights, justice, morals, victimization, criminality, and the use of administrative, civil and regulatory justice systems. The papers included all follow a critical path, expressing a claim of an alternative criminology consistent with South’s claim that addressing environmental harms and injustice requires ‘‘a new academic way of looking at the world but also a new global politics’’ (2010: 242).

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Nurse, A. Green criminology: shining a critical lens on environmental harm. Palgrave Commun 3 , 10 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-017-0007-2

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Original research article, environmental crime and the harm prevention criminalist.

• School of Social Sciences, University of Tasmania, Hobart, TS, Australia

The role of the ‘pracademic’ comes in the fore in the interface between academia and environmental protection. This article explores the translation of evidence-based research and theoretical innovation in environmental crime prevention into ground level practice. Crime prevention as applied to illegal fishing forms the initial focus of the discussions. This is followed by discussion of pracademics and the importance of combining academic work and practitioner experience as part of applied criminology. The paper then discusses the potential role of a ‘harm prevention criminalist’ in crime prevention interventions. As something potentially at the frontier of future work, this position involves a combination of skills including site and crime assessment, interpersonal communication, collaborative engagement, and horizon scanning.

Introduction

Jobs for the future need to be created in the present. Environmental degradation, threats to biodiversity, and climate change are the most important systemic issues facing humanity. How we respond to these challenges is not only a matter of strategic planning and marshalling of resources, but workforce development. Addressing environmental crime requires agencies equipped with appropriate professional human resource capabilities, both in responding to crime and preventing it.

This article explores links between academic research in environmental crime prevention and ground level practice. Crime prevention as applied to illegal fishing forms the initial focus of the discussions. As part of this, the article discusses the knowledge and reception of academic literature on crime prevention in a government authority tasked with stopping illegal fishing, a task made particularly complex given that it occurs in a community that is highly culturally and linguistically diverse. Attention then turns to the role of a ‘harm prevention criminalist’ in crime prevention interventions. Being at the frontier of future work, this potential position involves a combination of skills including site and crime assessment, interpersonal communication, collaborative engagement, and horizon scanning.

The article speaks to the necessity for both theoretical and applied criminology and acknowledges the role of pracademics in trying to ‘make a difference’ with respect to real world policies, programs, projects, and politics. The main orientation of the discussion is toward the future – both in terms of general environmental developments and a potential role for criminologists as practitioners in responding to environmental calamity.

The practice of prevention: Illegal fishing

Environmental crime prevention as a specific type of crime prevention encompasses a range of considerations. Different kinds of harm require different kinds of responses. There is now an extensive body of work that deals with preventing environmental crime in different geographical locations, in relation to different types of commodities and crimes, and utilising many different techniques and approaches (see for examples, Pires and Moreto, 2011 ; Lemieux, 2014 ; Sollund et al., 2016 ; van Uhm, 2016 ; Cao, 2017 ; Moreto, 2018 ; Sollund, 2019 ; Wong, 2019 ; Wyatt, 2022 ). As these studies indicate, general pronouncements about the nature of harm need to be accompanied by analyses of specific sites and crimes. This applies to illegal fishing as it does to other types of environmental crimes and harms.

There are, for instance, major variations in illegal fishing as this pertains to criminal activity and this in turn is shaped by context and purpose, such as fishing for subsistence versus money-making ( White, 2008 ). Studies of specific types of illegal fishing (e.g., abalone, crab, lobster and toothfish) show marked differences in motives, techniques, local cultures, and scale of operation ( McMullan and Perrier, 2002 ; Tailby and Gant, 2002 ; Smith and Anderson, 2004 ; Anderson and McCusker, 2005 ; de Coning and Witbooi, 2015 ; Petrossian et al., 2015 ; Petrossian et al., 2016 ). Within specific fishing sectors, there may also be great variation. For example, abalone theft includes organised poachers, licensed divers, shore-based divers, extended family groups, and individuals, all of whom differ in methods, motivation and use of the abalone catch ( Tailby and Gant, 2002 ). Moreover, different actors may be involved at different points – harvesting, processing, transporting, retailing, consuming – requiring different skills, such as diving, canning, driving, selling, and cooking.

Environmental crime prevention, therefore, needs to be tailored to fit circumstance.

Models and techniques of prevention

Accordingly, a range of crime prevention approaches have been developed in relation to illegal fishing – that incorporate social developmental and community measures as well as those that are situational and techniques oriented ( Sutton et al., 2021 ). Recent methods and techniques of environmental crime prevention, specifically as applied to illegal fishing, include:

● application of Situational Crime Prevention that features increasing the effort of crime through target hardening, increasing the risks through enhanced satellite surveillance, reducing rewards by disrupting markets, reducing provocations by neutralising peer pressure that sustains a culture of offending, and removing excuses by measures such as posting instructions about compliance and enforcement regimes ( Kurland et al., 2017 ).

● employment of the CRAVED Theft Model , which refers to Concealable [size, overall catch load]; Removable [easy to catch]; Abundant/Accessible/Available [hot spots]; Valuable [larger, scarce]; E njoyable [found in recipes]; and Disposable [highly commercial] ( Petrossian and Clarke, 2014 ). Using this model, investigators can provide analyses applied to multiple illegally-caught species, make comparison across species and locations; focus on methods, perpetrators, consumers; and be informed by the notion of ‘suitable targets of crime’.

● a Crime Script Analysis considers the variety of motives, different sets of skills and knowledge, and different modus operandi involved in criminality ( Sahramaki and Kankaanranta, 2017 ; Petrossian and Pezzella, 2018 ; Dehghannirir and Borrion, 2021 ). Crime is a process, and the actual criminal event is only one of the ‘events’ in this process. Accordingly, the task is to lay out a ‘script’ and carefully scrutinise the sequential steps. This leads to policy and programmatic responses built upon the knowledge provided by script analyses. A crime prevention response is based upon ‘reading’ the script based upon the responses and information provided in investigation.

● a Market Reduction Approach , as applied to the illicit endangered species trade, seeks to identify the routine patterns of those involved, such as poachers, handlers, and consumers ( Schneider, 2012 ) and is also relevant to investigation of illegal fishing. Issues of seasonality, how harvested, demand, and processing are all included in such analyses. As applied to fishing, key agencies include fisheries, customs, marine park authorities, port authorities and the navy; key stakeholders include commercial and recreational fishers, tourism operators, local residents and biologists.

● a fisheries Value-Chain Model refers to an abstract rendition of typical progressions based on experience and prior examinations of an industry ( UNODC, 2019a ). For instance, the fisheries ‘process value chain’ occurs on shore and at sea, and involves standard stages including preparation, fishing, landing, processing, sales, transport, and the consumer. Each of these stages simultaneously reflects various social control processes – for example, during ‘preparations’ matters might include licenses, quotas, crew, captain and vessel registration, while ‘sales’ involves things such as invoice, accounting, product yields, bank transactions, correspondence, and contracts. This is not a crime script as such, but it does provide crime prevention practitioners with a sense of ‘where to look’ and ‘who to watch’ as part of the fisheries value chain model.

● Trade-related measures involve schemes that require documentation to accompany the product to authenticate its legitimacy ( Lack, 2007 ). In regards illegal fishing, vessel lists can be drawn up and used to identify authorised vessels (‘white lists’) and vessels considered to be fishing in breach of the law (‘black lists’). The lists are then used to restrict the access of black listed vessels to ports and port services. Such lists may also involve trade bans on specific States that are considered to have failed to co-operate in the implementation of regional conservation and management measures.

● Community Crime Prevention measures include working at the local level to address issues ( Moreto, 2018 ). These issues include the ambiguities surrounding fishing, given that it is legal and it is only certain regulations that make it illegal, and where local cultures view it as a ‘folk crime’ and not really that serious ( McMullan and Perrier, 2002 ). Prevention involves encouraging citizen engagement as guardians of nature and having local tourism and other commercial interests as natural resource managers (through initiatives such as ‘Fish Watch’ and confidential phone-in hot lines) and use of relevant technology (GPS-linked photos; fish identification). Coastal watch schemes and monitoring programs, as well as Indi genous coastal patrols, are also community-based measures.

● Focusing on high-risk locations is common to crime prevention approaches generally and this has also been applied to identification of the places where illegal fishing occurs ( Weekers and Zahnow, 2018 ). For example, detailed analyses show a distinctive spatial distribution of poaching events within the no-take Marine National Parks of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. Based on these findings, that demonstrate most crimes of a particular type occur in a small number of ‘risky’ places, tailored crime prevention measures can be applied, such as random patrolling, deployment of surveillance cameras, and GPS tracking of boats from nearby launch sites, in these high-risk areas.

As with other types of environmental crime, illegal fishing may stem from the exclusion of small-scale fishers from traditional fishing spots or species, and reflect historical inequalities and colonial experiences ( Hubschle et al., 2021 ). A holistic approach to crime prevention acknowledges that diverse interests need to be accommodated as part of the crime prevention problem-solving process ( Sutton et al., 2021 ) and that environmental restorative justice should likewise be considered part of the crime prevention toolkit ( Pali et al., 2022 ). As applied here, such an approach attempts to foster community-level compliance and engagement in guardianship, the tackling of economic and cultural factors that legitimate illegal fishing, uses the full suite of techniques and technologies to monitor and address issues, and situates fish (and the protection of fish) within the context of both ecological and social environments.

Smaller scale interventions and prevention

While sophisticated methods and models of environmental crime intervention have been developed by criminologists, policymakers and practitioners operating at high levels of office, at the ground level the situation is somewhat different. Here work tends to be much more constrained by circumstance and limited resources.

For example, the main orientation of fisheries officers in the State of Victoria in Australia is on ‘catching the bad guys’ rather than prevention as such. It is notable, therefore, that Fisheries Victoria recently organised one of its first ever conferences and related activities on crime prevention (2020-2021). The chief organiser wanted to impress upon her colleagues the importance of crime prevention (rather than focussing solely on reactive investigation and prosecution). She, too, had to learn much ‘from scratch’ as crime prevention had not been part of either her training or her day-to-day job mandate.

Several criminologists, including myself, were invited to present overarching explanatory papers at the conference. Much of the work of Fisheries Victoria relates to freshwater fishing and breaches of fisheries law. Two things immediate stood out for me as a conference participant. First, it was basically just the one person driving the ‘crime prevention’ agenda (most of the regulatory activity is reactive not proactive), and she was trying to organise training and materials without any previous exposure to criminology or crime prevention literature. Second, a vital issue in the State of Victoria is ‘community crime prevention’ insofar as the culturally and linguistically diverse population means that there are challenges in regards communication, expectations, relationships to ‘authority’, and notions/knowledge of acceptable behaviour. Practitioners were thus simultaneously endeavoring to learn the essential concepts and models of crime prevention, how best to achieve behaviour change and prevent crime, and how to strengthen community engagement to make prevention programs stronger.

The challenge for practitioners was to learn more about prevention techniques that resonated with their own jobs and experiences, as well as social crime prevention approaches to address the diversity of the regulated communities. The challenge for academics was to move from abstract models to try to pinpoint specific tactics and techniques that would be seen as useable by practitioners, relevant to policymakers, and affordable from the viewpoint of those controlling the agency purse strings. On either side, the problem of language is formidable – since specific terms frequently mean quite different things to different people (see Pink, 2021 on diverse uses of terminology in regulation and law enforcement), and there are varying degrees of understanding across the technical, experiential, applied and intellectual domains. Practitioners in Fisheries Victoria and agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency, for example, come from a variety of backgrounds – including marine science, ichthyology, economics, chemistry, and law enforcement – and this is partly reflected in the variable ways in which they apply their specific knowledge and skills in undertaking regulatory work. Not everyone is on the same page when it comes to mission and role.

As a result of this engagement with Fisheries Victoria, my attention turned toward initiatives that could help to translate academic knowledge into grounded practice. Part of this involved interrogating the nature and role of ‘pracademics’ in environmental crime prevention. This was grounded in experiences such as the previously mentioned conference and has led to further consideration of the potential role of criminologists in working with people at the coalface. The emergence of new types of harms, such as those pertaining to global warming, also propelled interest in how changing ‘harmscapes’ ( Mutongwizo et al., 2021 ) are rapidly shifting the terrain of both conceptions of harm and practitioner responses. For example, these profound changes have huge implications for aquatic and marine life (e.g., migration of fish species in the oceans, the impact of drought and algae blooms on fish populations in freshwater systems). For environmental crime generally, it points to larger issues of perspective and approach that need further unpacking.

Pracademics and applied criminology

The term ‘pracademic’ is based on the words, ‘practitioner’ and ‘academic’. It alludes to persons who strive to combine elements of applied, practical knowledge with the insights of abstract research and/or scholarly knowledge.

Practitioners tend to be focussed on the tasks at hand, drawing upon experience, expertise, and technical skills to address matters such as, for example, crime scene examination, criminal investigation, legal advocacy and DNA analysis. There is a defined project, defined goal and defined outcome, whether this relates to scientific analysis, police work, regulatory compliance, or court adjudication. Academics carry out studies and evaluations of policy and practice, and impacts and risks, and less frequently engage directly in practical interventions. Some concentrate on consolidating knowledge in the form of developing theories and concepts, categorising previous research into conceptual models, and summarising existing findings and/or writing histories of knowledge ( White, 2023 ).

The role of the pracademic comes to the fore in the interface between academia and environmental protection. It finds its best purchase when evidence-based research and theoretical innovation in environmental crime prevention is translated into ground level regulatory and law enforcement practice. This sort of ‘applied criminology’ involves academic and practitioner attempts to concretely address environmental crimes and harms. That is, the emphasis is on action and intervention. Rather than simply or solely studying an environmental issue or problem (e.g., the causes of climate change, the impact of city air pollution on children), the point of applied criminology is to prevent, stop and/or deter perpetrators as well as support environmental victims (however defined). It is about (in)justice in the here and now, occurring in specific places, and involving specific actors, situations, commodities, and institutions. Academic interest lies in how the stakeholders and institutions of criminal justice perform their roles and how they might improve their strategic, operational, and tactical capacities, based on comparative research, practice evaluations, improvements in technology and conceptual innovation.

Addressing environmental crime requires official state agencies that are equipped with appropriate professional human resource capabilities, in at least two areas. First, in the global setting there is presently a lack of consistency in approach to training environmental officers. This applies to services that include ‘green police’ through to environmental regulators whose task is to monitor compliance and enforce laws in areas such as national parks, wildlife protection and pollution control. International organisations such as the International Network for Environmental Compliance (INECE), INTERPOL and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, and their counterpart domestic organisations such as the Australasian Environmental law and Regulators Network (AELERT) provide increasing support for improved training and capacity-building measures. In regards environmental crime, for example, the UNODC has recently produced guides on drafting legislation to combat wildlife crime and addressing corruption in the fisheries sector ( UNODC, 2019a ; UNODC, 2019b ). As part of its ‘Global Programme for Combatting Wildlife and Forest Crime’, the UNODC is working to enhance capacity-building and wildlife law enforcement networks. Its work also includes the delivery of specific technical assistance activities, such as coordinating the implementation of the Wildlife and Forest Crime Analytic Toolkit ( UNODC, 2012 ).

As part of these developments, there is a need to develop further a professionalised workforce with an appropriate and recognised career structure. Academics can play an important part in professional training and education by conveying knowledge and skills in a structured work-relevant manner. For instance, the ‘Education for Justice’[E4J] initiative seeks to prevent crime and promote a culture of lawfulness through education activities designed for primary, secondary, and tertiary levels. The intention is that these activities will help educators teach the next generation to better understand and address problems, including actively engaging in their communities and future professions to do so. The UNODC has coordinated the preparation of E4J tertiary level materials, consisting of peer-reviewed university modules. In the specific area of environmental crime, the tertiary modules include modules on wildlife, fisheries, and forestry crime . Module 5: Sustainable livelihoods and community engagement (/34j/en/wildlife-crime/module5/index.html) provides an exemplary model of community crime prevention as applied to wildlife crime including illegal fishing. These resources are ‘open access’ and thus not subject to copyright restrictions.

Second, there is the need for a new type of professional whose specific function is to provide improved assessments of environmental harm and collaborative methods of responding to them. Such a position would be at the fulcrum of diverse disciplines (for example, toxicology, marine science, biology, law) and provide the organisational lever for the establishment of multi-agency task forces. What is needed is a working model of collaborative practice that from the very beginning is organised around specific purpose and intended outcomes, that would include investigation across the retrospective (past harms) and prospective (future harms) continuum, inclusive of different levels of scale (local, national, regional, transnational, global), with a view to enhancing strategies for crime prevention, environmental regulation, law enforcement, emergency services planning, and crisis response.

The use of multidisciplinary teams ensures deployment of skills that combine scientific and technical expertise, crime scene expertise, and expertise in detection of illegality and criminality. Likewise, the institutional culture surrounding regulation, compliance and enforcement activities has a great bearing on how work to monitor, investigate, prevent and prosecute environmental crime is carried out in practice. The push for professionalisation of environmental intervention is a move which would help institutionalise a consistent approach to the prevention and policing of environmental crime.

Clearly defined areas of expertise, supported by ongoing training and education, can instil a strong sense of mission and independent critical thinking. An example of this is the FloraGuard project in the United Kingdom. This project set out to develop a methodological approach that combines the efficiency of Artificial Intelligence [AI] search algorithms with a suitable level of human analysis ( Whitehead et al., 2021 ). To tackle the problem of online trading in illegally sourced wildlife, several disciplines needed to be involved to combine expertise in the fields of conservation science, criminology, law enforcement, and information and communications technology (ICT). This, in turn, required the creation of a novel socio-technical workflow, one that involved the different disciplines at different stages or steps in the investigation of Internet-facilitated illegal wildlife trade. For example, at Step 1 the concern is to identify species of interest. This involved conservation scientists and law enforcement officers. Step 2 is concerned with developing a lexicon suitable for the website search. This step involved the conservation scientists, law enforcement officers, ICT scientists and criminologists. Each step therefore involved diverse participants depending upon the expertise required and the insights needed.

Importantly, this methodological approach required an intensely multidisciplinary approach that approached the transdisciplinary. While each discipline performed specialist tasks, a cross-disciplinary exchange of information was frequently essential for the successful execution of those tasks. Knowledge transfer occurred not only between disciplines at the designated stages of the workflow (for example, Step 1) but also more organically, as key inputs and outputs were produced. As the project developed, therefore, knowledge sharing led to deeper understanding across the team. Not only was the workflow planning itself novel (and, effectively, multidisciplinary), but the process likewise led to a greater sense of interdisciplinary participation and experience.

Projects such as FloraGuard provide working tools whereby forensic computing can be mobilised to assist conservation practitioners and law enforcement agencies in detecting poachers online with the potential of disrupting their means of profiting from illegally sourced specimens. Diverse skills and knowledge are required for this to happen, including the use of algorithms to direct searches for online posts, plant identification, knowledge of trade names of the plants being bought and sold (rather than formal scientific descriptors) of sought-after plant species, and behavioural analysis associated with online activity including evidence of illegal trade.

Environmental harm prevention

Fundamentally, discussion of pracademics and applied green criminology point in the direction of ‘praxis’ – the synthesis of theory, research, and intervention. Praxis is the unity of ‘theory’ and ‘practice’ in motion at the ground level of action. We learn by ‘doing’; we learn by ‘reflecting’. How we act in preventing and responding to environmental crimes and harms depends on the sophistication of our understanding of the issues. It also depends on the skilfulness of our interventions in communities and across diverse social contexts. For pracademics the importance of praxis is that it bridges artificial divisions between academic study and grounded practice.

We stand at a pivotal point in human history, one that is witnessing systematic destruction of the basic environmental contours of our planet. The three greatest threats to humankind and myriad other species, ecosystems and the Earth generally are climate change, rapidly diminishing biodiversity, and pollution and contamination of land, air and water. Social intervention to counter these trends, and the implementation of suitable mitigation and adaptation strategies, is urgently needed. The field of criminology and its associated disciplines such as law, sociology, psychology, political science, international relations, and economics should and must play a part in the needed institutional shake-up and system transformation. This requires concerted activity around environmental issues. It also demands creative thinking and innovative ways in which to construct professional roles.

For instance, we can start by analysing environmental harm as a crime scene. Some preliminary work along these lines has already begun ( Lam and Tegelberg, 2021 ). This kind of re-imagining also suggests a new type of investigator: the harm prevention criminalist. This position could have wide and diverse applications including contributions to effective disaster relief, policing, emergency service provision, and more. There is urgent need to develop an integrated approach to environmental harms. Creating this new occupational category, informed by criminological theory and practice, is a means by which to do this. The vision is of improved assessments of environmental harm, and collaborative methods of response. Courts, police, and environmental protection agencies are crucial actors here, as are the emerging environmental enforcement networks ( Pink and Lehane, 2012 ; Pink and White, 2016 ) – along with scientific experts, non-government organisations, and citizen scientists.

Matters pertaining to social and environmental justice in the context of present institutional arrangements are also of concern. For instance, the environmental justice framework seeks to prevent environmental threats and is premised upon a series of interlinked propositions and principles ( Bullard, 2005 ). These principles emphasise values such as social equity (in which all individuals should have a right to be protected from environmental degradation) and harm prevention (that focuses on eliminating a threat before harm occurs). Each of these areas requires that considerable resources be devoted to measuring things such as human exposure to environmental chemicals, and sociological analysis of harm and risk distributions among diverse population groups.

It asks “How little harm is possible?” rather than “How much harm is allowable?” This principle demands that decision makers set goals for safe environments and examine all available alternatives for achieving the goals, and it places the burden of proof of safety on those who propose to use inherently dangerous and risky technologies.

Moreover, the environmental justice framework requires that: ‘[those] parties applying for operating permits for landfills, incinerators, smelters, refineries, chemical plants, and similar operations must prove that their operations are not harmful to human health, will not disproportionately affect racial and ethnic minorities and other protected groups, and are nondiscriminatory’ Bullard (2005 : 28–9).

Taking precaution is not only about risk assessment. It is about marshalling requisite expertise in order to best understand the specific problem at hand. Science can and must be a major tool in deliberations over human interventions and human impacts. But this is only one sort of knowledge. Expertise is also developed from the ground up, not simply on the basis of experiment and scientific method. Farmers on the land, and fishers of the sea, for example, have generations of expertise built up over time and under varying environmental conditions. Indigenous peoples frequently have knowledge and understandings of their environments that go back to time immemorial. The fact that some Indigenous people have survived for thousands of years, and thrived, in extremely hostile environments (the frozen lands of the north, the deserts of the dry continents) is testimony to human practices that are positively connected to immediate environs ( Robyn, 2002 ). Discussions of conservation and wildlife protection in Africa highlight the fundamental importance of local communities as ‘fulcrum institutions’ which, accordingly, means they ought to occupy centre stage in such efforts ( Hubschle and Shearing, 2018 ). A public participatory process of deliberation needs to incorporate all these kinds of voices. It also needs to be able to challenge the ‘wisdom’ and ‘truth’ of each, without prejudice and without fear.

The harm prevention criminalist

Today, a major consideration is how to translate future projections, particularly around climate change, into the realm of applied criminology. This is precisely the intent behind the creation of the harm prevention criminalist position, which would formally bridge the gap between disciplines and thus constitute a practical demonstration of how cross-disciplinary, multi-disciplinary and transdisciplinary research and practice can be institutionalised (in this instance around the frame of ‘environmental harm’). This is not simply about sciences and disciplines ‘talking with each other’. It presents a working model of collaborative practice that from the very beginning is organised around specific purpose and intended outcomes, incorporating community collaborations and co-design as part of its mandate.

The accompanying figure ( Figure 1 ) provides a schematic portrayal of the key dimensions of the proposed harm prevention criminalist.

Figure 1 Dimentions of the environmental harm criminalist.

The specific skills and intellectual input associated with forensic science/studies, environmental/social impact assessment, and crime prevention are unique insofar these are quite specific areas of endeavour (see for example, Burdge, 2004 ; Elliot, 2014 ; Taylor et al., 2004 ; Peel, 2005 ; Morrison-Saunders, 2018 ; Julian et al., 2022 ). The harm prevention criminalist would need to tap into each of these areas and apply relevant concepts, techniques, technologies, and methods to specific types of environmental harm, such as for example, legacy mining, eco-damage stemming from salmon farms, plastic in oceans, water theft, and bush fires (exploring each of these in terms of past, present, and future harms). These examples of environmental harm have temporal and geographical dimensions, with diverse consequences and impacts on industries, human and non-human species and environments depending on extreme weather events, the cumulative build-up of risk, efficacy of regulatory systems, and shifts in overarching climate conditions.

Applied investigation is needed across the retrospective (past harms) and prospective (future harms) continuum, inclusive of different levels of scale (local, national, regional, transnational, global), with a view to enhancing strategies for crime prevention, environmental regulation, law enforcement, emergency services planning, and crisis response. Tasks of the harm prevention criminalist include skills and knowledge audits in support of forming relevant task forces; incorporation of eco-justice considerations in analyses of harm (humans, ecosystems and non-human entities as subjected to harms); modelling collaboration (vertical, horizontal, diagonal) suited to the issue at hand; comparative analyses (over time, and with respect to different places); and horizon scanning oriented toward identification of trends and issues into the future (and applications of the precautionary principle). Issues of intelligence gathering and forward planning are essential to the tasks and duties of the harm prevention criminalist, as are the soft skills of interpersonal communication.

The necessity for a harm prevention criminalist is demonstrated in discussions surrounding the environment and security. Hall (2013 : 36) observes that definitions of ‘environmental security’ differ, but generally the concept tends to link environmental degradation and associated scarcity of resources with human conflict at individual, group, and state levels. Scarcity is tied to the over-exploitation of natural resources. It is also increasingly linked to the consequences of global warming ( IPCC, 2014 ; White, 2018 ; IPCC, 2022 ). Environmental harm is a contributor to and outcome of human insecurities. Illegal and over-fishing, side-stepping of hazardous waste disposal regulations, water and land theft, rorting of alternative energy subsidies and policies, and transference of toxicity and contaminated products across national borders are driven by different motivations and involve a wide range of actors. Yet, the consequence of such activities contributes to even more ruthless exploitation of rapidly vanishing natural resources, as well as the further diminishment of air, soil and water quality, thereby exacerbating the competition by individuals, groups and nations for what is left.

Old crimes are presenting in new contexts (e.g., water theft), and new crimes are emerging out of changing circumstances (e.g., carbon emissions fraud). Crime prevention strategies and rapid response efforts are needed for both kinds of crime.

This occupational proposal is fundamentally about prediction and prevention, and therefore must include a typology of environmental harms that reference diverse situations, settings, offenders, and offences. For example, consideration has to be given to crimes such as water theft for family farm use related to basic survival (caused by lack of rain and changes in temperatures), through to new opportunities for organised crime networks to be involved in activities such as illegal trade in water. A vital component is an orientation toward building social resilience within and among communities, and as part of this enhancing the capabilities of specific institutions and agencies in dealing with the foreseeable and unanticipated consequences of environmental harms and climate change. This parallels similar arguments with respect to the notion of ‘resilience policing’, which envisages a role for police in enabling communities and other actors to develop strategies for adapting and surviving broader societal shocks and harms ( Mutongwizo et al., 2021 ).

Diverse skills, knowledge and collaborations are required in each instance of environmental harm, and it is the bringing together of these that forms the basis of the harm prevention criminalist role. This role is not conceived as ‘project management’; rather, the intention is that it be a mid-range position within a strategic hierarchy of intervention as this pertains to specific kinds of environmental harms. Thus, for example, the key administrator or organisational lead is dictated by the nature of the environmental issue – for example, environmental protection agency in regards fish farms, fire services in relation to bush fires and arson, police with respect to water theft and illegal waste disposal issues, and so on. The role is envisaged as a professional officer position within the context of investigation and response to specific environmental harms. It would involve a sophisticated suite of and familiarity with practice-relevant concepts, techniques, skills, technologies, personnel, and intelligence gathering and analysis.

At the heart of the harm prevention criminalist role is brokerage. This refers to the ability to know who to link up with whom, which knowledge and techniques to be deployed in which circumstance, and how to maximise the effective use of material and human resources within existing fiscal limits and community settings. One does not need to be a criminologist to work as a criminalist, but criminology is an essential foundational field (parenthetically, it can be added that not all criminologists would wish to be criminalists – a diversity of research, teaching, policy, and practice roles exist, and ‘applied criminology’ of this sort is only one option).

Earlier in this article, various models and approaches to tackling illegal fishing were summarily outlined. Each of these, in turn, rests upon a much more detailed series of processes and procedures. Familiarity with this detail is vital to knowing the best fit when it comes to intervention tactics and strategies (including combinations of techniques and approaches) in specific circumstances. The criminalist can be an organising figure who assists in building the right kinds of teams, community connections, and the necessary multidisciplinary responses to specific kinds of environmental crime.

Collaborative practice

Collaboration not only involves work across areas of professional and scientific expertise (such as the Floraguard project). It is also central to practitioner engagement in combatting environmental crime. The activities and collaborations of environmental crime response agencies have tended to naturally occur around networks which are geographically-based (for example, known transit points and destinations), discipline-based (for example, environmental regulators) and commodity-based (for example, waste). Collaboration across these dimensions and involving these networks can be predominantly horizontal, vertical, or diagonal (see Figure 2 ).

Figure 2 Dimensions of Collaborative Practice. Source: Pink and White, 2016 .

Criminal groups and networks have the advantage generally of flexibility and a good working knowledge of local conditions and actors, which facilitate the crimes in question. In some instances, they garner buy-in by local community members and/or rely on community participation in illegal economies ( Hubschle and Shearing, 2018 ). A collaborative response needs to mirror these attributes. For example, it can mobilise a broad range of actors, with varying types and levels of expertise, with local through to international connections, around single-purpose interventions. It should have the capacity to provide ‘eyes on the ground’ as well as a ‘bird’s eye’ view of commodity chains and criminal networks. At the core of collaboration activities is information sharing. If this is accommodated and accomplished between and among the various agencies and actors within a particular group, then it opens the door to application of intelligence-led policing initiatives (based on tactical, operational, and strategic assessment of intelligence databases) as well as market reduction approaches (that target disposal markets, including handlers and consumers). These require systematic and detailed analysis of specific information. Two-way sharing of information demands that specific protocols be put into place. Accountability to local people is essential as well.

What is most important in joint working arrangements, however, is the human element. At an operational level, things seem to work best when relationships are built upon trust . This takes time. It also frequently involves informal as well as formal contact. Relationships of trust can take years to build – between individuals, teams/groups, agencies, and institutions. They can also take seconds to unravel (one person betraying a confidence; an event that goes pear-shaped). Resilience must be built into the equation, in part by establishing protocols, but also by ensuring that teams as well as individuals are highly engaged. At a practical level, this means that the skills of interpersonal communication are critically important ( Pink and White, 2016 ).

Anticipating change

There is increasing criminological interest in analysing and understanding existing and future threats to environmental wellbeing (see for example, Agnew, 2011 ). A recent innovation in this area has been work coupling the analytical framework of eco-global criminology with the futures orientation of horizon scanning ( White, 2011 ; White and Heckenberg, 2011 ). The result is an approach that provides a broad methodological framework that can inform the study of specific environmental harms. The various orientations in the model – substantive (that deals with risk, harm, and causes), justice (environmental, ecological species), and futures (based around concepts of intergenerational equity, precautionary principle, transferences over time) – are intended to provide direction and the conceptual building blocks for more detailed analysis of specific issues and trends, including those relating directly to criminality. Taken as a whole, these constitute the basis for an environmental horizon scanning exercise.

For horizon scanning, the focus of analysis is on current developments pertaining to the environment and extrapolating from these potential harms and transgressions that may be problematic in the future. Underpinning this process is the use of a mixed-methods approach that draws upon a variety of sources and data collecting strategies. The use and need for horizon scanning as an intellectual exercise and planning tool is related to the idea that many threats and opportunities are presently poorly recognised (see Sutherland and Woodroof, 2009 ). Accordingly, a more systematic approach to identification and solution of issues is required rather than reliance upon ad hoc or reactive approaches. For example, work around the implications of climate change for policing has been undertaken by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute ( Bergin and Allen, 2008 ) and individual police practitioners ( Chambers, 2011 ), and more recently from a criminological perspective ( Mutongwizo et al., 2021 ). The process of horizon scanning involves detailed study of the specific trends and issues associated with environmental degradation and destruction ( White and Heckenberg, 2011 ).

One of the key lessons of conventional crime prevention is that it ought to be based largely on a problem-solving, rather than policy-prescribed, model of intervention ( Sutton et al., 2021 ). For this reason, future work should include discrete case studies of environmental harm, in the process developing new and innovative ways to investigate these via development of the harm prevention criminalist position. In this regard, it would parallel and build upon previous work on bushfire arson ( Willis, 2004 ) and how to prevent it ( Anderson, 2010 ). Different places and people are vulnerable to different sorts of environmental harms and crimes. A problem-solving approach to crime prevention demands specificity. While grounded in the realities of existing environmental harms today, intervention also needs to have a clear future orientation and preventative focus.

Where to from here?

The implementation tasks associated with establishment of HPC roles are interrelated and include endeavours such as:

● Constructing an inventory of the ideal attributes of a harm prevention criminalist. In other words, what kinds of skills and knowledge are required for the position of harm prevention criminalist? This would involve the construction of an inventory of techniques and technologies, concepts and practices, associated with relevant fields and disciplines (e.g., conservation sciences, forensic studies, criminology, environmental impact assessment, restorative justice).

● Analysing regulatory, investigatory, enforcement and sanctioning practices in relation to environmental harms. We need to know how different agencies are responding to criminality and offending behaviour associated with environmental harms. This involves systematic identification of agencies involved in environmental regulation and policing (e.g., water theft), the changing legislative parameters within which they work (e.g., laws introducing a general ‘environmental duty of care’), and the experiences and exposure of special emergency services to crime and harms arising from or related to environmental disasters (e.g., pollution).

● Assessing crime prevention strategies and the role of the harm prevention criminalist in responding to environmental harms. For this we need to ask what can be done proactively, utilising a harm prevention criminalist, to prevent the negative consequences of environmental harms? Work would be directed at developing strategic crime prevention plans that incorporate forward planning and training and resource needs, based on assessments of existing and projected environmental harms.

● The position of harm prevention criminalist is meant to bring together diverse skills sets, knowledge, and agencies in assessing and addressing specific kinds of environmental harm. This process would be ongoing and be informed by the accumulation of specific case studies and the development of holistic expertise.

Preventing environmental crime is a complicated social process. It involves bringing together different agencies (e.g., regulatory, enforcement, emergency services) and practitioners (e.g., scientists, technicians, lawyers, police, NGOs) who collaborate in various ways to address specific types of crime such as illegal fishing and illegal waste disposal. It also needs to be contextually specific in regards to geography and community. To be effective, crime prevention must be forward looking, planning oriented, and operationally ‘fit for purpose’.

Criminologists concerned with analysing and understanding threats to the environment face one central question: How can we best interpret, respond to, and prevent environmental harms and crimes? To answer this, we need to seek innovative ways to conceive these issues as well as measures that will address them, according to our best appraisal of emerging needs. Environmental degradation, pollution and climate change are the most important issues humanity confronts. One response is to establish a harm prevention criminalist position – a role that can connect key stakeholders and knowledge holders so that expertise and experience is directed in the most effective and efficient manner.

Data availability statement

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/supplementary material. Further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author.

Author contributions

The author confirms being the sole contributor of this work and has approved it for publication.

Conflict of interest

The author declares that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

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Keywords: collaboration, criminalist, crime prevention, environmental harm, horizon scanning, Illegal fishing, pracademic

Citation: White R (2022) Environmental crime and the harm prevention criminalist. Front. Conserv. Sci. 3:1049160. doi: 10.3389/fcosc.2022.1049160

Received: 20 September 2022; Accepted: 17 November 2022; Published: 01 December 2022.

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Copyright © 2022 White. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Rob White, [email protected]

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Article contents

Environmental crime.

• Carole Gibbs Carole Gibbs Department of Criminal Justice, Michigan State University
•  and  Rachel Boratto Rachel Boratto Department of Criminal Justice, Michigan State University
• https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190264079.013.269
• Published online: 29 March 2017

Environmental crime is a complex and ambiguous term for several reasons. It is sometimes used as an umbrella term for crimes related to biodiversity, wildlife, animals, natural resources, hazardous waste, banned substances, and environmental quality, but scholars have also developed typologies to capture the unique dimensions of each form of environmental crime. Disagreements regarding whether to distinguish violations of environmental laws (addressed via civil prosecution or administrative actions) from environmental crimes (criminally prosecuted), and whether to also consider environmental harms (legal activities that harm the environment) or environmental risks produce further confusion. The range of offenders also complicates this concept, as individuals, groups/networks, and powerful organizations commit environmental crimes. The degree of harm created by each actor may, or may not, be equivalent.

Given the complexities of this area of study, scholars have developed and/or tested a wide range of theoretical perspectives on and interventions to address environmental crime. Consistent with conceptual disagreements, these theoretical frameworks and corresponding interventions vary (arguably the most) based on whether the dependent variable is environmental crime (as defined by law), or environmental harm or risk defined using other criteria. However, multiple theoretical perspectives/interventions are also examined within research on these broad categories of environmental crime, harm, and risk. In order to capture the breadth of research on environmental crime, we narrow the focus of this article to pollution related crimes (e.g., hazardous waste, banned substances, environmental quality). In the following article, we offer further detail regarding conceptual discussions, legal complexities, types of offenders, types of crime, and research on this subset of environmental crimes.

• environmental crime
• environmental regulation
• environmental law
• environmental offenders
• corporate environmental crime
• conservation criminology
• green criminology

Understanding and addressing environmental crime is extremely important. The impacts to the natural environment, including ecosystems, flora, and fauna, are often extensive and long lasting (Moore & Luoma, 1990 ; Peterson et al., 2003 ). These crimes also impact human health, causing birth defects and cancer among other health problems (Cohen, 2012 ). In addition, people living near polluted air, water, and land often report high levels of stress, citing concerns about family health and economic ties to the affected resources (Gill, Picou, & Ritchie, 2011 ).

Yet, understanding these issues can be challenging. Environmental crime is an ambiguous and complex term, in part due to the range of behaviors that fall within the concept. It is sometimes used as an umbrella term for crimes related to biodiversity, wildlife, animals, natural resources, hazardous waste, banned substances, and environmental quality (e.g., Clifford & Edwards, 1998 ; Shover & Routhe, 2005 ). However, scholars have also developed typologies to capture the unique dimensions of each form of crime. For example, White and Heckenberg ( 2014 ) distinguish between the harms associated with “brown,” “green,” and “white” environmental issues. “ Brown issues tend to be defined in terms of urban life and pollution (e.g., air quality); green issues mainly relate to wilderness areas and conservation matters (e.g., logging practices); and white issues refer to science laboratories and the impact of new technologies (e.g., genetically modified organisms)” (White & Heckenberg, 2014 , p. 69, emphasis in original ). Environmental enforcement organizations make another set of distinctions. For example, the INTERPOL Environmental Crime Programme has three key areas: biodiversity, natural resources, and environmental quality (White, 2016 ). 1 Crimes that impact biodiversity include illegal activities that remove flora and fauna from the natural environment; cruelty to animals; and illegal possession of wildlife, illegal trade, and exploitation (Nurse, 2015 ; Wellsmith, 2011 ). 2 Natural resource exploitation refers to illegal logging, mining, and fishing. Crimes related to environmental quality, such as air pollution, soil contamination, and the illegal disposal of hazardous waste or banned substances are considered pollution crimes. 3 In the following article, we focus on environmental quality or pollution crimes.

Even after narrowing the focus to environmental quality/pollution issues, conceptual questions remain. Pollution crimes vary in the degree of harm produced (Clifford & Edwards, 1998 ). Should littering be referred to as an environmental crime of similar magnitude to the illegal disposal of hazardous waste? The range of potential offenders further complicates this concept, as individuals, networks, and powerful organizations commit environmental crimes (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ; Shover & Routhe, 2005 ). Are the actions of individuals equivalent to those of large organizations? What if the public engages in these behaviors en masse (see, e.g., Vandenbergh, 2004 )?

In addition to these philosophical questions, the environmental legal terrain creates confusion. Environmental laws are typically implemented by regulatory agencies and these agencies have the power to use different bodies of law to sanction offenders. Under administrative law, cases can be addressed internally by regulatory agencies (e.g., administrative actions), but cases can also be referred for civil prosecution. These issues are typically considered environmental “violations” or “noncompliance.” However, many pieces of environmental legislation also contain provisions for the criminal prosecution of environmental “crimes” (Shover & Routhe, 2005 ; Uhlmann, 2014 ). Environmental legislation contains general criteria for criminal prosecution, but what criteria distinguish administrative, civil, and criminal cases is unclear in practice (Uhlmann, 2014 ). Further, academics disagree regarding whether administrative and civil violations should be studied alongside (or as) environmental crimes (Tappan, 1947 vs. Sutherland, 1949 ). Setting that issue aside, legal codes vary by jurisdiction, which especially complicates matters when examining environmental crimes that cross borders (i.e., transnational environmental crime). Finally, environmental law is unique in that a specified amount of harmful activity is permitted. For example, cutting down trees and polluting the air or water is allowed within a certain limit. To some, this suggests that environmental damage is something to be managed rather than an inherent wrong (i.e., mala prohibitum rather than malum in se) (White & Heckenberg, 2014 ).

Moving beyond the law, scholars have also argued that we should study environmental harms rather than environmental crimes defined by the legal code (White, 2008 ), or that we should study environmental risks in addition to environmental crimes (Gibbs, Gore, McGarrell, & Rivers, 2010 ), as many activities that damage the environment are legal. The variety of perspectives on what we should study (violations, crimes, harms, risks) results in many theoretical frameworks, approaches to research, and proposed and evaluated interventions. Therefore, sorting through the relevant research can be a challenge.

In the following article, we offer a road map through this confusing terrain. We begin with an overview of the types of legislation designed to protect the environment and the forms of regulation implemented to prevent/reduce pollution crimes. We next describe the types of environmental crimes that occur, the types of entities that violate these laws, potential explanations for these crimes, and offer a brief review of ongoing research. We conclude with a list of key sources for further study on this topic.

The Legal Context

U.s. legal context 4.

As summarized in Table 1 , Congress passed the majority of environmental protection laws in the 1960s and 1970s. In 1970 , the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was created by executive order to be the lead agency to implement and manage these policies (Clifford, 1998 ). The Clean Air Act (CAA, 1963 ), the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA, 1976 ), the Clean Water Act (CWA, 1972 ), the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA, 1976 ), and the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act (CERCLA, 1980 ) are some of the most significant pieces of legislation to limit pollution. Generally speaking, the CAA places limits on air pollution; the CWA regulates the discharge of pollutants into waterways; and RCRA establishes a regulatory system for hazardous waste (Uhlmann, 2014 ). The EPA is responsible for translating these general environmental laws into specific requirements, enforcing those requirements, and sanctioning companies or individuals that fail to comply.

The laws referenced above have many provisions, but one important component is the establishment of a permitting system. Manufacturing facilities that pollute the air and/or water must apply for permits that place limits on pollution and establish a schedule to monitor pollutant levels and report the results to the relevant regulatory agency to assess compliance. Similarly, the RCRA establishes a permitting and monitoring system to track hazardous waste from “cradle to grave.” In addition, the CERCLA, a supplement to RCRA, created a special tax on the petroleum and chemical industries, as well as a general environmental tax to create a “Superfund” to remediate or remove abandoned and inactive hazardous waste disposal sites. Money from the Superfund can be used to pay for EPA cleanup and for the claims of private parties.

In addition to these pieces of legislation the EPA also regulates other areas of industry and development. For example, the Toxic Substances Control Act ( 1976 ) regulates the manufacturing, transportation, and sale of toxic chemicals. The Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act ( 1947 ) governs the manufacturing and sale of pesticides. Development projects are monitored through the National Environmental Policy Act ( 1969 ), which requires environmental assessments for new projects. The Coastal Zone Management Act ( 1972 ) protects coastal regions from excessive and harmful development, and The Marine Protection Research & Sanctuaries Act controls the dumping of waste into the ocean. The EPA enforces some of these pieces of legislation in collaboration with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

Table 1. U.S. Federal Legislation.

As previously stated, environmental legislation typically includes provisions for civil or criminal prosecution and also allows the agency to respond to violations internally via administrative law. When seeking civil or criminal prosecution, cases are referred to the Department of Justice Environment and Natural Resource Division (or regional U.S. states attorneys). Generally speaking (summarizing across pieces of legislation), environmental violations may be prosecuted criminally when they are (1) knowing, (2) negligent, or (3) endanger human life (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). The courts have interpreted the “knowing” requirement as a showing of general intent . To obtain a criminal conviction, prosecutors must demonstrate that the defendant had a general awareness that he/she was dealing with a substance likely to be regulated and knowledge that a discharge was occurring. In contrast to traditional criminal law, the prosecutor does not have to establish specific intent. In other words, the prosecutor does not have to establish that the defendant premeditated to illegally dispose of regulated materials (Cooney et al., 1996 ). Cases may also be criminally prosecuted when a person fails to do what a “reasonable person” would do in the same circumstances. In other words, criminal prosecution can be based on negligence, or a lack of “due care.” Finally, cases may be subjected to criminal prosecution if human life is knowingly or negligently placed in imminent danger of death or serious bodily injury, regardless of whether injury actually occurred (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). In essence, the standards of proof in environmental law more closely resemble strict liability than traditional intent (Mandiberg, 2011 ). EPA guidance encourages prosecutors to consider the level of environmental harm and culpable conduct to make decisions regarding civil vs. criminal prosecution (Devaney, 1994 ). In practice, cases with deceptive or misleading conduct, plants operating outside of the regulatory system, and those that present a threat of significant harm to the environment or public health are more likely to be criminally than civilly prosecuted (Uhlmann, 2014 ).

The Department of Justice has used these provisions to prosecute companies and individuals for violations of environmental law. A corporation may be held criminally liable for the actions of its employees if prosecutors can establish that (1) the acts were done on behalf of the company, and (2) the acts were within the scope of the employee’s authority (Cooney et al., 1996 ). Under the “responsible corporate officer” provision, responsible individuals in the company can also be prosecuted. The individual must be a (1) corporate officer who is (2) directly responsible within management for the conduct in question, and (3) knew that the type of improper activity was occurring. In addition to the responsible corporate officer doctrine, individuals in the company may be held criminally liable if there is direct evidence of intent or willful blindness (or conscious avoidance) of knowledge of the issue (Cooney et al., 1996 ). Although CEOs may be held criminally liable, small companies and low- and mid-level managers are more often convicted for environmental violations at the federal level (Cohen, 2012 ; Uhlmann, 2014 ). It is unknown to what extent people who engage in environmental crime outside of their employment context are prosecuted. 5

Despite this discussion of prosecution, criminal prosecution is the least common response and administrative actions are the most common response to environmental violations (Gray & Shimshack, 2011 ). In addition, sanctioning offenders (i.e., a punishment-oriented approach) represents only one strategy to reduce and prevent environmental crimes. Punishing offenders through command-and-control regulations, which specify exactly what regulated entities must do (command) and issue sanctions (control) when regulated entities fail to meet the legal requirements, was initially the primary regulatory tool of EPA (Gunningham, 2009 ; Gunningham & Grabosky, 2004 ). However, the EPA has also historically worked cooperatively with industry to achieve compliance. For example, the agency provides a significant amount of compliance assistance (e.g., trainings, troubleshooting systems) to regulated entities to prevent violations before they occur and works with companies in violation to establish a schedule to return to compliance rather than immediately resorting to prosecution (Hunter & Waterman, 1996 ). EPA also relies extensively on alternative forms of regulation that offer more flexibility to the regulated community to achieve compliance, such as self-regulation and economic instruments.

Self-regulatory approaches include voluntary commitments, such as the EPA’s Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) 33/50 Program in which companies could volunteer to reduce legal toxic emissions for 33% by 1992 and 50% by 1995 . Economic instruments are also used to provide flexibility and incentives to regulated entities to comply and improve environmental performance beyond the minimum legal requirements. For example, the Acid Rain Program, which was designed to reduce the sulfur and nitrous oxide discharges responsible for acid rain, was the first large-scale environmental market in the world (Gunningham, 2009 ). In environmental markets, or “cap and trade” systems, regulated entities are issued a cap on emissions that specifies the amount of pollution they are allowed to emit. They are also either allocated or must buy credits, or rights to pollute a specified amount. On a regular basis (typically each year), companies must “surrender” (to the government agency) credits equivalent to the amount of their emissions. These credits can be traded like a currency, so those who have extra credits can sell them to entities that need more credits to cover their cap. Therefore, companies have a financial incentive to reduce emissions below their cap, as they can profit from the sale of credits.

As such, in many ways the term “environmental crime” is misleading. Although criminal prosecution is a component of environmental regulation and enforcement, the use of cooperative strategies and significant reliance on administrative actions results in many more environmental violations than environmental crimes, an important distinction in terms of the stigma attached to the act. Some argue that this approach and other forms of “environmental deviance” on the part of the government (described below) reflect regulatory capture, or the domination of regulatory agencies by industry (Simon, 2000 ). Others suggest that the concept of regulatory capture is inadequate because it fails to explain how industry wields power to corrupt regulation and enforcement (Snider, 2010 ). Snider ( 2010 ) argues that corporate economic, political, and ideological power allows industry to shape regulation by defining itself as a legitimate stakeholder.

Despite this discussion of the “EPA approach” and its limitations, many other agencies also have responsibilities related to environmental noncompliance. For example, the Department of Energy is tasked with addressing environmental violations at nuclear energy facilities (Clifford & Edwards, 2012 ). In addition to the federal distribution of responsibilities, the EPA has also delegated the authority to enforce federal laws to many state environmental regulatory agencies. 6 In fact, the states actually conduct the bulk of environmental monitoring and enforcement (Burns et al., 2008 ; Environmental Council of the States (ECOS), 2001 ), sometimes investigating cases in collaboration with regional EPA investigators and prosecuting offenders through the State Attorney General’s office (Rivers, Dempsey, Mitchell, & Gibbs, 2015 ). Traditional police officers also play a role in environmental enforcement (Carter, 1998 ; Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). For example, state troopers are often the first to discover violations of RCRA regulations in the form of unpermitted transfer of hazardous waste on state highways (Edwards, 1996 ). Thus, although EPA is the lead agency, environmental enforcement in the United States is actually achieved through a complex array of different types of agencies at different levels of government.

The International Legal Context

Outside of the United States, other countries have similar environmental agencies and domestic legislation. For example, the legal framework of Environment and Climate Change Canada (Canada’s environmental protection agency) includes the Canadian Environmental Protection Act ( 1999 ) and the Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act ( 1985 ), both dedicated to protecting ecosystems and people from pollution and potential harm. In the United Kingdom the Environment Agency is responsible for regulating and monitoring water quality, industry and waste, conservation and ecology. On a regional scale, countries within the European Union are required to comply with over 200 pieces of legislation dedicated to the protection of the environment, with member state compliance enforced by the European Court of Justice (EU, 2014 ).

In addition to the complex patchwork of environmental enforcement in the United States and other countries, international laws, treaties, and organizations are also relevant to environmental regulation. The United Nations (UN) is the primary international organization to facilitate these treaties. When international treaties are signed by a minimum number of countries, they are supposed to be implemented in those countries via domestic law (UN, 2012 ). In the United States, for example, if a president signs these treaties, new legislation has to be introduced as a bill, passed in the House and Senate, and signed by the president (U.S. Senate, 2016 ).

There are numerous international environmental treaties. In general these treaties regulate the emission and/or international trade of a specific category of pollutants. Some of the major treaties designed to control or reduce pollution include the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, the Basel Convention on Transboundary Shipments of Hazardous Waste, the Rotterdam Convention on the Prior Informed Consent Procedure for Certain Hazardous Chemicals and Pesticides, the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Kyoto Protocol, and the Marrakech Accords.

The Montreal Protocol is designed to protect the ozone layer by phasing out the production of ozone depleting substances (UNEP, 2012 ). It includes provisions to adjust the controls on chemical substances as scientific knowledge accumulates. The Basel Convention ( 1992 ) seeks to decrease the movement of hazardous waste between nations. Reducing the transfer of hazardous waste from developed to developing nations is of particular concern (UNEP, 1992 ). The Rotterdam Convention focuses on another dimension of the hazardous waste trade; it requires exporters to use proper labeling and directions, and to inform purchasers of restrictions or bans on the substance (UNEP, 2004a ). In addition, signatory nations may ban the importation of listed chemicals. Exporting nations must also ensure that producers within their jurisdiction comply with the provisions of the Rotterdam Convention. At the manufacturing level, the Stockholm Convention (UNEP, 2004b ) aims to restrict the production and use of persistent organic pollutants, which are chemicals that persist in the environment and bioaccumulate through the food web. Under this convention, developed countries must provide financial resources and take measures to eliminate the production of intentionally and unintentionally (when feasible) produced persistent organic pollutants, as well as manage and dispose of these wastes in an appropriate manner (UNEP, 2004b ).

In addition to these treaties, a series of agreements have led to restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions responsible for global warming and climate change. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Kyoto Protocol ( 2005 ), and the Marrakech Accords have resulted in national caps on greenhouse gas emissions and a trading system (or market) in which credits for greenhouse gas emissions can be bought and sold. In other words, if countries emit more than their cap allows, they can purchase credits from other countries that emitted less than allowed. Member nations have implemented this cap and trade system by translating their caps to regulated companies through domestic legislation (Gibbs, Cassidy, & Rivers, 2013 ). These regulated entities may also engage in trading to achieve compliance.

Typology of Environmental Crimes

Environmental laws result in a variety of unique offenses that can be categorized in a number of different ways. The type of affected environment, such as air or water, can be used to categorize crimes. Many of the laws (such as the Clean Water Act or the Clean Air Act) follow this format, as they pertain to a particular type of environmental media. However, some crimes involve the simultaneous violation of multiple laws. Thus, there are circumstances when it is impossible to disentangle water pollution from soil pollution from air pollution (e.g., the dumping of toxic chemicals can contaminate soil, off-gas into the air, and eventually leach into the watershed). Alternatively, crimes can be categorized according to the type of pollutant involved, such as electronic or e-waste (i.e., broken or obsolete electronics), oil, or asbestos. Or, we can categorize a crime based on the disposal methods used, for instance dumping (toxic waste), mining, or spills. More broadly, environmental crimes can be organized by geography, such as domestic versus transnational environmental crime; or crimes committed across international borders (White, 2011 ). We will review some of the more prominent offense types, first looking specifically at water, soil, and air pollution, and then broadening to three common mechanisms of pollution, dumping, mining, and oil spills. We will finish our discussion with a brief overview of transnational crime.

Water pollution offenses can occur as a result of chemicals that passively leech into the water shed, factory effluents directly pumped into bodies of water, poorly treated sewage released into the environment, or garbage dumped into the water (e.g., FBI and Coast Guard’s 1994 “Operation Overboard” caught a cruise ship dumping waste at sea (Rebovich, 1998 )). Sometimes water contamination cases can have such a great impact that polluted areas become entirely uninhabitable. For example, a flooding incident in Times Beach, Missouri, caused such high levels of contamination due to dioxin (which was part of a spray treatment used to reduce dust on roads in the 1970s), that the EPA purchased the town and relocated the residents in 1983 (Gray & Shadbegian, 2015 ). Water pollution offenses can also have devastating and lasting impacts on local communities. For instance, in 1995 , Central Industries’ poultry rendering plant contaminated the Jackson, Mississippi, water supply with untreated wastewater (Cohen, 2012 ). Water pollution can also be tightly linked to soil pollution that occurs when toxins are released or transfer into the soil during contact with contaminated water or air.

Similarly, air pollution offenses can have detrimental effects through the release of toxins into the air, resulting in poor air quality and/or acid rain. One of the most tragic cases of air pollution involved the manufacturing of the pesticide Sevin, by Union Carbide in Bhopal, India. In 1984 a quarter of the city’s population was exposed to a toxic gas that escaped from a storage tank; approximately 5,000 people died in the first two days alone, with a final death count around 20,000 people (Varma & Varma, 2005 ). While this is an extreme case, in many urban centers people live day to day with poor air quality. Breathing polluted air, especially during exercise, can have severe adverse health impacts and reduce quality of life (Li et al., 2015 ). Incidents of extreme smog advisories highlight the potential damage of air pollution, not just to the environment, but also on daily life.

Moving beyond the type of media affected, we can categorize crime by the method. Dumping, for instance, can cause long-term harm to soil, watersheds, and air quality. For example, Hooker Electrochemical Company bought “the Love Canal,” which was dug in the early 20th century for power generation, and used it as a waste disposal site in the 1940s (Clifford & Edwards, 1998 ). The site was covered over in the 1950s and homes and a school were built on top. By the 1970s people began to have serious health problems (Clifford & Edwards, 1998 ). The presence of hazardous chemicals ultimately resulted in birth defects, sterility, and cancer among local residents (Seis, 2012 ). In 1978 the state deemed the site too hazardous and permanently relocated the residents (Clifford & Edwards, 1998 ).

Similar to dumping, mining can also have broad and long-term impacts. Picher Oklahoma/Tar Creek was once home to the biggest lead producing mines in the world, but due to high levels of pollution, the town was declared uninhabitable (Andrews & Masoner, 2011 ; Neuberger, Hu, Drake, & Jim, 2009 ). Similarly, Clark Fork, Montana, became a Superfund site after more than 125 years of mining and smelting had contaminated the watershed with copper, zinc, cadmium, lead, arsenic (affecting the fisheries in 21,000 km of rivers) (Moore & Luoma, 1990 ). Thus, the long-term impacts of multimedia pollution caused by irresponsible mining can not only destroy local economies, but can also create conditions unsupportive of human life.

Oil spills can also have broad and lasting impacts, particularly on marine life and the fishing industry. Some of the most notable oil spills include the Santa Barbara oil spill ( 1969 ) and the 1995 Russian oil spill (Everson, 2012 ). In addition, in 1989 the Exxon Valdez spilled 11 million gallons of crude oil in Prince William Sound, resulting in a criminal and civil settlement of $1.125 billion (U.S. dollars) (Cohen, 2012 ). The spill continued to have documented impacts on wildlife in the Prince William Sound for over 10 years (Peterson et al., 2003 ). Recently, the BP Deepwater Horizon explosion in the Gulf of Mexico killed 11 workers and spilled an estimated 53,000–62,000 barrels of oil (Seis, 2012 ).

In addition to these domestic cases, environmental crimes can also be transnational. Transnational environmental crime has been broadly defined as an act that is against the law, crosses international borders, and results in an environmental crime (White, 2013a ). Further defining transnational crime is challenging, as academics disagree as to what bodies of law are relevant. Elliott ( 2012 ) argues that any movement of wastes across borders in contravention of international agreements or domestic laws represents transnational environmental crime, whereas enforcement organizations rely on criminal laws to define transnational environmental crimes. However, because not all acts that cause harm to the environment are illegal, some green criminologists argue that harms should also be included in transnational crime (White, 2011 ). Regardless, these crimes often involve sophisticated networks and opportunistic traders who take advantage of ports where surveillance and enforcement are lax, and frequently take complex routes through multiple countries to avoid detection (Elliott, 2012 ).

It is important to understand these crimes for several reasons. Some trade statistics and seizure data suggest that transnational environmental crime is increasing (United Nations Environment Program and INTERPOL, 2016 ). In addition to this potential growth, transnational crimes can be considered especially egregious because they reflect the global imbalance of power, with unscrupulous offenders taking advantage of less developed countries with weak environmental laws or corrupt enforcement systems (White, 2011 ). This can lead to the improper disposal of hazardous chemicals in vulnerable developing countries (White, 2011 ). For example, in 1986 a ship, Khian Sea , containing toxic ash with heavy metals, left Philadelphia. After sailing for 2 years, 11 countries had refused to take the contents of the ship, so they eventually dumped their cargo in Haiti and between Singapore and the Suez Canal (Klenovšek & Meško, 2010 ). In a similar 2006 incident, the Trafigura dumped 600 tons of caustic soda and petroleum residue around the capital city of the Ivory Coast (White, 2008a , 2011 ). The ship, originating in the Netherlands, had been rejected by multiple countries before being covertly unloaded in the middle of the night by a disposal company named “Tommy,” which was formed for the sole purpose of disposing of the ship’s waste (White, 2008a , 2011 ). This crime involved a number of actors from different countries; the ship was built in Korea, owned by Greeks, registered in Panama, and manned by a crew of Russians (Klenovšek & Meško, 2010 ).

The growth of the technology industry and the need to dispose of ever-growing amounts of discarded, broken, or obsolete electronics (e-waste) also produces various forms of transnational environmental crime (Gibbs, McGarrell, Axelrod, & Rivers, 2011 ). Issues have been raised about the movement of waste products, and their improper disposal. For example, in Jinghai County, Northern China (a hub for e-waste disposal) links have been made between e-waste disposal and poor human health, such as genetic mutations (Liu et al., 2009 ). The study of e-waste is further complicated by the fact that multiple types of offenders (described below) are involved in the interface between legal and illegal e-waste disposal (Bisschop, 2012 ).

Typology of Environmental Criminals/Offenders 7

Environmental offenses may be committed by a variety of different types of offenders. Though the law recognizes offender types to differing degrees that vary by jurisdiction, the environmental offender profile is markedly diverse. Differences in the characteristics of various types of offenders can be quite unique. Therefore, understanding the differences is key to not only describing the crime, but also developing crime prevention strategies. Building on the work of Situ & Emmons ( 2000 ), offenders can be grouped into a five-category typology: individuals, groups, governments, businesses, and state-corporate crime.

Individual/Personal Offenders

Individual, or “personal” offenders, refers to those who commit environmental crimes outside of their workplace (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). These individuals rarely have criminal backgrounds, and in many cases do not believe that they are committing a crime, especially when there is little social stigma attached to their actions (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). In regard to pollution, “household crimes” and “recreation crimes” are linked to individual environmental offenders (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). The specific actions that constitute household crimes vary by jurisdiction, but may include: dumping paint and other chemicals down the drain; improper disposal of batteries, electronic devices, or appliances; illegally piping home sewage into waterways; or ignoring drought limits on water use (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). This category may also include illegally dumping tires (Clifford, 1998 ) or crimes committed through recreational activities, such as failing to remove waste while camping (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ).

Group Offenders

When two or more individuals jointly commit an environmental crime, they are considered group offenders, a category that can be further subdivided based on the characteristics of the group and how the offense is carried out (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). Informal groups or networks generally associate over a short period of time, during which the group utilizes their collective skills to take advantage of criminal opportunities (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). When there is no longer an advantage to their association, the group will disband (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). For example, two men in West Virginia were attempting to steal anhydrous ammonia from a mining waste-water treatment center to make methamphetamine, when they split a theft-prevention valve cover and caused 2,500 pounds of toxic anhydrous ammonia to leak into the air. Upon being caught they were charged with a violation of the U.S. CAA ( District of West Virginia vs. Workman, Brown, Hudnall, & Tucker , 2013 ).

Additional research suggests that more elaborate networks are also involved in environmental crime. In reference to wildlife crime, White ( 2016 , p. 92) states that moving specific commodities around the globe requires “an integrated network that links the point of origin to the point of sale, even though the gatherers/producers and consumers/clients may be disparate and unconnected” (see also Ayling, 2013 ). More generally, transnational environmental crimes include smaller crimes (e.g., smuggling, corruption, fraud, tax evasion, money laundering) that occur through complex transactions between informal networks across multiple geographic boundaries (Elliott, 2012 ; White, 2016 ). In addition, academics, government officials, and non-governmental organizations report “multi-commodity smuggling” in which traffickers use the same trade routes to illegally move drugs and wildlife (South & Wyatt, 2011 ). Although the specific nature of networks involved in the illicit trade in pollutants or wastes are not well understood (see, e.g., Gibbs et al., 2011 ), given what is required for these crimes to occur, more complex networks or interconnected nodes are likely involved.

In addition to these informal groups, more traditional organized crime groups have also been implicated for environmental offending. These organized groups are formed for the purpose of financial profit and have a hierarchy structured around restricted membership (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ); they use force (or the threat of force), coercive measures, and corruption in the pursuit of their goals (Finckenauer, 2005 ). This is exemplified by the Naples, Italy, Garbage Crisis, where the city contracted criminal entities (through “favors”) to properly dispose of the city’s garbage, but the waste was instead illegally buried or exported (Ruggiero & South, 2010 ). Recent reports suggest that organized crime participation in transnational environmental crimes is growing, but acknowledge that the data on this point are problematic (United Nations Environment Program and INTERPOL, 2016 ).

Business Related

Business-related crimes can also be divided into multiple categories, including corporate (organizational crimes), occupational crimes, and small business crimes. Organizational or corporate crimes are committed in the pursuit of organizational goals by employees on behalf of the corporation (Braithwaite, 1985 ). Occupational crimes are unique, as they are committed in the employees own self-interest rather than on behalf of the corporation or the business (Clinard & Quinney, 1973 ). These individuals exploit their position, and commit crimes in order to gain personally through financial rewards or career advancement (Clinard & Quinney, 1973 ). For example, an employee could offer to falsify auto emissions certifications for customers in exchange for personal bribes. Although often overlooked in discussions of environmental offenders, small businesses can also be a source of environmental crime (Clifford, 1998 ). Anecdotal examples of small business environmental crimes from regulatory personnel include the illegal disposal of waste from vehicle oil change facilities and the dumping of chemicals from dry cleaners. This category of business-related offenders might also engage in illegal tire disposal (Clifford, 1998 ).

Governments

Governmental environmental crime can at first glance seem counterintuitive, as the government is supposed to enforce the laws. However, there are circumstances where governmental organizations do not comply with, or fail to enforce the law, thereby causing environmental harm. For example, there have been numerous incidents of municipal waste treatment plants illegally dumping untreated sewage into lakes and rivers (Clifford & Edwards, 2012 ). Similarly, governmental bodies are often responsible for the improper disposal of trash resulting in contaminated soil and toxic gas emissions (Clifford & Edwards, 2012 ).

Yet, the government is fairly protected from prosecution through domestic legislation and the lack of an international governing body with unrestricted legal authority. Theoretically, governments may be held accountable by international law, but on the global scale these laws can be difficult to enforce, particularly if countries are not signatories to a convention, or have not ratified these conventions into law (UN, 2012 ). Realistically, the UN authority to address government environmental crimes is limited unless the government agrees to participate in the process (Seis, 2012 ). In addition, Article 3 of the U.S. Constitution states that one federal agency cannot sue another (Seis, 2012 ).

However, the EPA can prosecute individuals within federal agencies who fail to act despite knowledge of violations (Clifford & Edwards, 2012 ). In addition, several environmental laws (e.g., CAA, CWA) include provisions for citizen suits against the government ( https://www.epa.gov/noi ). States may also sue federal EPA. For example, in Massachusetts v. EPA , several states and cities filed suit against EPA for failure to regulate greenhouse gases under the CAA (Greenhouse, 2007 ). Conversely, 26 states have since sued EPA to block new regulations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the energy sector known as the Clean Power Plan (Meyer, 2016 ). Finally, federal EPA may hold states and municipalities accountable for failure to comply with federal legislation (Clifford & Edwards, 2012 ).

Despite these provisions, discussions of government environmental crime suggest that actual prosecution is rare (Clifford & Edwards, 2012 ; Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). As such, academics disagree regarding how to approach this category of offenders. Some argue from the strict-legalist perspective that an act should only be studied as government crime if a law is broken (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). Others take a broader perspective, arguing that the government is responsible for protecting people from harm, therefore any act which puts people at risk is considered criminal regardless of prosecution (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ).

Within this broader perspective, governmental environmental crimes can be divided into two categories: acts of commission and acts of omission (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). Acts of commission involve participation in an activity that results in harm. For example, Rocky Flats military defense facility, which manufactured nuclear warheads, dumped toxic waste and released radioactive material into the air (the government defense contractor involved pleaded guilty to five felony charges and was charged $18.5 million) (Lipsett, 1998 ). Acts of omission include knowingly failing to prevent the occurrence of an environmental harm (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). For example, a contractor in the town of Walkerton, Canada, failed to properly test and treat the drinking water, resulting in 2,000 people becoming ill and seven deaths (Holme, 2003 ).

The recent water crisis in Flint, Michigan, spans these two forms of government crime, as it included both acts of omission and commission. Residents of Flint were exposed to lead through their drinking water after a state-appointed emergency manager changed the city’s primary water source from Lake Huron to the Flint River without adequate preparation to address the corrosivity of the water. The water corroded public and private lead service lines and plumbing, resulting in lead contaminated drinking water. The Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (and later the U.S. EPA) and the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services failed to adequately enforce drinking water regulations and protect human health, but also actively sought to discredit community member and academic claims regarding the water problem (Flint Water Advisory Task Force, 2016 ). This example reflects the human health implications of failure to comply with environmental regulations. Given the racial and economic composition of Flint, it also represents a clear instance of environmental injustice (Flint Water Advisory Task Force, 2016 ).

State-Corporate Crime

The concept of state-corporate crime is consistent with the notion of government crimes, but uniquely highlights the connection between governments and the corporate sector in the production of harm (Michalowski & Kramer, 2006 ). State-corporate crime is defined as “illegal or socially injurious actions that result from a mutually reinforcing interaction between (1) policies and/or practices in pursuit of the goals of one or more institutions of political governance, and (2) policies and/or practices in pursuit of the goals of one or more institutions of economic production and distribution” (Michalowski & Kramer, 2006 , p. 15). Kramer and Michalowski ( 2012 ) have argued, for example, that the confluence of political and economic power has limited greenhouse gas regulations in the United States. Tombs and Whyte ( 2015 ) also describe this symbiotic and interdependent relationship between corporations and the state. Coupled with the inherently destructive nature of the corporation, “a-social, irresponsible outcomes” are inevitable (26). The authors envision a new economy that excludes the corporate form, to be achieved by attacking the legal basis for corporate power (e.g., the legal personhood of corporations) (Tombs & Whyte, 2015 ).

Theoretical Perspectives

The vast and complex nature of environmental crime obliges scholars to take a number of theoretical approaches. These theories are tied to differing ideas regarding how to conceptualize environmental problems. For example, some have used legal codes to define environmental crimes as a violation of statutes designed to protect the ecological and physical environment (Clifford & Edwards, 1998 ; Shover & Routhe, 2005 ). Domestic legislation and/or international treaties are then used to further identify specific types of environmental crime. Most scholars include administrative or civil “violations” or “noncompliance” as forms of environmental crime in addition to cases prosecuted under criminal law.

Studies using legal definitions of environmental crime often draw upon preexisting theoretical frameworks in criminology to understand this form of crime. As summarized in Table 2 , scholars have used deterrence theory to examine whether the severity and certainty of government sanctions reduce environmental offending (Gray & Shimshack, 2011 ). Through the subjective expected utility theory, others have elaborated on rational choice theory to understand environmental offending (Paternoster & Simpson, 1996 ). Rational choice theory presumes that although not perfect decision makers, people generally weigh the costs and benefits of various behavioral options and choose the course of action that has the most personal benefit (Clarke & Cornish, 1985 ). Extensions of rational choice to corporate environmental crime have examined how managers consider the costs and benefits to themselves and the company to make decisions (Simpson, 2002 ).

Others integrate concepts and theories from the business literature to further expand understanding of corporate environmental behavior. For example, Rorie ( 2015 ) integrates the social license theory with the subjective expected utility theory. The social license theory states that corporate managers are influenced by licenses to operate, including the legal, economic, and social license (Thornton et al., 2003 ). These licenses emerge from regulators, economic constraints, and the community/activists. The level of facility responsiveness to the licenses depends on the dominant environmental management style (Thornton et al., 2003 ). Other business scholars argue that corporate offending is related to motivation, opportunity, and choice. Factors external and internal to the organization (e.g., pressure for profit) can create motivation as well as opportunity. Ultimately, how managers choose to respond to those factors is shaped by whether effective controls exist (McKendall & Wagner, 1997 ).

In addition to theories of environmental crime, scholars have also developed perspectives on compliance and overcompliance (e.g., polluting less than legally allowed) with environmental regulations. Scholars have suggested that the worldviews of environmental managers (e.g., the social license theory), individual norms, or corporate culture might produce these outcomes. For example, Vandenbergh ( 2003 ) developed a typology of individual norms of compliance to understand why individual managers make decisions to comply. Others have theorized that corporate citizenship, or the degree to which firm culture promotes a broader commitment to society, may explain overcompliance (Gibbs, 2012 ).

Table 2. Theories of Corporate Environmental Crime/Compliance/Overcompliance.

Scholars have also developed theoretical perspectives on how to improve environmental regulation, as summarized in Table 3 . For example, Smart Regulation highlights the importance of combining multiple regulatory instruments (e.g., command-and-control regulation, economic incentives, certifications) and multiple “regulators” (e.g., third parties, self-regulation) with government intervention. Single interventions are unlikely to succeed, as each type of policy has weaknesses. Instead, complementary methods of addressing problems must be used concurrently such that one instrument compensates for the weaknesses of another (and vice versa). Smart Regulation requires flexibility, as solutions must be tailored to address the specific problem at hand (Gunningham & Grabosky, 2004 ).

The New Environmental Governance (NEG) offers strategies for producing this type of governance system (Holley, Gunningham, & Shearing, 2011 ). Like Smart Regulation, the NEG also advocates the use of broader policy response, focusing primarily on methods to draw upon third parties to facilitate collective responses to environmental problems. This framework advocates a set of principles designed to bring regulated entities (or stakeholders involved in a non-regulated issue) together with the general public to develop and implement creative policy interventions. These private, public and non-government stakeholders are involved in a participatory process in which dialogue and deliberation are used to construct flexible, inclusive and transparent solutions through consensus building (Holley, Gunningham, & Shearing, 2011 ). “This enterprise involves collaboration between a diversity of private, public and non-government stakeholders who, acting together towards commonly agreed (or mutually negotiated) goals, hope to achieve far more collectively, than individually” (Gunningham, 2009 , p. 203). Further, although NEG typically seeks to incorporate local expertise and context into local solutions, discussions of integrating governance between different scales to address larger-scale problems are underway. For example, many local decision-making groups may operate as an interdependent system (Holley, Gunningham, & Shearing, 2011 ).

Table 3. Theories of Regulatory Governance.

However, the use of strict and socio-legalist definitions of environmental crime and related interventions have been criticized for failing to recognize the impact of power on environmental law (see, e.g., Halsey, 2004 ). To address this problem (i.e., that many activities that threaten the environment are legal), some argue that scholars should study environmental harms (e.g., Lynch, 1990 ; White, 2008a ). For example, Herbig and Joubert ( 2006 ) defined conservation crime as “any intentional or negligent human activity or manipulation that impacts negatively on the earth’s biotic and/or abiotic natural resources, resulting in immediately noticeable or indiscernible (only noticeable over time) natural resource trauma of any magnitude” (p. 96). Despite the use of this broader definition of environmental harm, many scholars still use the term “crime” to describe these behaviors to convey the seriousness of legal activities that harm the environment. The theoretical frameworks associated with this approach are summarized in Table 4 .

The initial research on environmental harms drew upon critical perspectives that identify power differentials and inequalities as the primary driver of environmental harm (Lynch, 1990 ; White, 2008 ). These scholars have used ecocentric approaches to define activities that have “identifiable environmental damage” (Lynch & Stretesky, 2003 , p. 227). Consistent with this critical and political approach, this area of study was coined as “green criminology.” Early green criminologists argued for the study of harms to and regulation of the environment of wildlife to understand the influence of power dynamics on environmental destruction (Lynch, 1990 ). Green criminologists have since introduced more specific theoretical perspectives, such as political economy theories (e.g., ecological Marxism, treadmill of production) (Lynch et al., 2013 ). For example, the “treadmill of production” theory argues that environmental problems in modern societies are inevitable due to the reliance on continued economic growth through production and consumption (Schnaiberg, 1980 ). Continued growth drives resource extraction and pollution and the model predicts that environmental problems cannot be solved without radical alteration of the system of growth, production, and consumption (Schnaiberg, 1980 ).

Other critical perspectives have also been used to define and study environmental harm. For example, ecofeminism explores the similarities between harm to the environment and the patriarchal injustices experienced by women (e.g., Lane, 1998 ). Environmental racism/justice examines the imbalance of environmental harm across socioeconomic and racial divides (e.g., Bullard, 1999 ). Shifting away from the anthropomorphic perspective that prioritizes impacts on people, the Deep Ecology approach instead argues that nature and its complex systems should be the focus of inquiry (Naess, 1973 ). Scholars in this tradition have suggested a variety of solutions to environmental destruction, including a return to a hunter-gatherer society (Shepard, 1998 ) and allowing famine, disease, and conflict to reduce the human population (Ehrlich, 1968 ). State-corporate crime, or the notion that the symbiotic and interdependent relationship between the state and corporations is responsible for environmental harm, is also a critical perspective (Kramer & Michalowski, 2012 ; Tombs & Whyte, 2015 ).

Overall, scholars have used various philosophical perspectives to define and explain environmental harm. However, this approach was later criticized for artificially narrowing the focus to certain causes of harm (e.g., capitalism or population growth) and ignoring others (White, 2008a ). Each perspective also limits the potential solutions (e.g., overthrow capitalism; limit human population growth) without acknowledging that the solution may vary by problem and context (for further detail, see Gibbs, Gore, McGarrell, & Rivers, 2010 ; White, 2008a ).

Recent work indicates that scholars still disagree regarding the domain of this area of inquiry and the term that best captures it. For example, broader definitions of green criminology have recently been introduced. For some, the term now encompasses any analysis of environmental harm, environmental law, or environmental regulation (White & Heckenberg, 2014 ). However, this definition has not been universally adopted. Some scholars reject the expansion of the contours of green criminology, arguing that political economy theories must be used to study environmental harms under the umbrella of green criminology (Lynch et al., 2013 ). It may also be inconsistent with the dominant approaches in the literature. In descriptions of green criminology research, scholars state that “much of this work has been directed at exposing different instances of substantive social and ecological injustice. It has also involved critique of the actions of nation-states and transnational companies for fostering particular types of harm, and for failing to adequately address or regulate harmful activity” (White & Heckenberg, 2014 , p. 8). Rather than studying legally defined environmental crimes, a large portion of green criminology continues to draw upon philosophical perspectives on justice (e.g., environmental justice, ecological justice, species justice) to define activities as environmental harms (White, 2013b ). Therefore, the bulk of green criminology research uses critical perspectives and a definition of environmental harm based on a philosophical stance. Finally, other scholars disagree regarding the use of the term “green criminology” to describe all research on environmental crimes and harms. Herbig and Joubert ( 2006 ) argue that the term is problematic because it is vague and associated with specific political perspectives, which will narrow the range of relevant issues. Some have instead used the conservation criminology to describe this area of research (Gibbs et al., 2010 ; Herbig & Joubert, 2006 ). Others have suggested that the term “environmental criminology” should be reclaimed from its association with the spatial study of criminal events (White, 2008a ).

Table 4. Perspectives on Environmental Harm.

Literature review.

Empirical research on environmental crime comes from a variety of different perspectives, leading to a myriad of approaches to the topic. For the purposes of this article, we focus on the criminological and regulatory literature, as this is consistent with our emphasis on environmental crime. A portion of scholarship uses a corporate crime perspective to examine corporate violations of environmental law. Others conduct case studies of specific environmental crimes, regardless of the offender type. Additional work examines the criminal justice response to environmental crimes. Finally, other scholars have sought to develop overarching perspectives on how to approach the study of and efforts to address environmental crimes.

Understanding Environmental Crime/Harm

Taking a corporate crime approach, which assumes that the organizational context is a primary determinant of patterns of criminal activity (Braithwaite, 1985 ), some researchers have examined whether environmental violations are associated with corporate goals or structure. This work typically uses legal codes to define activities as environmental crimes. In the Sutherland ( 1949 ) tradition, scholars generally include civil and administrative violations along with cases adjudicated under criminal law as environmental crimes. This research has been conducted at the corporate level using EPA court case or violation data (McKendall & Wagner, 1997 ; Simpson, Garner, & Gibbs, 2007 ) or has incorporated the corporate context with individual-level factors by examining managerial decision making through the collection of factorial surveys (Rorie, 2015 ; Simpson et al., 2013 ). These studies sometimes combine multiple types of EPA violations (McKendall & Wagner, 1997 ) and/or multiple types of corporate crime (Simpson, 2002 ), although some focus on a single type of violation such as water violations (Gibbs, 2012 ; Simpson et al., 2013 ). Some work uses self-reports of compliance with multiple environmental laws (Wu, 2009 ). This research typically tests theoretical perspectives on corporate (environmental) crime, previously described in Table 2 .

Other researchers have illustrated theoretical perspectives using specific cases of environmental crime or harm with domestic or transnational impacts. Some of these take a legalistic approach examining environmental crimes that are in contravention of the law. For example, Uhlmann ( 2011 ) explored the legal implications and the role of the criminal justice system in the BP oil spill and the criminalization of negligence under existing legal system. Others draw on green criminology perspectives to explain instances of environmental harm, focusing less on the contravention of environmental laws, and more on ecological damage and threats to human health (White, 2008a ). For example Eman and Meško ( 2013 ) explored the environmental and human impacts of pollution in Eastern Europe, such as the Ajka aluminium factory disaster in Hungary, which released toxic waste into the surrounding environment, endangering lives and polluting rivers.

Theoretical perspectives of green criminology are also used to empirically examine the role of capitalism and the influences of political and economic factors on environmental harm, as well as the enforcement of environmental law (Lynch et al., 2013 ), using the theoretical frameworks described in Table 4 . For example, Stretesky and Lynch ( 2009 ) find that exports to the United States are positively related to national per capita CO 2 emissions from 1989 to 2003 , perhaps due to consumption practices in the United States and the movement of dirty industries from the United States to other countries. In other work, Stretesky, Long, and Lynch ( 2013 ) suggest that the state may not be able to effectively address environmental harms through sanctions, as sanctions had little impact on emissions recorded in the toxic release inventory (TRI), a voluntarily reported record of legal industrial emissions. The notion of state-corporate crime has also been used to explain the environmental harms emerging from the U.S. failure to adequately address climate change (Lynch, Burns, & Stretesky, 2010 ).

Regulation and Enforcement

Legalistic perspectives have been used more broadly to examine environmental regulation and enforcement. For example, the previously described corporate-level research examines whether environmental sanctions impact compliance (e.g., Simpson et al., 2007 ). Additional work examines the deterrent impact of sanctions on manufacturing plants (e.g., Gray & Shimshack, 2011 ). 8 Textbooks on environmental crime describe investigative approaches and techniques (Burns et al., 2008 ; Carter, 1998 ; Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). Others outline jurisdiction, perceived roles, and personnel involved in environmental enforcement at the state and federal levels (Situ & Emmons, 2000 ). Surveys of state trooper and attorney general offices have also been used to document the types of environmental crimes addressed by these agencies (Edwards, 1996 ). Scholars have also examined the impact of innovations in enforcement (i.e., intelligence-led policing on transnational environmental crimes, like e-waste (Gibbs, McGarrell, & Sullivan, 2015 ). Finally, scholars have made arguments for international environmental enforcement efforts in collaboration with multiple institutions and researchers (Pink & White, 2016 ).

In addition, a diverse group of scholars have examined the impact of alternative forms of regulation, such as self-regulation (King & Lenox, 2000 ; Stretesky, 2006 ), on compliance. Others have explored the relative impact of command-and-control versus cooperative approaches on intentions to comply with environmental laws (Simpson et al., 2013 ). In other work, researchers have examined whether and how alternative regulators can influence business compliance (Delacote, 2009 ; Grabosky, 1994 ; Nielsen & Parker, 2008 ). More broadly, the NEG creators have evaluated whether this approach to regulation is feasible and successful (Holley et al., 2011 ; Holley & Lawson, 2015 ).

Critical scholars have also examined environmental enforcement. For example, some have challenged the notion of broad environmental regulatory governance due to a lack of political will to innovate to reduce problems like e-waste (Snider, 2010 ). Other critical scholars have considered the benefits and challenges associated with a theoretical integration of “ecocide” as crime under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (Hellman, 2014 ). Hellman ( 2014 ) defines ecocide as “the mass damage, destruction to or loss of ecosystems of a given territory, whether by human agency or by other causes, to such an extent that peaceful enjoyment by the inhabitants of that territory has been severely diminished” (p. 278). Including ecocide under the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court would serve to establish environmental crimes as a crime against peace, in a similar vein to crimes against humanity or genocide (Hellman, 2014 ; Higgins, Short, & South, 2013 ).

Overarching Perspectives

In addition to the theoretical umbrella of green criminology, scholars have also developed other overarching theoretical perspectives related to environmental crime. One critical perspective, “eco-global” criminology, acknowledges the transnational nature of environmental harm, and explores issues of global injustice under the lens of ecology and justice (eco-justice) (White, 2009 , 2011 , 2013a ). White highlights the challenges posed by international research, calling for the use of culturally and politically sensitive methodological approaches to transcend geographic and social boundaries, and ensure the execution of ethical fieldwork (White, 2009 ).

Conservation Criminology represents another overarching perspective on how to study and address environmental problems. Conservation Criminology is an interdisciplinary framework to study environmental risks that occur from illegal and legal activity. The technical definition of risk is the probability of exposure multiplied by the expected consequences of the hazard if exposure occurs (Howes, 2005 ), but public perceptions of risk are also relevant (for further detail, see Gibbs et al., 2010 ). Instead of relying on subjective definitions of environmental harm, the concept of risk provides a mechanism to systematically investigate activities that impact or could impact the environment. Conservation Criminology does not advocate for a particular theoretical perspective. Instead, the framework privileges interdisciplinary approaches to understanding environmental crime and risk. Therefore, theories from multiple disciplines should be used to understand environmental risks on a case-by-case basis. In addition, strategies to reduce these legal and illegal risks can be drawn from and evaluated using a range of disciplines. This approach is meant to recognize the complexity of environmental problems and the need to bring together multiple perspectives to solve them (Gibbs et al., 2010 ).

The environmental crime literature currently covers a spectrum of environmental laws and offense and offender types using a variety of theoretical perspectives and methodologies. Some perspectives are rooted in traditional theories of crime and enforcement (e.g., deterrence theory), while others draw on critical perspectives to explain broader notions of harm (e.g., the treadmill of production). Scholars have also sought to develop new approaches to categorizing, understanding, and addressing the range of environmental crimes, harms or risks (e.g., Gibbs et al., 2010 ; White, 2013c ; White & Heckenberg, 2014 ). The literature further explores the impact of environmental crimes/harms on the global community and raises questions regarding a healthy environment as a human right (Hellman, 2014 ; Higgins, Short, & South, 2013 ).

As the world faces increased threats to the global environment, it is our hope that scholars will continue to advance knowledge regarding environmental crime using a number of different lenses and create a feedback loop between research and practice. In our view, the causes of and solutions to environmental crime will likely vary by crime type, offender, and context (see, e.g., Gibbs et al., 2010 ). As such, the diversity of perspectives and connections to policy are crucial to inform and refine potential solutions to address the complex forms of environmental crime.

Further Reading

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• Situ, Y. , & Emmons, D. (2000). Environmental crime: The criminal justice system’s role in protecting the environment . Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.
• South, N. , & Brisman, A. (Eds). (2013). Routledge international handbook of green criminology . Abingdon, U.K.: Routledge.
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1. The division of labor between the United States Environmental Protection Agency and the Fish and Wildlife Service and the organization of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Environmental and Natural Resource Division ( https://www.justice.gov/enrd/organization-chart/chart ) are largely consistent with these distinctions.

2. Poaching falls under the wildlife crime umbrella and includes the illegal removal of wildlife from its natural habitat through activities related to sport, recreation, retaliation, profit or food consumption (Muth & Bowe, 1998 ; Eliason & Dodder, 1999 , Crow et al., 2013 ; Moreto & Lemieux, 2015 ).

3. Many academics have begun to use terms generally consistent with the organization of regulation and enforcement, distinguishing “wildlife crime” and “fisheries crime” (i.e., “natural resource crimes”) from “environmental” or “pollution crime” (see e.g., Burns, Lynch, & Stretesky, 2008 ; Wellsmith, 2011 ).

4. We begin with the United States legal system to provide a detailed example and a point of comparison for other legal systems. To offer a comprehensive description of this topic, we later describe the international legal context and provide examples of environmental crimes and environmental offenders from around the globe.

5. Summary accomplishments published by the DOJ Environmental and Natural Resource Division do not distinguish between crimes committed within or outside of a business context. To the best of our knowledge, scholars have not conducted research on this topic. Therefore, we are unaware as to whether raw prosecution data could be sorted by employment status.

6. These state agencies are also responsible for implementing state environmental laws, which are required to be equally or more stringent than federal standards (Clifford & Edwards, 2012 ).

7. We note that our typology is specific to the pollution crimes discussed in this chapter. We encourage readers interested in wildlife crime to examine the offender types described by Nurse ( 2011 ), Ayling ( 2013 ) and Wyatt ( 2013 ).

8. Research from outside of criminology has focused on violations by manufacturing facilities without consideration of the larger corporate context (e.g., Gray and Shimshack, 2011 ).

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Environmental Crime and Contemporary Criminology: Making a Difference

• Published: 26 April 2019
• Volume 44 , pages 656–669, ( 2019 )

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• Matt R. Nobles 1  

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The current body of literature on the topic of environmental crime is bigger and better than ever, but the question of whether criminology/criminal justice scholars make a difference in this area is another matter entirely. This paper offers an interpretive view on the strengths and shortcomings in the sub-field of environmental crime, including discussion of the green criminology movement as well as various studies addressing criminal justice system responses to this complex phenomenon. Although this domain has grown steadily since the 1990s, our discipline must change its approach fundamentally in order to maximize the potential for impact. To this end, four major recommendations are directed to the field, along with two overarching messages: (a) environmental crime must move away from the fringes into the criminological mainstream, and (b) participation in this process is open to all motivated criminologists.

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In the spirit of disclosure, I am not unfamiliar with the subject matter. I served formerly as co-Principal Investigator on a funded project from the Environmental Protection Agency focused on developing standardized training for criminal and non-criminal investigators at the municipal and state levels, and I have co-authored peer-reviewed research on wildlife crime appearing in the top academic journal in conservation sciences (Moreto, Lemieux, & Nobles, 2016 ).

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Acknowledgements

This paper was presented as part of the Presidential Plenary at the 2018 annual meeting of the Southern Criminal Justice Association in Pensacola Beach, FL. The author gratefully acknowledges thoughtful input and patient feedback from Marv Krohn, Will Moreto, Gene Paoline, and Ráchael Powers, as well as the editorial staff from the American Journal of Criminal Justice .

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Nobles, M.R. Environmental Crime and Contemporary Criminology: Making a Difference. Am J Crim Just 44 , 656–669 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12103-019-09483-7

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Environmental Crime Research Paper

This sample environmental issues research paper on environmental crime features: 6700 words (approx. 22 pages) and a bibliography with 49 sources. Browse other research paper examples for more inspiration. If you need a thorough research paper written according to all the academic standards, you can always turn to our experienced writers for help. This is how your paper can get an A! Feel free to contact our writing service for professional assistance. We offer high-quality assignments for reasonable rates.

I. Introduction

Academic writing, editing, proofreading, and problem solving services, get 10% off with 24start discount code, ii. what is environmental crime, iii. environmental law, iv. enforcing environmental laws, a. the federal level, b. state-level environmental enforcement, c. law enforcement and the environment, d. public involvement in addressing environmental crime, v. what to expect and what’s needed with regard to environmental crime, a. scholarly attention, b. sustainability, c. enhanced enforcement efforts, d. political change and support for the environment, e. increased globalism, vi. conclusion.

Societal recognition of, and concern for, environmental issues waxes and wanes according to various factors and developments. For instance, recent concerns about global warming and increased costs of oil have contributed to enhanced societal concerns for environmental issues. Similar concern regarding oil shortages in the 1980s generated public concern for environmental issues, including the need for alternatives to fossil fuel–operated vehicles. The term environmental issues encompasses many different issues, including protection of the environment, sustainability, and environmental crimes. The last of these is the focus of this research paper.

Scientific and academic focus on environmental issues has contributed to the emergence of environmental studies as a distinct academic discipline. Such programs typically require an interdisciplinary approach to address the varied nature of environmental science. Studying environmental crime demands an interdisciplinary approach that includes fields such as biology, criminology, criminal justice, economics, sociology, chemistry, and psychology. Accordingly, criminologists have much to contribute to the study of environmental issues, primarily due to the significant occurrence of environmental crimes. Unfortunately, the study of environmental crime is in its infancy and much work remains to be completed.

Annually, far more people are killed from environmental crimes than from traditional homicides (Burns & Lynch, 2004), and millions more suffer ill effects from environmental harms. Yet, the study of environmental crime is largely absent from the criminal justice and criminology research literatures. Medical and environmental scientists, as well as sociologists, have studied various aspects of environmental harms; however, there is scant coverage of the crime- and justice-related elements of environmental harms in the research literature. Criminologists have long studied traditional, or street crimes, often at the expense of environmental crime and other white collar offenses.

Environmental harms have traditionally been recognized by much of society as simply “the costs of doing business.” Fortunately, such acts are increasingly being recognized as the crimes they are. Most attention devoted to environmental crimes highlights the direct, visible, or primary harms associated with offenses against the environment. However, the initial, or direct harms stemming from environmental crimes often signify only a small portion of the associated harms. Many environmental crimes have substantial secondary, or indirect harms that may initially go unnoticed. Accordingly, these harms are sometimes not attributed to the criminal act.

Take, for instance, the harms associated with polluting a lake. The most obvious and direct harms associated with such an act may be the death of the fish in the lake or the discoloration of the water. Consider, however, the secondary effects such as individuals consuming the contaminated fish, swimming in the dirty lake, and drinking the polluted well water located close by the lake. These secondary harms from polluting the lake, which may very well result in serious illnesses or deaths, may not appear for years. The initial disconnect between the crime and the recognizable harms will likely result in any penalties for the offense being significantly disproportionate to the associated harms.

The term environmental crime has been used somewhat loosely thus far in this research paper. The following section discusses what, specifically, constitutes environmental crime. From a legal perspective, a crime cannot occur without a related law. Accordingly, the discussion of what constitutes an environmental crime is followed by an overview of environmental law. Laws serve little purpose if they aren’t enforced; thus, the section on environmental law is followed by coverage of enforcement efforts pertaining to environmental crime. The final section of this research paper addresses several issues likely to impact the future of the environment and, specifically, environmental crime.

There are several ways to define environmental crime. From a legal perspective, one could define environmental crime as harms committed against the environment that are in violation of statutorily defined terms. Philosophers may expand this definition to include environmental harms that do not fall under legally proscribed guidelines. The varied interpretations of what specifically constitutes environmental crime generate particular challenges for many groups, including industry leaders, environmentalists, criminologists, and politicians. For the purposes of this research paper, environmental crime is defined as any act, or attempted act, committed against the environment that violates statutorily defined laws.

Environmental crime is often viewed as a form of white collar crime, particularly when considering that the actors involved in committing the illegal act often represent corporate interests. However, it is possible for individuals who don’t necessarily fit the mold of a white collar criminal, or are not committing crime on behalf of a business or corporation, to commit environmental crime. For instance, the individual who illegally disposes of his or her used car battery in a secluded area wouldn’t necessarily be considered a white collar criminal, yet he or she is certainly committing an environmental crime.

Similar to traditional crimes, environmental crime is committed by various groups and individuals in society. As noted, corporations are responsible for much environmental crime, particularly with regard to pollution and the disposal of hazardous waste. Individuals and small businesses also engage in environmental crime, for instance, when they illegally dump hazardous materials or simply engage in littering. Organized crime syndicates also engage in environmental crime, such as through illegally disposing of toxic and biohazardous materials for other enterprises.

Much crime and justice research effort and policy making are directed toward traditional crimes such as rape, robbery, burglary, and drug offenses. These and related offenses are certainly important to study and address; however, a strong argument could be made that environmental crimes are equally important. Even so, environmental crime remains understudied. Much of the discrepancy in the attention devoted to the two forms of crime (environmental crime and traditional crime) stems from the differences between the acts and the actors involved in each type. For instance, as mentioned, the harms resulting from environmental crime are often indirect. Environmental crimes also differ in that they are often committed by corporations. Further, environmental crimes differ from traditional crimes in that multiple individuals are often involved in their commission, and identifying who is responsible may be difficult. Identifying the perpetrator(s) of traditional crimes is often more easily done.

There are many other differences between environmental crimes and traditional crimes. For instance, environmental crimes are typically more multidimensional than traditional crimes. To illustrate, investigating an environmental crime requires specific skills and knowledge not often needed during investigations of traditional crimes. Environmental crimes often involve multiple victims, whereas traditional crimes typically involve one offender and one victim. Further, environmental crimes are often committed outside of the public’s view. For example, the public may be unaware that a factory is producing an illegal level of pollution. Finally, environmental crimes differ from traditional crimes in the legal responses they generate. For instance, environmental crimes are often considered civil matters that result in financial penalties, while traditional crimes are processed in criminal courts. In sum, environmental crime is different from traditional crimes in many ways, yet the two types of crime are similar in that they both pose notable threats to society and are responsible for substantial harms. Perhaps most critical to any discussion of environmental crime are the legal aspects associated with harming the environment.

Significant legislation targeted toward environmental crime didn’t emerge until the latter half of the 20th century. Increased societal concern for the environment in the 1960s and 1970s generated major pieces of legislation designed to address environmental crime. Former President Richard Nixon, through executive order, created the federal-level Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 1970. Prior to that date, there was scant societal attention directed toward environmental crimes and few sanctions available to address them. In other words, formal regulation of environmental crime existed in piecemeal fashion prior to 1970. The creation of the EPA generally coincided with a series of significant laws targeted at environmental crime.

Environmental laws are often complex given the atypical nature of environmental crime, the toxicity involved in many of the offenses, and the difficulty of translating scientific information into laws. Such laws must identify what constitutes a violation, the exposure level requirements, appropriate testing methods and equipment to be used, and the expected protocols. Further, environmental laws are often complex due to the political process in which multiple interests must be served. Particularly, legislators must consider the interests of industry, the public, and various interest groups. Adding to the complexity of environmental law is overlap among jurisdictions (e.g., state and federal) often associated with environmental crime, and the fact that multiple bodies of law may apply in particular situations (e.g., civil and criminal law). Finally, environmental laws are relatively new and many specifics have yet to be clarified in the courts. The laws are routinely challenged and often reinterpreted and redefined.

Among the more significant pieces of legislation regulating environmental protection are the Clean Water Act; Clean Air Act; the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act; and the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act. Discussion of the vast body of environmental law is beyond the scope of this research paper. Thus, this discussion is restricted to an overview of four pieces of major federal legislation regulating harms against the environment, with the goal of sharing the range of such laws.

The Clean Air Act was created in 1963 and amended in 1970, 1977, and 1990. Prior to passage of this act, there were no national standards regarding clean air in the United States. The legislation was designed to reduce air pollution levels through creating national, uniform standards for air quality. These standards are primarily assessed through evaluation of pollution emissions.

The Clean Water Act was originally passed as the Federal Water Pollution Control Act in 1972. The Clean Water Act (passed in 1977) was designed to prevent pollution discharges into waterways over which the federal government has constitutional authority. Further, the act was targeted to create fishable and swimmable waterways that protect marine animals and wildlife. To do so, the Clean Water Act utilizes a permit system and the designation of water quality standards.

The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), also known as the Superfund Act, provides the EPA broad powers to protect and restore the environment through requiring offenders to clean up hazardous waste sites. Under CERCLA, the EPA is permitted to take the necessary steps to protect public health and the environment with regard to hazardous waste sites that present an imminent hazard. The EPA may employ civil remedies to recover remediation costs in cases where a corporation or individual created a hazardous waste site. Provisions in CERCLA also allow the EPA to sue defendants for costs incurred by the federal government when cleanup or other remediation actions are needed.

The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) pertains to management of solid and hazardous wastes. RCRA seeks to establish a tracking system for hazardous solid waste that regulates its transport, handling, storage, and disposal. Through its provisions, the RCRA encourages reductions in solid waste via recycling and improvement in manufacturing technology, alternatives to land disposal, safe land disposal when such disposal is required, and increased state responsibility for managing solid waste disposal.

This discussion highlights only a few aspects of federal legislation pertaining to environmental protection. To be sure, there are many more pieces of federal legislation pertaining to environmental harms, and it is anticipated that there will be more to come. However, the federal government is not alone in legislating environmental protection. States create and enforce their own laws, which vary from state to state, and local governments may create specific statutes that address environmental crime. Federal environmental laws provide the legal minimums for environmental protection by which each state and municipality must abide.

Laws have little impact if they are not considered by potential or actual offenders, nor are laws necessarily effective if they are not enforced by regulating parties. Whether they be restrictions against polluting the environment or statutes regulating the transport or disposal of hazardous waste, laws provide boundaries for acceptable behavior and sometimes prescribe penalties for unacceptable behavior. Accordingly, legislation must be considered with regard to its ability to deter or dissuade criminal behavior, and the extent to which laws are enforced. Legislative bodies are continuously creating laws to protect the environment, although some interested parties would argue that more laws are needed. Of particular concern with regard to legislative actions, especially those pertaining to the environment, are the enforcement practices of regulatory and law enforcement agencies.

The existence of environmental laws dictates the need for enforcement actions. Accordingly, numerous federal law enforcement and regulatory agencies oversee environmental protection; however, environmental laws are primarily enforced by the EPA (including its regional offices spread throughout the country) and state environmental regulatory agencies. Local law enforcement agencies also have responsibility for enforcing environmental laws; however, their role has been notably limited in this area given local law enforcement’s preoccupation with traditional, or street crime.

Environmental laws are enforced in a different manner from traditional crimes. For instance, the EPA regulates industry by gathering information via industry self-monitoring, industry record keeping and reporting, inspections by government officials (most of which are announced prior to the visit, and occur infrequently), and citizen complaints. When confronting violators, the EPA engages in administrative, criminal, or civil enforcement. The enforcement process typically is initiated by the EPA gathering information and requesting the alleged violator to cease the violating behavior. No further action is taken if the violator complies. Informal negotiations between the EPA and the violator, with the goal of remedying the problem, follow should the violator fail to comply. Civil or criminal actions may be imposed if the violator fails to comply with the request. Criminal enforcement is used as a last resort and requires the cases to be turned over to the U.S. Department of Justice for prosecution. Very few environmental offenses are prosecuted in criminal court.

Enforcing environmental laws places the EPA and other agencies in a volatile, yet important position. For instance, the EPA is criticized by industry groups for impeding industrial progress, while environmentalists believe the EPA doesn’t do enough to protect the environment. Accordingly, the EPA must consider the interests of multiple groups in its enforcement practices.

The EPA performs many duties and has numerous responsibilities. Although the agency’s objectives fluctuate over time, the EPA consistently focuses on regulating air and water pollution, hazardous waste, and hazardous chemicals. Organizationally, the EPA’s national office is in Washington, D.C., and it maintains 10 regional offices throughout the country. Each regional office is responsible for the execution of EPA programs throughout the region. Most EPA employees are located in regional offices.

Given its vast charges, the EPA is particularly vulnerable to changes in society. For instance, societal changes (e.g., enhanced public concern for pollution) may dictate that varying levels of emphasis be placed on specific issues, and the agency might adjust priorities based on changing EPA administrators and presidents. The EPA has been responsible for many great achievements and has conducted impressive work in protecting the environment. Given its challenging task of representing multiple interests, however, the EPA has been criticized for having unclear agency objectives, succumbing to strong political influences, and corrupt leadership.

The EPA is the primary, but not the sole federal agency responsible for protection of the environment. Other federal agencies maintain partial jurisdiction over the environment, including the Department of Agriculture, which has authority over the National Forest Service, grasslands, and natural resources; the Department of Justice, which is responsible for prosecuting criminal cases related to the environment; the Department of Defense, which has jurisdiction over military installations, including the handling and disposition of chemical and nuclear weapons; the Department of Energy, including the Office of Environmental Management; and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which works closely with the Department of Defense concerning issues pertaining to nuclear fuel and radioactive materials/ waste.

Several other federal agencies have some level of environmental authority, including the Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Labor, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Transportation, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the Consumer Product Safety Commission, the Federal Maritime Commission, and the Federal Trade Commission. The EPA also works closely with other groups and agencies that are interested in protecting the environment, including the Council on Environmental Quality and the Department of the Interior (DOI). The EPA also works closely with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). For instance, in April 2008 the DHS and the EPA jointly hosted a 3-day conference to address high-priority technical challenges for assessing risk of exposure to pathogens.

By 1990, each U.S. state had an environmental regulatory agency charged with protecting the environment. Each state regulatory agency must address the unique challenges posed by environmental concerns in its respective state. The EPA works closely with state environmental regulatory agencies, primarily through its regional offices. This decentralized approach to environmental protection is beneficial, as each state can focus on specific environmental issues. Such decentralization, however, limits the EPA’s environmental protection efforts, as decision-making authority is dispersed among multiple levels of government.

State environmental regulatory agencies must adopt federal environmental protection standards, although they may impose more stringent regulations than those required at the federal level. As such, there exists much variation among the enforcement practices of the state regulatory bodies. Further contributing to the variation among state environmental regulatory agency practices are differing societal views of particular environmental issues, state fiscal issues, the influence of various interest groups, and the geographic distribution of particular industries and natural resources across the country. State environmental regulatory agencies provide significant protection of the environment.

Aside from state and federal environmental regulatory agencies, law enforcement agencies at all levels enforce environmental law. Historically, local law enforcement has played a limited role in environmental law enforcement, although their involvement in this area has expanded in recent years as local agencies have become increasingly aware of environmental crime. Through their routine activities such as patrolling, local law enforcement officers are aptly situated to identify and react to environmental harms. The training of local-level law enforcement officers to identify and respond to environmental crimes has been limited, and, historically, officers generally believed that environmental crimes were not worthy of their attention or were the responsibility of other agencies. However, increased concern for homeland security has encouraged local law enforcement officers to become more cognizant of issues beyond street crime, and they are increasingly being trained to detect and respond to environmental crimes.

Issues pertaining to homeland security garnered much public attention following the terrorist attacks against the United States on September 11, 2001. To some extent, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and fear surrounding the possibility of additional terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, shifted public attention away from environmental harms. In response to concerns over homeland security, local-level law enforcement agencies are tasked with the additional and substantial burden of recognizing and reacting to terrorist threats, which could distract them from dealing with environmental crimes. However, efforts toward homeland security certainly involve recognizing terrorist attacks against sites that fall under the jurisdiction of environmental protection agencies, which could lead to enhanced scrutiny of these locations. Further, terrorist threats could increase local law enforcement’s recognition of environmental harms as law enforcement agencies increase in size and officers become increasingly responsible for identifying and responding to unusual activity.

The general public performs a vital role in addressing environmental crime. Public attitudes help shape societal action, and public action typically follows enhanced societal concern for the environment. The actions may include government and industry responses to public pressure, or they can be the result of the public taking a proactive approach to environmental concerns—for instance, as recognized in the contributions of the various environmental movements in recent history.

Recent concern for environmental issues has contributed to the public becoming more responsive to environmental crimes. This is not a unique situation; for example, public attitudes toward environmental crime shifted during the 1980s when the general public became more likely to view environmental crimes as notably harmful acts and not simply the costs of doing business.

Currently, many Americans are troubled by the “greenhouse effect;” global warming; contamination of soil and water by toxic waste; maintenance of the nation’s supply of fresh water for household needs; and pollution of drinking water, rivers, lakes, and reservoirs. Some of this concern undoubtedly stems from Nobel Peace Prize–winner Al Gore’s documentary An Inconvenient Truth, which highlighted the effects of environmental degradation and won an Academy Award.

Grassroots efforts have contributed much to environmental protection, particularly with regard to the detection of environmental crimes. Such efforts facilitate the prevention and resolution of environmental crime at a local level by addressing particular concerns often overlooked by corporations, politicians, and government entities such as law enforcement and regulatory agencies. Accordingly, there is a demonstrated need to confront environmental harms at the local level as opposed to the historical practice of relying on the seemingly distant federal and state agencies to confront environmental issues. Similar to the recent emphasis on community-oriented policing in which the police have greater interaction with the public and rely on citizens to assist in crime-fighting endeavors, grassroots efforts provide a vital supplement to bureaucratic state and federal regulatory efforts regarding environmental law enforcement.

The many challenges associated with addressing environmental crime undoubtedly hamper efforts to protect the public. For instance, consider that regulatory agencies are primarily responsible for enforcing environmental laws, and the penalties associated with committing environmental crime are arguably ineffective as a form of deterrence, rehabilitation, or retribution. The approach taken by regulatory agencies in response to environmental crime largely contrasts with approaches to dealing with traditional crimes (i.e., regulation versus prosecution).

Societal concerns regarding oil prices and global warming have encouraged citizens to become more environmentally conscious. Increasing oil costs have resulted in large SUVs becoming less visible on U.S. roadways and automakers developing alternatives to fossil-fueled vehicles. Recycling efforts are popular, as evidenced for instance in the marketing strategies of numerous large corporations who wish to appeal to environmentally friendly consumers. These and related developments bode well for the future of the environment.

Continuous protection of the environment, particularly through addressing environmental crime, is dependent upon many factors. The following addresses several issues of consideration with regard to effective environmental protection, with an emphasis on addressing environmental crime. While not a comprehensive list, these items will undoubtedly have significant impacts on environmental protection, including the prevention, detection, and enforcement of environmental crimes.

Traditional crimes are highlighted by the media in news reports, on television, and in movies. Media coverage of environmental crime is much less obvious in society. For instance, empirical research on environmental crime doesn’t go back much further than the mid-1980s and early 1990s, as there were few empirical studies of environmental crimes prior to this time. Such skewed coverage of crime distorts public perceptions regarding the nature, seriousness, and frequency of both environmental and street crime. Increased research focus on environmental crime, including responses to such offenses, will presumably contribute to more effective regulation of the environment.

From a research perspective, the study of environmental crime is seemingly overshadowed by issues of conventional crime. To address this limitation, additional research on environmental crime could, among other things, assess the applicability of theoretical explanations of crime with regard to environmental offenses; identify challenges environmental crimes pose to the criminal justice system (e.g., evidence collection procedures, jurisdictional issues, etc.); highlight the harms associated with environmental crime; and observe the impact of particular sanctions imposed on environmental crime offenders. To be sure, environmental crime is an understudied, yet important area of focus.

The dearth of environmental crime research can be attributable to a historical lack of data available to researchers. In other words, there is little historical research in this area simply because researchers struggled to obtain data. Accordingly, it is important that useful environmental crime and related data be collected and made available to researchers to analyze and possibly impact policy practices. The EPA and other environmental regulatory agencies have made substantial progress in disseminating data that can be used to study environmental crime.

Arguably, researchers can no longer cite the lack of data as a reason for neglecting the study of environmental crime. Researchers suggest that the EPA and state environmental regulatory agencies should continue their current data collection process and provide more detailed and helpful information. Increasing the extent to which the EPA and other agencies collect data will undoubtedly require additional resources. Nevertheless, the future for the study of environmental crime seems promising, as the EPA and other environmental regulatory agencies have made considerable progress in providing data for environmental crime researchers and have offered grants and various forms of support for empirical evaluations. The increasing popularity of computer mapping programs, the continued development of academic studies/programs on environmental issues, and the ease with which environmental crime data can be collected online, among other factors, point to increased levels of environmental crime research in the years ahead.

Several obstacles could prevent enhanced levels of environmental crime research. Of particular importance is the government practice of removing “sensitive” information from public access. Concern for homeland security resulted in public agencies throughout the United States removing what were deemed sensitive documents from public access. The attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, prompted fears about additional attacks and the subsequent removal of information that could contribute to the study of environmental crime, although much information remains freely accessible. Time will tell if the heightened concern regarding terrorism continues and additional information is removed from public access.

The perpetuation of interdisciplinary studies is critical to the continued momentum of environmental crime research. The historical lack of cooperative work among researchers in various fields must be addressed if the study of environmental crime is to reach its potential. The various disciplines involved with the study of environmental crime dictate that more collaborative efforts are needed.

In simple terms, sustainability refers to the practice of continuously producing the necessities of human life with little to no harm to the environment. Sustainability, which involves substantial long-term planning, relies on effectively managing society’s material and energy needs and wants. Such management requires cooperation among various government agencies, with the goal of maximizing and replenishing natural resources. Accordingly, sustainability requires collaborative and cooperative efforts from various agencies and disciplines, and effective enforcement of environmental laws to protect against continued harms to the environment.

How can sustainability be practiced, and ultimately achieved? The answer to this question is quite complex; however, many efforts are currently underway as society moves closer to sustainable living. For instance, as mentioned earlier, recycling efforts are becoming increasingly popular. Recycling bottles, paper, and other products prevents the continued destruction of environmental resources. The manufacturing and driving of automobiles that don’t rely on fossil fuel provide additional examples. Automakers are currently seeking and increasingly producing alternatives to fossil fuel–powered vehicles in response to public demand. The use of reusable grocery sacks, as opposed to the environmentally harmful plastic bags, is another example of efforts toward sustainability, as is the effective prevention of environmental crime and enforcement of environmental laws.

“Green living,” which involves a demonstrated concern for the protection of environmental resources, is becoming more popular as society moves toward sustainable living. Much work remains for society to ensure that the necessary environmental resources will be available for future generations. Nevertheless, current concerns for sustainability, the enforcement of environmental laws, and every small effort individuals make toward environmental protection contribute to a more promising future.

Consider a society in which there was a notably inappropriate level of social control. For instance, imagine what it would be like if street crimes were regularly dealt with in a piecemeal fashion, and the penalty for serious crimes such as rape and robbery was a warning, or perhaps a fine that provided little deterrent to offenders. What if police patrol efforts were announced, and those caught committing serious crimes were simply granted an opportunity to discontinue their criminal behavior? Such a situation would undoubtedly generate substantial public outcry and the need for enhanced social control efforts. Why, then, has society not effectively voiced concern over environmental crime and responses to it?

Society has not voiced substantial concern about environmental crime primarily because of the differences between environmental crime and street crime. For instance, as noted earlier, environmental crime is often viewed as the “costs of doing business,” and strong political interests often shield the true effects of environmental crime from the general public. Significant enhancements are needed for the effective enforcement of environmental laws.

Such enforcement is complex, however, and involves various groups, the criminal justice system, and enhanced legislation. Citizens could contribute, for example, by voicing their concerns and helping to identify harmful practices. Law enforcement agencies could become more cognizant of, and responsive to, harmful environmental practices. Stricter laws, including the increased use of criminal penalties as opposed to civil sanctions, would contribute to the enforcement of environmental laws, and the courts could increasingly recognize and treat environmental harms as something more than “business costs.” Further, correctional agencies could focus less on incapacitating those convicted of environmental crimes and more on deterrence, rehabilitation, and punishment. Needless to say, addressing environmental crime effectively is going to take commitment on behalf of many individuals, groups, and government and industry leaders.

As noted, recent concern about terrorism and homeland security could contribute to the enhanced enforcement of environmental laws. Federal law enforcement efforts seemingly became better organized with the creation of the Department of Homeland Security, and many state, county, and local law enforcement agencies have redirected their efforts toward identifying terrorist activities. These efforts, in turn, could substantially contribute to dealing more effectively with environmental crime as law enforcement agents become increasingly involved in the day-to-day activities of citizens and businesses alike. For instance, law enforcement efforts that result in the intrusion into industry for the purposes of national security could potentially expose environmental harms, or at the very least deter violators who perceive a greater sense of vulnerability given the government’s enhanced interest in their practices.

Environmental protection in the United States is heavily dependent upon the actions of the federal government, and is particularly influenced by the president and the party affiliation of those controlling Congress. For instance, the president has substantial impact on environmental protection simply through being able to choose the administrator of the EPA. Historically, Republicans have promoted less regulation than Democrats, primarily due to Republicans maintaining greater support of industry. However, politicians are dependent on the public for votes and support, and in theory they respond to public opinion.

Environmental issues are regularly among the topics of discussion and debate in political elections, particularly those at the national level. Voters are often able to develop a better understanding of political candidates through recognizing how those who wish to be elected consider environmental issues. Those in support of environmental protection applauded former President Bill Clinton when he chose the environmentally friendly Al Gore for vice president. In contrast, those who were concerned about the environment were discouraged to see George W. Bush be elected to the presidency and even more discouraged when he chose Dick Cheney as vice president. Both Bush and Cheney have strong ties to industry, which signaled to environmentalists that they were going to be faced with numerous challenges during Bush’s presidency.

Addressing environmental crime will require much greater cooperative and collaborative efforts among countries as international commerce and more general interaction increasingly occurs. Such a change poses particular challenges to current enforcement efforts regarding domestic environmental crimes. International cooperation requires, at minimum, agreement by all involved parties that work is needed to protect the environment. Getting numerous countries with diverse cultural backgrounds and varied economic interests to agree on environmental crime prevention and resolution efforts is a daunting, albeit necessary task.

The need to consider issues beyond national boundaries is becoming popular in many countries, and global environmentalism is increasingly an area of concern. For instance, the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, South Africa, demonstrated the overall move toward global considerations of environmental issues. The summit involved a series of workshops, presentations, and exchanges between international organizations, industries, and various interest groups. Further, the fact that the EPA maintains an “Office of International Affairs” suggests that environmental concerns are not simply restricted to the United States, and the federal government recognizes the need for international efforts to protect the environment. Nevertheless, the United States, as a world leader in production and manufactured goods, faces specific challenges and maintains particular responsibilities that must be addressed with consideration given to environmental protection. Much work remains in the area of international environmentalism.

Environmental crimes continue to impact society. The significance of environmental harms, particularly with regard to public health and sustainability, is real. Much progress has been made in the short time that major environmental laws, and the EPA, have been in existence. While it is easy to draw attention to the limitations of environmental protection efforts, one must consider the progress that has taken place since 1970. Fifty years ago, there was no EPA. There were no substantial environmental laws. Environmental protection was a non-issue to many.

Now, consider the shape of the environment 50 years into the future. Is enough being done to ensure that the generations to come will not suffer the ill effects of today’s neglectful environmental practices? Continued development with regard to environmental protection will undoubtedly result in a safer, healthier environment for those who follow.

The future of environmental protection is full of hope. Progress toward a better environment demands consideration of the complexities inherent in environmental crime. For example, progress will require law enforcement and regulatory agencies to become increasingly familiar with enforcement practices related to environmental crime. Legislation will need to continuously emerge and develop, society must maintain its interest in environmental protection, and sustainability will hopefully be the status quo and not simply a buzzword. Further, researchers will need to extend beyond their academic boundaries, and countries will need to work collaboratively as expansive efforts are required for environmental protection. Anything less would be a step backward in the evolution of environmental protection and contribute to the ignorance of environmental crime.

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