Hypotheses on the causes of financial crime

Historian G.M Trevelyan (2005) said that the rebellions of 1848 constituted a turning point at which history failed to turn. The same can be said of the 2007-2008 financial collapse. The crash defied the ideology of market self-regulation, proving that the doctrines around the efficient distribution of goods can cause calamitous consequences. And yet financial business carried on as usual, and ‘none of the leading bankers whose fraudulent products caused the economy to crash went to jail; criminal prosecution took a back seat to the stability of the system.’ (Kuttner, 2018: 62). This paper examines the aftermath of the crisis, it attempts to identify a range of causes that determined it and are likely to trigger similar events in the future. The analytical tradition established by the study of white-collar crime provides the background for such an examination, which also avails itself of some conceptualizations derived from classical economic thought