Abstract

At the onset of the twenty-first century, egregious criminality by elite status offenders in the corporate milieu has emerged, with significant social and victim impact. Due to the lack of pertinent empirical data, the study of white-collar crime has been relatively more focused on the type of offense rather than the offender. This paper develops a theoretical model, founded on sociological and criminological literature and critically complemented by the principles of Catholic social thought, to understand elite white-collar criminality. We establish that the incentive structure is very different at the elite level than in lower social-economic levels of society. Specifically, we address the significance of socio-cultural influences on the corporate economic environment, assessed with interpretative insight supplied by Catholic social principles, to provide a distinctive view of elite white-collar offenders, with further research and policy implications.