ABSTRACT

There is evidence that economic fraud has, in recent years, become routine activity in the economies of both high- and low-income countries. Many business sectors in today's global economy are rife with economic crime.

Neoliberalism and the Moral Economy of Fraud shows how neoliberal policies, reforms, ideas, social relations and practices have engendered a type of sociocultural change across the globe which is facilitating widespread fraud. This book investigates the moral worlds of fraud in different social and geographical settings, and shows how contemporary fraud is not the outcome of just a few ‘bad apples’. Authors from a range of disciplines including sociology, anthropology and political science, social policy and economics, employ case studies from the Global North and Global South to explore how particular values, morals and standards of behaviour rendered dominant by neoliberalism are encouraging the proliferation of fraud.

This book will be indispensable for those who are interested in political economy, development studies, economics, anthropology, sociology and criminology.

chapter |13 pages

‘After' the crisis

Morality plays and the renewal of business as usual

chapter |15 pages

The moral economy of post-socialist capitalism

Professionals, rentiers and fraud

chapter |14 pages

Do they do evil?

The moral economy of tax professionals

chapter |14 pages

Genealogy, parasitism and moral economy

The case of UK supermarket growth

chapter |13 pages

Murder for gain

Commercial insurance and moralities in South Africa

chapter |15 pages

Economic freedom mis-sold

Neoliberalism and the moral economies of the PPI scandal in the UK

chapter |14 pages

Seeking God's blessings

Pentecostal religious discourses, pyramidal schemes and money scams in the southeast of Benin Republic

chapter |14 pages

Producing moral ambiguity

State illegality, economic growth and norm change in Argentina's sweatshop business

chapter |16 pages

Public good for private gain

Public sector reform, bureaucrats, and discourses of moral accountability in post-socialist Central Europe

chapter |15 pages

Fraudulent values

Materialistic bosses and the support for bribery and tax evasion