A Normative Justification for Establishing State Organized Crime as an International Crime

Chapter 5 makes a theoretical argument for establishing state organized crime as an international crime. It opens with general reflections on the social function of criminalization, discusses the dynamics of international criminalization, and identifies grounds underlying the genesis of existing international crimes, suggesting that international criminalization serves the purpose of protecting specific interests. In light of this theoretical framework, it argues that state organized crime ought to be criminalized because it threatens interests that states deem worthy of protection by way of international criminalization, constituting as it does an abuse of state authority, a threat to international peace and security, a violation of internationally guaranteed human rights, and a subversion of the rule of law and of the proper functioning of interstate cooperation. This chapter also suggests that the positing of state organized crime as an international crime would fulfil an important expressive function.