The state or government refers to those institutions that rule over a society. The modern state comprises institutions that are responsible for making and codifying law — the legislature; the executive — which is responsible for the effective implementation of the laws and policies passed by the legislature; and the judiciary — which is responsible for adjudication in the event that laws are violated.
The fields that are conventionally responsible for the study of the state are political science and political sociology. Political science deals with understanding different systems of government and with the description and analysis of political thought and behaviour. Political sociology, on the other hand, focuses on the study of the relations between the state and society. Political sociologists ask questions such as “What factors contribute to the decline in voter turnout?” or “How does ethnicity affect voter behaviour?”
In general, both political science and political sociology as fields of study are highly influenced by the notion of legitimacy. Legitimacy refers to the acceptance and right of the authority of a government. When an authority is said to be legitimate, it means that it is seen to have the right to exercise power. Legitimacy is a basic requirement for smooth and efficient governance. Indeed, the lack of political legitimacy would mean that the government would have to resort to force and coercion. Governments that lack legitimacy are often widely unpopular with the people and are only able to survive because they are considered legitimate by a small, influential elite, or power is based on force and intimidation rather than authority.
A ruler who relies on authority generally uses his qualities of leadership and his ability to persuade and influence others. It is on that basis that he has authority. If the ruler lacks legitimacy, he would have to rely instead on the application of coercion, force and power. When there is legitimate authority, the ruler feels that he has the right to rule, while the ruled feel that they have an obligation to abide by the law or obey the ruler.
The fields of political science and political sociology generally developed in the context of political developments in the advanced industrialised West, where states are widely seen to be legitimate and to exercise legitimate authority. The basic vocabulary of these fields — constitution, limits of power, separation of powers, checks and balances, leadership, influence, lobbying and so on — reflect the idea of legitimacy.
But, the conduct of the state in many Third World countries is not such that there is widespread perception on the part of the citizens that the state is legitimate. Such states often resort to coercion and force rather than rule through leadership, persuasion and influence. The lack of legitimacy is often due to the fact and perception that the state is involved in criminal activities. An example is the kleptocratic state.
In his pioneering work, The African Predicament, published in 1968, sociologist Stanislav Andreski describes how corruption was so pervasive in African states such that “politics becomes a strictly money-making activity”. Politics was basically the only game in town. Politicians and bureaucrats were the main accumulators of capital rather than the private sector. They accumulated capital through corrupt practices involving bribery, extortion and nepotism. Such a polity was defined by Andreski as a kleptocracy. Kleptocracy is a system of government defined by corruption.
Although Andreski wrote decades ago about kleptocracy, it is only more recently that this type of polity has received serious attention. Of note is the US Department of Justice’s Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Initiative. This is tasked with identifying and seizing foreign assets held by corrupt foreign leaders in the US.
Last year, the DoJ filed a civil forfeiture complaint against assets that it alleged had been bought with money stolen from the sovereign wealth fund, 1Malaysia Development Bhd. The DoJ claimed that more than US$3.5 billion was misappropriated from the fund. It filed the 144-page complaint in federal court in Los Angeles targeting about US$1 billion in assets located in the US, the UK and Switzerland. The assets include mansions and penthouses, a US$35 million executive jet and artwork.
The DoJ claimed the assets are “traceable to an international conspiracy to launder money misappropriated from 1MDB”. This is said to be the biggest forfeiture action since the Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Initiative was set up by the DoJ in 2010.
Criminology is the scientific study of crime, including its nature, causes, consequences and methods of prevention. It looks at criminal behaviour at both the individual and societal levels. The field of criminology recognises the state or government as a criminal actor.
Ronald Kramer, Ray Michalowski and Dawn Rothe, in their article — The Supreme International Crime: How the US War in Iraq Threatens the Rule of War, published in the journal Social Justice in 2005 — define state crime as “any action that violates public international law, international criminal law or domestic law when these actions are committed by individuals acting in official or covert capacity as agents of the state pursuant to expressed or implied orders of the state, or resulting from state failure to exercise due diligence over the actions of its agents”.
The field of criminology is very useful for the study of the kleptocratic or other kinds of criminal states. Criminological theories would help us to understand various facets of the kleptocratic state.
For example, one explanation for the criminal behaviour of state officials is the strain put on the individual’s behaviour due to the gap between socially accepted norms and social reality. In most societies, material success is highly valued. The accepted means of achieving such success is diligence, discipline and hard work. Most people conform to both the dominant values as well as the means to realise these values. Such people would adjust their expectations were they not able to achieve a certain level of material success. Kleptocrats, on the other hand, are so focused on success that they resort to illegal means and criminal activities such as bribery, nepotism and extortion to achieve their goals.
Criminology also tells us that kleptocrats may engage in the elaborate rationalisation of their criminal activities. They do this to make their activities seem normal, correct or even laudable in the eyes of the people. They may deny that their acts amount to corrupt practices and claim that those acts benefit the state and society. They also often condemn those who judge them. Such rationalisation also functions to clear the conscience of kleptocrats.
A survey of states around the world would reveal that state criminality covers various types of activities, including corruption, warmongering, idealistic and material support for terrorism and the violation of human rights. To the extent that such criminal activities dominate and define our governments, it is vital that scholars study the state from the perspective of criminology in order to not just understand the criminal state but also to create public awareness and outrage.
Syed Farid Alatas is Head of the Department of Malay Studies and Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at the National University of Singapore
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