Making a case for the extension of the International Criminal Court’s jurisdiction to include corporations: A critical evaluation into the potential and suitability of the ICC & Rome Statute to encompass “Corporate Criminal Responsibility”
McInern, Chantelle
McInern, Chantelle
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Publication Date
2022
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journal article
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McInern, Chantelle. (2022). Making a case for the extension of the International Criminal Court’s jurisdiction to include corporations: A critical evaluation into the potential and suitability of the ICC & Rome Statute to encompass “Corporate Criminal Responsibility”. University of Galway Law Review, 1, 53-67.
Abstract
Corporate Criminal Responsibility (CCR) is a contentious creature. The international economy, through globalisation and privatisation, has undergone extensive amplification within the last few decades, triggering a remarkable by-product; the ascension of the modern corporation. Such corporations have exorbitantly expanded to become major components of the international community, wielding exceptional financial power, political influence and economic force that trumps the resources of some states.1 Despite this unprecedented magnification of corporate competence, sufficient international criminal restraints have failed to develop alongside its growth, leaving the revitalised corporation at liberty to yield its forces to do global good, by propelling economic development, or bad, by committing gross infringements against International Criminal Law’s (ICL) most sacrosanct protections. This legal lacuna has enabled corporations, as a collective, to contribute to grave international atrocities from pillaging resources to financing armed conflict, with relative impunity. Therefore, this essay undertakes a critical evaluation into the potential jurisdictional expansion of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to encompass CCR through its Rome Statute (RS),2 two decades after its rejection at the Rome Conference.3 Furthermore, it will investigate the ICC’s institutional suitability to enforce CCR both conceptually and functionally, before concluding on whether, and if so, how, the “juridical person”4 should be encompassed within the RS to fulfil the Court’s “progressive purpose”5 of preventing and punishing international crimes that “threaten the peace, security and wellbeing of the world”6 , of which corporations may, now, be capable.
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University of Galway
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Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International