Abstract
This article contributes a critical study of efforts to internationalize the investigation and prosecution of corruption. The efforts to internationalize anticorruption enforcement are visible, for instance, in calls for an International Anticorruption Court (IACC) or an Anticorruption Protocol to the United Nations Convention against Corruption (APUNCAC). Inspired by a historical sociological perspective, this article investigates mobilizations around these initiatives, how mobilizers frame their engagement, and the ideological context in which they operate. In particular, the article zooms in on elites and how they push for states to internationalize the investigation and prosecution of corruption. This article situates the efforts of these elites in a larger historical context and compares the push to internationalize anticorruption enforcement to earlier legal mobilizations in the field of international criminal justice focused on atrocity crimes.
Highlights
The analysis seeks to identify the roots of the current push to internationalize anticorruption enforcement and draw distinctions, in comparison with legal mobilizations around international criminal law focused on atrocity crimes
The push to internationalize anticorruption enforcement often copied the legal formats and injustice frames employed by activists to mobilize international action regarding core crimes
While some of these frames were employed for nearly a century, they gained political support through concurrent mobilizations by activists, politicians and academics to build consensus around the International Criminal Court (ICC) and similar institutions
Summary
In addition to its effects on the state and its institutions, corruption is likely to impact the relation between states, and have effects at the international and even global level (Elliott 1997; Rotberg 2009). A range of agents mobilized to internationalize anticorruption enforcement These agents pointed to the internationalization of enforcement as necessary for dealing with the perceived transnational effects of corruption and potential impact on international relations, peace and security. The push to internationalize the investigation and prosecution of corruption occurs in a context characterized by a very different legal and political ideology when compared to the push to internationalize the enforcement of atrocity crimes that accelerated in the 1990s. I analyze international enforcement efforts against core crimes and mobilizations against corruption, focusing on the agents, patterns of mobilization and legal framing. The conclusion outlines the main differences and similarities between the two patterns of mobilization and points to the broader implications of the analysis
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