Sanctions for Legal Entities in South American and European Systems of Corporate Criminal Liability

Abstract

The analysis of the sanctions for corporate criminal liability is conducted in a comparative perspective on two-fold level and scope. In the first place, we will consider the sanctions adopted in South-American jurisdictions which have introduced such system, especially in the last twenty years, based on the UN instruments to contrast transnational organised crime and corruption. Then, we will move to a parallel overview of the sanctions of EU jurisdictions. The analysis highlights analogies and differences both between the national systems from both contexts and between the two groups of jurisdictions. Overall, a process of ‘weak harmonisation’ is traced between the considered systems of corporate liability. Finally, we will draw some recommendations for further normative interventions aimed at advancing the common front of sanctions for corporate crimes, which is increasingly useful in the light of the extension and pervasiveness of their action.