Understanding effects of corruption on law enforcement and environmental crime

The document examines the symbiotic relationship between corruption and environmental crime, arguing that corruption acts as a 'door-opener' for illegal activities and renders law enforcement an unreliable tool for conservation. It highlights how corrupt incentives lead to biased enforcement targeting low-level offenders while protecting powerful actors, and suggests that practitioners use risk analysis and extra-territorial legislation to mitigate these effects.

• Corruption facilitates environmental crime by acting as a "door-opener," enabling violators to bypass laws through bribes for timber concessions, fisheries quotas, hunting licenses, and the manipulation of environmental impact studies.
• Corruption leads to selective and biased law enforcement, where resources are directed toward low-level crimes—such as poaching or transportation violations—because they provide easier opportunities for officers to extort bribes, while high-level illegal actors who can pay are avoided.
• Political interference and corrupt interests can obstruct the suppression of illegal activities by causing the loss of evidence during case preparation or influencing judicial verdicts and punishments.
• Corruption can be embedded into the legal framework itself, resulting in biased laws that penalize minority groups more severely or creating systems of political control based on patron-client networks.
• Because natural resource corruption often crosses national borders, the document recommends using extra-territorial legislation, such as the UK’s Bribery Act, the US Lacey Act, or the US Foreign and Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), as alternatives for prosecution.

APA

Williams, D. A. (2019). Understanding effects of corruption on law enforcement and environmental crime. WWF International. https://www.worldwildlife.org/documents/757/77iwoqmh90_Introductory_Overview_Understanding_the_effects_of_corruption_on_la_vD34ePi.pdf

Chicago

Williams, David Aled. Understanding effects of corruption on law enforcement and environmental crime. WWF International, 2019. https://www.worldwildlife.org/documents/757/77iwoqmh90_Introductory_Overview_Understanding_the_effects_of_corruption_on_la_vD34ePi.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Williams |first1=David Aled |title=Understanding effects of corruption on law enforcement and environmental crime |publisher=WWF International |date=December 2019 |url=https://www.worldwildlife.org/documents/757/77iwoqmh90_Introductory_Overview_Understanding_the_effects_of_corruption_on_la_vD34ePi.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{williams2019understanding, author = {Williams, David Aled}, title = {{Understanding effects of corruption on law enforcement and environmental crime}}, institution = {WWF International}, year = {2019}, month = dec, url = {https://www.worldwildlife.org/documents/757/77iwoqmh90_Introductory_Overview_Understanding_the_effects_of_corruption_on_la_vD34ePi.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }