ELITE DEVIANCE SIMON D. Księgarnia

Elite Deviance

ISBN 0-205-27643-1 382pp

Preface

As this sixth edition of Elite Deviance goes to press. President Clinton is fighting the third sexual scandal of his political career. The so-called "zippergate scandal" is an example of elite deviance. The scandal is steeped in myths, cover-ups, and excuses that were created by both Clinton defenders and detractors.

These myths tell us as more about the corrupt state of American culture than they do about the truth of what happened.

Myth: The Clinton sex scandal is an aberration. Most American scandals are about abuses of power, not sex. When sex becomes an issue, usually the Democrats are involved. When money is an issue, it's usually a Republican doing.

Fact: Both political parties have a long history of sexual scandals among their members. The key factor operating here is not sex or money, but the relationship between sexual scandals and all other abuses of power. Anyone in a position of authority who takes up with any underling is, almost by definition, abusing a basic form of power-the power to hire and fire.

Myth: What politicians do in their private lives is unrelated to the performances of their jobs.

Fact: A review of the record reveals that the vast majority of politicians accused of sexual misconduct also misbehave in other areas, including in their public careers. In the post-Watergate, post-Chappaquiddick era, tattling on elites, including politicians, has become a cultural obsession. As a result, politicians clearly put their careers at risk and endanger their chances for their party's future success by engaging in reckless sexual behavior or by committing perjury or obstruction of justice in order to cover it up.

• Myth: Sexual scandals are only about sex.

Fact: The line between sex, status, power, and money in this most materialistic of cultures grows blurrier by the day. Ms. Lewinsky has already been offered $2 million by Penthouse for her photos and story. Many other women involved in political and sexual scandals with the wealthy and powerful have posed naked in men's magazines, written books, or starred in movies or nightclub acts as a result of the incidents that made them famous. This includes Elizabeth Ray, former congressional spouse Rita Jenrette, prostitutes visited by televangelist Jimmy Swaggart and actor Hugh Grant. The sex scandal industry is a cottage industry in contemporary democratic societies. Women with a modicum of intelligence are well aware of the possibilities offered by sexual encounters with the rich and famous, and the Clinton sex scandal is no different.

Given America's cultural contradictions concerning sexual goings on, its constant craving for knowledge of the "backstage" behavior of the powerful, rich, and famous, and the media's werewolflike yearnings to make profitable commodities out of everything and anything, the sex scandal business can only continue to grow.

Trashy and tragic as it may sometimes become, sexual news is an economic mainstay of mass media journalism and advertising and symbolizes the degree to which sexual scandal is now popular culture. Given satellite TV news, tabloid journalism, the sexual scandalization of politics is probably in the infancy of a new era of tell all, see all, and sell all sexual scandals.

For years there has been a question of whether the deviance taking place in the private lives of elites also constituted elite deviance. My answer has always been-absolutely, if such deviance becomes public knowledge. "Zipper-gate" is only the most recent example of this phenomenon. Further discussion of sexual scandals is contained in David R. Simon and Frank Hagan's, White-Collar Deviance (Allyn and Bacon, 1999), which, when used along with this book, provides a more complete picture of the scope of contemporary white-collar wrongdoing.

ELITE DEVIANCE AND THE NEW MILLENIUM

This sixth edition of Elite Deviance appears at the dawn of a new millenium, an era characterized by new global realities. The global nature of elite deviance and its consequences are noted throughout this edition.

Chapter 1 introduces readers to both the concept of elite deviance and a description of the environment in which these acts of great harm take place. Within the United States as well as globally, the distribution of power and wealth are becoming ever more concentrated, making it more and more difficult to exercise any control over what elites do.

Chapter 2 presents the higher immorality-an institutionalized set of deviant practices that are now global in scope. This is especially true of elite cooperation with global crime syndicates involved in the $850 billion global narcotics trade and the vast amount of money laundered by legitimate financial institutions, lawyers, and other elite professionals.

Chapters 3 and 4 discuss the contemporary nature of corporate deviance. The $260 billion price tag and hundreds of thousands of lives taken by global corporate crime make this form of deviance one of the world's most serious social problems. Add to these figures the pollution and resource depletion that are a result of global mass consumption and the gravity of these practices becomes truly immense.

Chapter 5 is devoted to various types of global elite deviance. International arms smuggling, the dumping of toxic wastes and selling products banned for sale in the United States because of their toxic nature constitutes yet another scandal. The chapter also contains an examination of human rights violations by regimes receiving U.S. foreign and military aid.

Chapters 6, 7, and 9 detail the nature of modem graft and corruption. Scandal in our era has become an institutionalized feature of America's power elite, one, as noted, with global ramifications.

Chapter 8 contains an analysis of the causes of elite deviance, and argues that a genuine sociological theory of such deviance must account for causal factors on the macro, immediate milieu, and individual levels of analysis. The chapter discusses how these various causes interrelate, as well as how elite deviance is interrelated with other types of wrongdoing.

Finally, the epilogue examines the types of policy changes viewed as necessary for the reduction of elite deviance. This section also contains solid suggestions for becoming more informed about and involved in the struggle against the social injustices embodied in elite deviance.

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czy wybrany tytuł polskojęzyczny lub anglojęzyczny jest aktualnie na półce księgarni.