Criminal law targets the poor while tort law disciplines the wealthy
Evidence
In this neoliberal perspective, there is also a natural stratification in what classes of law are applicable to different scofflaws: “the criminal law is designed primarily for the nonaffluent; the affluent are kept in line, for the most part, by tort law.” In other words, economic competition imposes natural order on the rich, because they have so much to lose. The poor need to be kept in line by a strong state, because they have so little to lose. Hence, the spectacle of (as yet) no major financial figure outside of Bernie Madoff and Raj Rajnarathan going to jail because of the crisis, while thousands of families behind on their mortgages are turfed out into the street by the constabulary, is a direct consequence of this neoliberal precept. — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 180
Categorization
- QUESTION: Is there empirical work quantifying how much of post-2008 mortgage foreclosures vs. financial prosecutions traces to this ideational split, versus other factors?
- XREF: connects to: Formal legal equality masks substantive inequality between rich and poor; The penal apparatus morally reeducated the poor into legalism — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 436; Law and morality are distinguished by the type of punishment attached — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular:…, 1150 (+2 more)
Broader Connections
- The law prosecuted lower-class crime while sparing refined upper-class spoliation
#corroborates(0.92) — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 572 - Formal legal equality masks substantive inequality between rich and poor
#expands(0.90) - Formal legal equality obscures real inequality because equivalence as a legal norm ignores difference
#expands(0.90) — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 786 - Law and morality are distinguished by the type of punishment attached
#expands(0.78) — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular, 1150 - The penal apparatus morally reeducated the poor into legalism
#complicates(0.75) — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 436