Criminality and Business Strategy: Similarities and Differences
explores what can be learned from criminal organizations on four
continents based on comparisons of their historical and cultural
origins, chosen governance and power structures, and business models. It
discusses how these contexts determined their applications of the
principles and practice of effective, but amoral leadership, and whether
these lessons can be applied to legitimate business enterprises.
In this book John Zinkin and Chris Bennett argue that defining a "crime"
is a contested issue and that criminality can be viewed as a spectrum,
comprising a range of different types of crimes, the harms caused, and
the variety of punishments involved. They discuss the critical role of
the state in determining where criminality is perceived to sit on the
crime continuum.
The authors delve into how the state and organized crime are natural
competitors, and how organized crime and legitimate businesses are
subject to many of the same internal and external strategic
considerations. They contend that the resulting similarities between
criminality in organized criminal organizations and legitimate
businesses are greater than the differences and that the differences are
only in degree and not in kind.
This thought-provoking study of criminality will be of immense interest
to professionals, coaches, consultants, and academics interested in the
techniques and ethics of leadership. The book is, in effect, the result
of an intellectual journey of the authors from the ideas presented in
their earlier book, The Principles and Practice of Effective
Leadership, to the issues in this book discussing important, difficult,
and contested subjects. The journey continues in their third book: The
Challenge in Leading Ethical and Successful Organizations.
