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The paper deals with the emerging role of domestic criminal law in preventing and punishing international crimes. Twenty years after the entry into force of the International Criminal Court’s Statute and under the pressure of the war in Ukraine, Italy has recently charged an expert commission to draft the Code for international Crimes. After presenting the reasons that support such a choice, two main ideas driving the project are highlighted: adapting substantive criminal law to the Rome Statute and ensuring consistency with classical criminal law rules encompassed in the Criminal Code. The outcome, concerning the general part of criminal law, is a limited set of proposals, that are analyzed and discussed within the paper, with a special focus on the modes of liability both for individuals and corporate entities.

This paper deals with the need for a specific legal analysis, from a criminal law perspective, concerning multinational enterprises (MNEs), given their involvement in illicit conducts that transcend the territorial boundaries of any single State and generate negative effects of enormous dimensions. The topic presents a high degree of complexity in terms of territorial and material scope: indeed, MNEs face a “dilemma” between undercompliance and overcompliance, since even the most cooperative entity, honestly seeking to fulfil its legal duties, is confronted with a fragmented and uncoordinated legal and regulatory scene. The risk thus arises of setting an insufficient standard for compliance, or vice versa, making an effort that is counterproductive in terms of efficiency while being supererogatory from the legal point of view. The present analysis thus addresses how MNEs might strike the right balance in combining the different sets of regulations, first of all by fulfilling the requirements applicable in the "home country" as well as those applicable in the "host country": to do this, the need arises for an MNE to compare the legislative requirements it has to abide by under the legislation applicable to the mother company and the ones applicable to the foreign entities it controls. A further layer of complexity relates to the extensive reach of certain pieces of criminal legislation issued by “third countries,” especially concerning anticorruption policies. Moreover, other emerging elements have to be taken into account by MNEs: on the one hand, private bodies and organizations increasingly define the compliance standards, the main example being represented by the ISO standards; on the other, international or transnational soft law and hard law rules are in the process of being elaborated, as the field of human rights clearly shows. In conclusion, the analysis reveals a progressive tendency among MNEs to comply with the higher legal standards set in home countries or at the international level, instead of the lower ones provided at the local level. Yet this tendency is far from general and admits a large number of exceptions, in particular where the procedural and institutional dimensions of compliance rules are concerned.

A dieci anni dalla consacrazione, ad opera dell’art. 6, par. 1 del Trattato sull’Unione europea, della Carta dei diritti fondamentali dell’Unione europea (CDFUE) quale strumento giuridico vincolante dotato della stessa forza giuridica dei Trattati, esito questo del travagliato iter, anch’esso durato all’incirca due lustri, che aveva condotto dal vertice di Nizza ad intraprendere la strada autonomista dei diritti fondamentali, è venuto a delinearsi progressivamente un assetto delle fonti che consente – e per certi versi impone – un bilancio anche in prospettiva penalistica. Non è tanto lo scorrere del tempo a conferire rilevanza al tema, né tantomeno la ricorrenza decennale che si è avuto modo di indicare, quanto piuttosto l’innegabile circostanza che in epoca a noi molto vicina si è sviluppato un intenso dibattito a più voci intorno alla collocazione della Carta dei diritti fondamentali nel sistema delle fonti e alla sua giustiziabilità dallo specifico angolo prospettico dell’ordinamento italiano.

La Carta dei diritti fondamentali, che ha acquisito la stessa forza dei trattati dal 1° dicembre 2009, è stata oggetto in questi dieci anni di un tormentato percorso, i cui effetti vanno misurati sul terreno del diritto penale. Dopo aver generato l’aspettativa di un incremento del livello di protezione delle garanzie, essa è rimasta vittima di un certo disincanto, in larga parte riconducibile alle note vicende della ‘saga’ Taricco, letta da molti come il segnale di un arretramento pericoloso sul piano dei diritti fondamentali. Oggi, ribadita la centralità costituzionale e politico-criminale della Carta, si impone una lettura ravvicinata dei dati giurisprudenziali che emergono dalle Corti supreme. Lo scenario che si delinea, guardando alla Corte di Giustizia, si caratterizza — con l’eccezione degli strumenti del mutuo riconoscimento — per un approccio riduzionista e notevoli incertezze. Più articolato è il tracciato seguito dalla Corte Costituzionale, a far data perlomeno dal celebre obiter dictum contenuto nella sentenza n.269/2017, la quale ha stabilito che in caso di doppia pregiudizialità occorra esperire in via prioritaria la questione di legittimità costituzionale, così limitando il potere del giudice penale di dare applicazione ai diritti fondamentali di fonte eurounitaria. Tale enunciato, largamente commentato dalla dottrina giuspubblicistica, si intreccia con un crescente uso parametrico della Carta nella giurisprudenza costituzionale, la cui disamina permette tuttavia di cogliere una certa tendenza al contenimento degli effetti della stessa in ambito penalistico. Significative indicazioni di una rinnovata attenzione al tema emergono nelle più recenti pronunce della Consulta, specie nel 2019, dove si segnalano quattro importanti decisioni che segnano una reviviscenza del ruolo della Carta, forniscono una più chiara indicazione delle prerogative del giudice comune e gettano le basi per la costruzione di uno statuto garantistico dell’illecito amministrativo punitivo.

On 8 September 2015, a new chapter opened in the history of European Criminal Law as a consequence of the judgment issued by the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Justice in the Taricco case. As a background hereto, the complex series of judicial decisions that have taken place must be recalled, by stressing the role played – among others – by the Italian Constitutional Court and the European Court of Justice (I). On such a basis, a comparative overview will allow us to identify some of the essential legal dilemmas at stake by focusing on the different conceptions surrounding the legal regime of time limitation for criminal offences and the wider implications arising therefrom (II). Apart from the divergence of perspectives which arises between the Italian and European judges, the judicial saga represents a turn in the history of the so-called European Criminal Law which deserves to be analysed.

As a general rule, both individuals and firms may be subject to sanction. In order to verify which kind of persons might be investigated and sanctioned, it is necessary to refer to the particular Guidelines under which the case in question is being brought.

The first section of this chapter will be devoted to an analysis of the various legal sources governing the sanctions process. Moreover, it will be offered an evaluation of the extent to which the legal framework created by the World Bank is respectful of the principle of the rule of law. However, before conducting such an assessment, it is necessary to verify if the rule of law can, in principle, be considered as applicable to the Bank’s sanctions process.

The use of World Bank’s funds for illicit purposes, including allocations for cronyism and politically driven investments (e.g., military spending), arose as a major problem during the last 20 years. Prior to 1997, the immediate question was whether funds that governments misappropriated constituted a breach of contract as stipulated on the grounds of the Articles of Agreement. However, the World Bank officials consciously avoided any use of the word corruption. Corruption was considered an internal affair that was beyond the World Bank’s mandate. Inaction was the unfortunate consequence of such a situation. This inertia was justified on the grounds of the Articles of Agreement themselves, which specifically prohibit staff members from making lending decisions on the basis of political considerations

Public corruption and fraud are among the most important impediments to economic development. Corruption also fundamentally undermines the rule of law. Deterring bribery requires a concerted effort to punish both those who pay bribes and those who receive them. To achieve this goal, we cannot rely only on enforcement by nation-states. In addition, deterrence requires active intervention by intergovernmental organizations, such as the World Bank.

The fight against international corruption has become a primary criminal policy objective at a global level. The ‘accumulation’ of regulations highlights the growing commitment to legality and, at the same time, the development of a perspective of global control of financial illegalities by some States. In such a context, the Italian experience, centred around the adoption of the multiple reforms of art. 322-bis of the penal code, appears rather poor on applicative grounds, with just a dozen of corrupt schemes being currently prosecuted. This seems to be connected to factual data, related to the difficulty of reconstruct criminal offences at an investigative and evidentiary level, but also to legislative options, such as the choice of criminalising only some of the possible forms of corruption. Most of all, a considerable role has been played by a not always fair use of interpretative instruments, sometimes aimed at inappropriately restrict the scope of application of the criminalising norms and more often at broadening the net of penal legislation. The investigation brings us to observe that the Italian system has actually pursued an overall stiffening of the preventive and repressive strategy of ‘domestic’ corruption, using international corruption as a convenient vector with a safe legitimation and a great symbolic power.

The adoption of the World Bank sanctions process appears to be grounded on different reasons: the first being the specific Bank’s aim of protecting its own resources from possible misuses and the second corresponding to the fight against corrupt and fraudulent activities as part of the World Bank’s commitment to reduce poverty and inequality. A third factor, related to the global policy against economic crimes, has recently emerged.

Sanctions vary according to the severity of offenses and the evidence presented against respondents. They impose different costs on the concerned firms and individuals. The Bank issued Sanctioning Guidelines in order to offer guiding criteria to the SDO and the Sanctions Board. The document specifies that the guiding principles “are not meant to be prescriptive in nature, but to provide guidance to those who have the discretion to impose sanctions on behalf of the” Bank. In World Bank v Contech Devices Pvt. Ltd., the Sanctions Board clarified

Cimentarsi nuovamente con le prospettive dischiuse e i problemi posti dalla celeberrima vicenda Taricco appare davvero uno sforzo inane, sol che si ponga mente alla mole e talvolta alla profondità dei commenti che hanno accompagnato il ‘canto’ e il ‘controcanto’ delle Corti, in un crescendo che a lungo è sembrato non potersi arrestare. Tra le questioni che hanno costituito oggetto di divergenti vedute, si staglia notoriamente il ‘nodo della prescrizione’, ed in particolare il corredo di garanzie chiamate a presidiare il regime temporale di applicazione della disciplina per il caso di mutamento dei termini massimi in presenza di eventi interruttivi. Si tratta di un nodo i cui capi sono stati tesi dalla Corte di Giustizia e dalla Corte Costituzionale in direzioni contrapposte e con un vigore inconsueto, dando luogo ad un ‘groviglio’ giuridico apparso a tratti davvero inestricabile, e che ha lasciato autorevolmente dubitare della tenuta di quel pluralisme ordonné preconizzato con lungimiranza in dottrina.

Legislative decree n. 231/2001 poses on corporation the duty of adopting internal self-enacted rules of crime-risk prophylaxis, so-called organisational models. Compliant corporations can access a series of benefits that can be directly measured on a penal level – which might reach the stage of exempting from any liability – where such precautions prove adequate, that is, capable of preventing further crimes, and effectively implemented. The first part of the article aims at offering an updated and critical reconstruction of the requisite of adequacy, both from the point of view of scholarly elaboration and on the level of judicial application, thus outlining the component of preventive capability. With regard to this element, the second part of the article will analyse the realised or suggested attempts of rationalisation, all aimed at reducing the normative uncertainty about the effectively adequate model and at allowing the ‘benefit system’ to operate within the due safeguards.

Historical pollution is a problem of global significance which has tragically emerged—in different times and forms—in a number of industrial contexts. From a criminological point of view, this phenomenon, despite its variable geometry, is characterized by recurrent features. In brief, it is—wholly or partially—the result of industrial outflows of polluting substances which took place in the past or were protracted over time, usually in line with the practice followed at the time of the facts. The nature of this environmental damage makes this phenomenon different from that of one single catastrophic polluting event with historical effects. This latter aspect triggers the need for specific legal answers. In this regard, comparative analysis highlights that in several countries the main responses to historical pollution are based on a variety of compensatory and reparatory measures belonging to civil or administrative law. To the contrary, criminal law plays a rather residual and supplementary role, normally limited to situations in which the contamination is recent or still ongoing. By way of exception, only in Italy is it possible to identify a long list of judgments issued by criminal courts in cases of historical pollution, and many of these have encountered difficulties in assessing criminal liability have been critically analyzed by scholar.

Le questionnement autour de l’influence du principe de précaution sur la responsabilité juridique s’est posé, à la fois dans le discours doctrinal et dans la pratique judiciaire, au constat du renouvellement des risques de dommage que l’évolution technologique entraine pour l’environnement et le vivant. Face à une croissante demande répressive et indemnitaire provenant du corps social, la question est de savoir si le principe de précaution est à même d’engendrer un renouvellement de la responsabilité juridique, civile et pénale.Combinant une approche pluridisciplinaire et une méthode comparative, cette recherche collective a eu un double objectif. Saisir au préalable la portée et le contenu normatif du principe de précaution à travers l’étude de son appréhension par les jurisprudences internationales ainsi que les dynamiques normatives que celle-ci peut entrainer au sein et entre les différents espaces normatifs : circulation entre les différentes branches du droit international dans lesquelles le principe de précaution a vocation à être appliqué et transfert du droit international et supranational au droit national. La recherche a permis ensuite de repérer les métamorphoses que le principe de précaution est susceptible d’engendrer sur la responsabilité juridique, le terme métamorphoses désignant, à l’instar des sciences du vivant, moins le résultat que les processus de transformation de la responsabilité juridique. Et c’est précisément à partir de l’analyse de ce processus de transformation, de changement, de façonnement de ce droit « vivant » que la recherche a permis de repérer, interroger, encadrer, et définir les limites de l’influence du principe de précaution sur le droit de la responsabilité, et notamment sur les sources et la mise en œuvre de la responsabilité pénale. Dans cette perspective, elle rend compte de tous les acquis, théoriques et pratiques, dans le domaine de la responsabilité – civile et pénale – au regard de l’expérience française et comparée (Italie, Espagne, Chine et Argentine).