Since 2022 Professor Anja Matwijkiw from Indiana University in the United States has been a Scientific Coordinator for the International & European Criminal Law Observatory on Cultural Issues, Human Rights and Security (IECLO-CUHRSE) (see https://www.dsg.unisa.it/en/department/structures?id=662; https://www.ieclo.org/our-staff/). Professor Anja Matwijkiw has continuously contributed to the legal and multidisciplinary network based at the Department of Legal Sciences (DSG) of the University of Salerno (UNISA), Italy. In particular, the Observatory aims to enhance the resources, skills, and expertise of the DSG and UNISA through developing scientific collaboration networks with scholars, practitioners, and institutions active in the fields of criminal law and criminal justice at the international, European, and national level to promote the fight against impunity for crimes of global concern. This mission and vision is near and dear to Professor Anja Matwijkiw’s heart, first and foremost, in the context of the United Nations and with multidisciplinary objectives and outcomes in mind. On 28 May 2025 in The Hague, Professor Anja Matwijkiw spoke on one of the topics that reveals a need for multidisciplinary approaches: grand corruption. 

“Global ethics, global law and global governance is a constellation that is as inescapable for progress as the fact that the United Nations globalization process is lacking behind when it comes to promotion of certain norms that are anchored in humanist values,” she explains. And she continues: “Concerning crimes of global concern, you see this discrepancy in the case of grand corruption. Basic human values are at stake here, but a broad notion of survival – one that includes socio-economic subsistence – is also what blocks political support, in part, because this opens for discussions about (re)distributive justice. Furthermore, there are many paradoxes. On the one hand, the legal literature contains examples of scholars who view bindingness as a concept that transcends the legal expression of norms per se. But concessions to substantive morality may then be paired with a fear of a Big Bang effect and subsequent norm-inflation – and so we get either little or no traction for ‘positive peace’ – a term Dr. Bronik Matwijkiw has traced back to Johan Galtung’s 1969 project on state-sponsored terrorism or structural violence (see https://brill.com/view/journals/icla/aop/article-10.1163-15718123-bja10198/article-10.1163-15718123-bja10198.xml). At the same time, contemporary legal scholars may oppose power politics and call for respect for jus cogens as a matter of principle. But what good is ‘principle’ in circumstances where kleptocracies, captured states, and representatives of authoritarian capitalism who drain the wealth of their own nation’s citizens are at the negotiation table, a predicament Transparency International also has mentioned in connection with grand corruption as a crime (see https://www.transparency.org/en/blog/ungass-2021-ignores-grand-corruption-elephant-but-creates-pathway-improvement-international-framework). These systems are paradigms of grand corruption. They pursue their own narrow interest at the expense of all the values involved in democracy and good governance, but they also differ from the standard realist challenge because their reasoning does not depend on considerations about available resources as a basis for claims to respect positive norms. Instead, they intentionally inflict fundamentally unfair (dis)advantages that are objectively avoidable. The resources are available, but rerouted to benefit the few.

The United Nations has policy instruments in place that accommodate “equitable relations” and “all human rights,” just as the global Organization can be credited with innovative and synergetic values like “food security,” and for that matter, ideas about a shared responsibility of all nations in the case of poverty eradication. From the perspective of humanistic and global ethics, the United Nations link between anti-corruption and poverty eradication and, even more broadly, sustainable development could be an important tool for effective altruism, a position that prioritizes effective use of resources. This type of global ethics does not guarantee the required solidarity in international relations, though.

Existing international core crimes like apartheid provide us with a “way in” if we want to discuss structurally determined corruption, that is, grand corruption. However, it is not good enough to confirm the 2006 findings of scholars like Hennie Van Vureen, that ”racist nationalism is as vulnerable to corruption as most systems of authoritarian rule” (see https://www.files.ethz.ch/isn/123917/2006_05_29.pdf) or, for that matter, talk about “gender apartheid” as an emerging crime that affects women and girls.  We need to understand all the facets of deprivation and oppression that puts the controlled at the mercy of unethical controllers – and unfortunately there are many myths about regimes and corruption. As I see things, the Scandinavian welfare state belongs on the list of corrupt systems. E.g., in Denmark people are often “placed” in accordance with an emphasis on Danishness as a measurement, but countries like Denmark nevertheless score high(est) on the Corruption Perceptions Index. This assessment is not the result of asking ordinary people. This is one reason why Professor Anja Matwijkiw thinks the first step forward is not a legal definition of grand corruption (although that is a must too), but instead it is to understand the phenomenon in all its facets so the institutional and structural “filters” are exposed. United Nations statements like “Inequality is not inevitable” may be far too sweeping. 

Professor Anja Matwijkiw’s presentation on multidisciplinary ideas for an analysis of grand corruption in the context of global ethics, global law and global governance was delivered for an audience of around 60 people at the XII Ibero-American Week of International Justice in The Hague (see https://www.iberoamericaninstituteofthehague.org/; https://www.iberoamericaninstituteofthehague.org/attachments/article/223/2025%20Programa%20de%20la%20XII%20Semana%20Iberoamericana%20de%20la%20Justicia%20Internacional.pdf). Professor Anja Matwijkiw, who is also a 2024-2025 Indiana University Presidential Art and Humanities Fellow, joined a panel of speakers from South and North America as well as Europe. On the photo, she is depicted together with the President of the Ibero-American Institute Professor Hector Olasolo (on the far right), Professor María Elena Baquedano, Dr. Laura Bono, Dr. Ricardo Abello, and Dr. Bronik Matwijkiw – who have contributed to a comprehensive research network and study that commenced in 2020 (see https://www.iberoamericaninstituteofthehague.org/formacion-e-investigacion/red-de-investigacion-respuestas-a-la-corrupcion-asociada-al-crimen-transnacional-organizado). The moderator for the panel Tatiana Sra. Bachbarova is not in the photo.