Money laundering counter-measures in the European Union : a new paradigm of security governance versus fundamental legal principles

The past fifteen years witnessed the emergence globally of a plethora of legislative measures aimed at countering money laundering. These developments have been inextricably linked with the growing international focus on newly perceived and/or prioritized global security threats such as organized crime and terrorism with money laundering counter-measures deemed essential to counter these threats. Taking these developments into account, this book examines in detail the evolution and content of money laundering counter-measures in the European Union. These measures constitute a new paradigm of security governance, achieved through three principal methods: criminalization, consisting in the emergence of new criminal offences; responsibilisation, consisting in the mobilization of the private sector to co-operate with the authorities in the fight against money laundering; and the emphasis on the administration of knowledge, through the establishment of new institutions, the financial intelligence units, with extensive powers to administer a wide range of information provided by the private sector. This paradigm may pose significant challenges to fundamental legal principles and to well-established social structures and the book attempts to address this balance. This up-to-date analysis includes the provisions of the new EU money-laundering Directive which was formally adopted in December 2001.