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Corporate crime is prevalent and imposes enormous costs on society, yet our understanding of its antecedents remains poor, especially in relation to executive characteristics. In this study, we examine the influence of CEO childhood social class on corporate crime. Using a unique data set of CEOs at the largest US corporations, we consider CEO childhood background and develop the argument individuals raised in middle-class families have a greater disposition to commit wrongdoing within the corporations they lead. Specifically, growing up middle-class leaves a lasting status-anxiety imprint, which increases the tendency to engage in corporate crime to preserve or enhance social status. Furthermore, we show two status-anxiety-minimizing factors – Ivy League education and membership in a prominent golf club – weaken the effect of middle-class upbringing on corporate crime. Our findings suggest childhood social class has significant explanatory power for executive behavior and corporate outcomes.

The present study explores gender inequalities in the entrepreneurial landscape in Romania, based on Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) data, highlighting similarities and differences between women and men entrepreneurs. Even if the GEM reports include data on entrepreneurship since 1999, Romania has been among the participating countries only since 2007 for the Adult Population Survey (GEM, APS). Thus, to include Romania in the analysis, the data from this study were selected for nine years, namely from 2007 to 2015. Our results indicate that among Romanian men and women, similar drivers influence the odds of engagement in entrepreneurial activities relative to not being involved in businesses. For both men and women, having confidence in their knowledge and skills had the highest odds ratio values. Also, identifying opportunities proved to be positive and significant for both genders, while fear of failure had the opposite effect. Knowing other entrepreneurs can lead to great benefits generated through social exchange. Findings reveal that the external knowledge that an entrepreneur’s environment gives rise to can prove to be supportive in the discovery of opportunities and their exploitation.

In recent years, academics, policymakers and activists in a number of countries have become increasingly concerned with the needs and experiences of imprisoned mothers and their children. With a few exceptions, this research has tended to focus on single jurisdictions or on limited jurisdictional comparisons. Several common themes emerge when considering international perspectives on mothering and imprisonment, but political, social, cultural, economic and penological factors mean that these issues can play out differently in different settings. Thus, in the United Kingdom and the United States, much of the debate is around keeping mothers and babies together, whereas in many other countries the focus is on the desirability of developing realistic and practical alternatives to children growing up in the prison with their mother. International organisations such as the UNCRC have considered the particular needs of children imprisoned with their mothers and also the challenges of ‘mothering from the inside’. That said, this research has tended to focus on narrow biological and gestational definitions of motherhood which may not reflect contemporary realities. With this in mind, this chapter will outline and explore international perspectives on mothering and imprisonment, identifying key issues of commonality and difference and situating these perspectives within emerging research on imprisonment, diversity and mothering.