Best Practices of the States of the Romano-Germanic Legal System in Countering Bankruptcy Crimes

Goal: The goal of research consists in studying the provisions of foreign criminal legislation, revealing peculiarities and regularities of the legislative design of criminal law norms, criminalizing bankruptcy crimes. Methodology: A comparative legal method was used for the analysis of foreign criminal legislation. Consideration was given to criminal legislation of the states of the Romano-Germanic legal system to provide an illustrative example: Italy, Germany and Austria. Results: When analyzing criminal legislation of selected states of the Romano-Germanic legal system in respect of the aspect of responsibility for bankruptcy crimes, it should be noted that legislative authorities use clearly repressive approach to criminal responsibility for the acts under consideration. Criminal legislations of the three states we have investigated (Germany, Italy, Austria) are characterized by criminalization of not only intentional acts resulting in bankruptcy, but also of a number of negligent crimes, which is a trend of contemporary criminal legislation of the European states of the Romano-German legal system. Responsibility for bankruptcy crimes in legal frameworks under consideration is distinguished by the perpetrator of the crime, which is special. Conclusion: the study of the states of the Romano-Germanic legal system found that they are characterized by strictly repressive approach to the issue of criminalization of socially dangerous acts involving bankruptcy. This is proved by the following factors: mainly criminal responsibility for the acts referred to above; extension of responsibility by criminalizing a large number of acts, as well as through inclusion of a number of negligent acts. © 2020, Springer Nature Switzerland AG.