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Over the last decades, public and private organizations have caused major health, financial, and ecological damages. This talk explores the organizational mechanisms that allow such harm to develop and continue. 

Drawing on publicly available data from major instances of structural harm caused by public and private organizations, this talk will explore common processes of organizational toxicity. It will ponder what implications these processes have for the way organizational harm is regulated, and also what findings from across the worst case studies mean for the academic study of white collar crime, compliance and business ethics. 

It will look at organizational targets, internal communication and discussion, organizational scale, socialisation practices, PR and legal framing in response to scandals, and leadership roles in structural rule breaking.

Light refreshments will be served in the Coombs Building Tea Room (9 Fellows Road) following the seminar. If you intend to attend and partake in post-seminar refreshments, please  for catering purposes by 9am AEST, Tuesday 2 September 2025.

ÃÛÌÒÊÓƵ the speaker

 is Professor of Law and Society at the Faculty of Law, University of Amsterdam. He directs the Center for Law and Behavior, also at the University of Amsterdam. He is also a Global Professor of Law at the University of California, Irvine. He studies and teaches about the interaction between law and behavior. His past work looked at compliance, regulatory law enforcement and access to justice in China in a comparative perspective. 

COVID protocols

The ÃÛÌÒÊÓƵstrongly encourages you to keep a mask with you at all times (for use when COVID-19 safe behaviours are not practicable) and to be respectful of colleagues, students and visitors who may wish to continue to wear one. Please continue to practice good hygiene. If you are unwell, please stay home. The ACT government’s COVID Smart behaviours can be accessed .

This seminar presentation is in-person only. Registration is not required for in-person seminar attendance as neither the ÃÛÌÒÊÓƵnor ACT Health conduct contact tracing.

If you require accessibility accommodations or a visitor Personal Emergency Evacuation Plan please email regnet.communications@anu.edu.au.

Image credit: Photo of boats operating floating booms to contain burning oil spill arising from the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster, taken from U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)'s Airborne Spectralphotometric Environmental Collection Technology aircraft. As works of the U.S. federal government, all EPA images are in the public domain. Image located at .