한국의 공무원범죄 추세분석, 1964-2005

Public Official Crime in Korea, 1964-2005

  The purpose of the present study is to examine the trend of public official crime in Korea during the past four decades. Public official crime statistics reflect not only the amount of crimes committed by public officials but also the outcome of crime control activities of criminal justice processes. Results from the analyses revealed that public official crime arrests increased dramatically druing the first or second year after new presidents were inaugurated. Specifically, during Kim Young-sam and Kim Dae-jung administrations we witnessed an explosion of public official crime rate, which was comparable to a substantially lower rate during Roh Moo-hyun administration and others. On the other hand, statistics for disciplinary actions against public officials were disproportionately higher in the late 1970s and early 1980s. It was also found that during the era of growing crime rate it was lesser serious crimes rather than serious ones that mostly contributed to the explosion. Comparisons of crime rates among central and local governments and by officials" ranks showed that crime rates of local government officials were generally higher than their counterparts. And lower-ranks officials of the central government tended to commit more crimes while a disproportionately higher crime rates were found among mid-rank local government officials. The theoretical implications of the growth and decline of public official crime and its control activities were discussed.